Posted originally on the Archive_of_Our_Own at https://archiveofourown.org/
works/12440409.
  Rating:
      Explicit
  Archive Warning:
      Graphic_Depictions_Of_Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
  Category:
      M/M
  Fandom:
      Supernatural
  Relationship:
      Castiel/Dean_Winchester
  Character:
      Castiel_(Supernatural), Dean_Winchester, Sam_Winchester, Bobby_Singer,
      Benny_Lafitte, Gabriel_(Supernatural)
  Additional Tags:
      Alternate_Universe_-_Dystopia, Parallel_Universes, Multiple_Worlds,
      Switch_Dean, Switch_Cas, Anal_Sex, Frottage, Implied/Referenced_Underage
      Sex, Pining_Dean, Hurt_Castiel, Police_Officer_Dean, Bisexual_Dean
      Winchester, Angst, Imprisonment, Sexual_Abuse, Angels, Demons, Slavery,
      Violence, Misunderstandings, BAMF_Castiel_(Supernatural), Slow_Burn,
      Rimming, Blow_Jobs, Barebacking, Somnophilia, Eventual_Happy_Ending
  Collections:
      DCBB_2017_(official)
  Stats:
      Published: 2017-11-06 Chapters: 19/19 Words: 86727
****** The Doppler Bridge ******
by AnonAnton
Summary
     Two hundred years ago, a catastrophic explosion had just ended a war.
     On another world an angel stepped through the newly created wall of
     heat haze filling his horizon. The angel was flung from world to
     world, losing his power and sanity until he landed back on his
     planet, his broken body and cracked mind beginning another war. This
     war would last centuries, cross worlds, and converge on an unknowing
     Earth. An Earth that is in disarray. Climate change has altered the
     planet beyond recognition. Rain falls constantly, the sun never
     shines and the Government has given up, focusing instead on the
     worlds beyond their own.
     -
     Dean Winchester, Police Officer third class, is tired of his life. He
     is directionless, fed up of living on his father’s terms, but unsure
     and unable to choose his own way. That is, until a bleeding, broken
     and battered man is all but dropped at his feet, giving him something
     to care about.
     Castiel, tortured and raped, has a mission. And he can’t do it alone.
     After nearly a lifetime of without a friend or ally, knowing only
     pain, can he learn to trust the one friend that is thrust upon him in
     time?
***** Chapter 1 *****
Chapter Notes
     The Doppler Bridge has been a story of mine in the running for almost
     a year now. I started writing this back in November 2016 for my first
     Nanowrimo and I'm now publishing it for my first DCBB, 2017. I have a
     huge number of people to thank for this, including everyone who
     cheered me on, who let me know they were interested in it, who
     reblogged the promo post... it goes on! Frankly, I'm amazed to get to
     the point of finishing this, and finishing it to a standard that I'm
     happy to publish too. In fairness, I still think it has a little way
     to go... But, it's done sufficiently for now. I hope you enjoy it.
     I need to thank a few people by name. I do apologise if I've missed
     anyone. After a year, I honestly can't remember who's done me the
     honour of helping. The first, and foremost, as ever, is the wonderful
     Shannon_kind. Without this superstar this fic would be the ramblings
     of an idiot. My second beta , Northenhearts, did me a spectacular
     job, and I can't thank her enough either. My dad too, although I'm
     yet to implement his suggestions, deserves a mention too. Lastly,
     Unforth, although she may not know it, helped me a lot in the very
     start with answering my random questions.
     On to the art. I am seriously bowled over by the astounding drawings
     the legend of Cenedrariva has created for me. I can't get over how
     amazingly she has rendered what I had in my head. They are truly
     perfect. You have my eternal love for these!
     I just hope you enjoy this story. I would be honoured to hear your
     thoughts both here and on my_Tumblr.
[Doppler Bridge title by Cenedra Riva]
There was nothing but blackness; cloying, thick and heavy.
A hissing broke the blackness in half, the sound new, echoing and weak—getting
louder. It became a drum roll—barbaric, agonising in its intensity—until it was
broken by a guttural noise, a groan, a sob, a whine. Then that too was
shattered by an unnatural screaming wailing.
Pain spread through him in great belting waves, from lightning stabbing at his
temples to the bone-deep ache in his lower back. The pain brought him back to
himself, the blackness no longer encompassing. He drifted; simply feeling, for
long moments. He allowed each wave and peak of pain to hit him, just flowing
with it, listening to the never ending pattering sound, familiar and yet
foreign. Rain. Rain on nothing but stone.
Castiel flinched as glaring, blinding light filtered through a tiny crack
between his eyelids. He coughed out a groan in protest, but forced his eyes
open further, blinking away the rain. He lay on the cold hard ground, pain
rolling up and down his right side, rain dripping down his face. The light held
no warmth—was not be the sun—too cold, too white.
His vision pitched and spun as Castiel tried to fix his gaze on a point other
than the light. Nausea rose quickly, but he managed to ascertain that, despite
the white glow in the sky, all else was dark. In front of him the ground was
gray, dark and pitted, embedded with tiny stones and pieces of shale. The
grayness continued as far as he could see—the dark swallowing up everything but
the glistening redness thrown up by the rain in the bleak glow of the strange
light.
It was overwhelming—there was too much. He allowed himself to sink into half
hidden memories. Flashes of color, whirling and broken, blackness and light—
Even that was too much, and Castiel let it all fade away.
-
Castiel awoke to the pain. It emanated from almost the entirety of his right
side. Shoulder, hip, leg, wrist and elbow. Castiel knew now that he must have
fallen to the ground on his right side; the scratching pain simply the
annoyance of grazes, open and sore with the pressure of his weight on them.
With that knowledge, he could block the pain from his mind. He had done
thatbefore. The dull, residual pain around his wrists and ankles was similarly
easy to ignore, just like the throbbing in his behind. With understanding came
the ability to set it aside. It was not important.
That left him with the brewing, pulsing, brain-shaking agony within his head,
and the jarring stabbing from his ear—pain the equal of his worst nightmares.
Each rain drop hitting him sent shock waves of hurt directly to the core of his
brain. He tried to drift, to forget, to feel nothing, and found himself
wondering where he was. He knew he had arrived in the right place generally. He
could feelit. But specifically? That eluded him.
It was a stench that brought back his train of thought and had him wrinkling
his nose in distaste. Taste too had returned in a rancid flood.
He could smell the rain; infected, sour, riddled with dust, grit, and grime.
From the ground rose the aroma of waste, death, and other things he had never
experienced before. Something stank akin to the hot tang of lava. He could not
name all the myriad scents within the miasma. There was simply too much, too
little known.
His mouth tasted sour too, like the air, but metallic. Foul with old blood.
He had no strength to spit, that screaming pain from his ear unrelenting and
locking his jaw anyway. He simply opened his lips a little, just a crack, and
allowed his tainted saliva to dribble out. Even that action was enough to tire
him. His throat was dry and he needed to cough, relieve a tickle lodged there,
but the reflex was beyond him.
He closed his eyes and concentrated on the breaths entering and leaving his
lungs through his open mouth. At least he could breathe here, he thought,
despite the rancid taste clinging insidiously to his tongue. Some of the places
he had passed through on his tumbling journey had barely been capable of
supporting him, full of burning ash and noxious smells.
With those thoughts vivid in his memories, he focused on the now rhythmic
movement of damp air in his chest. He could not understand the marsh-gas-like
light, nor the searing agony in his burning ear, or the unceasing rain, but he
could gratefully concentrate on his rasping breath and allow himself to be
lulled him back to temporary oblivion.
-
Cloud, heavy and white, tumbling, sky, ground, sky, ground, sky. Bright color,
the sun, pulsing gold, yellow, red. Green forests, bare stalks, wide still
seas, and rushing waves. Arid deserts and endless undulating hills and prairie.
Each image; a flash, too fast to grab hold of, to understand, to take in and
comprehend. His motion, uncontrolled, terrifying, unsteady, too fast.
Castiel awoke with a start and a gasp, the sudden motion arresting him, choking
him in the never ending gray darkness. Rain, cold and heavy, hitting him, then
pain. Blankness.
-
He woke once again, the rain heavier, colder. He could feel grit clinging to
his skin, flung up by the pounding raindrops, splashing his face, sticking to
his beard and eyelashes, and turning his eyes gummy. It was just another
discomfort to add to the list.
A thought crept up on him as he stared vacantly into the never ending gray—a
moment of clarity as he lay there undisturbed. The thought made his thirst-
cracked and bloody lips curve up into a smile. A blissful, terrifying,
exhilarating thought.
He was free.
He had made it.
Suddenly, he wanted to celebrate the pain burning in his ear. He wanted to
aggravate it, wanted to really feelit, to make sure it was there, to make sure
it was real.
It meant he was free.
His head still roiled and span, despite his unmoving and prone position on the
hard, filth strewn surface beneath him. He needed to move. He felt the need
with a jolt of urgency to his gut. He needed to get up and warn someone. He
needed to share what he knew—but he couldn’t. He was sotired.
Another errant thought sent a lightning fast bolt of fear through him, lighting
up his various injuries and smashing through his liquid feeling brain, sparking
every hurt he had sustained in his flight and fall.
What if they sent someone to recapture him?
Castiel needed to get to safety, he needed to hide. Beyond anything, his
health, even his life, he needed to be free, he didn't want to be a prisoner
any longer. He wasn't even certain that saving a life, a hundred lives was
worth going back to his own personal hell for.
A sob rose up from deep within his chest, painful and aching, racking his sore
body. He tried to calm himself, sucking in long slow breaths of the tainted
air. He was too broken, too damaged to cry, to lose control, to give in to the
pain and the fear. If he gave in, he would never come back to himself. He would
be lost. Utterly. He had to be strong.
He reminded himself that, in this place, he was well hidden, or so he believed.
He needed to be careful, yes, but, so long as he stayed in control he could do
what he needed to do.
He had to get up. He had to move, hide. He was hidden in only one respect. Bare
to the night, injured, cold and bleeding, he needed to find shelter. He needed
safety, he needed to heal—before he could save the world.
He sighed and closed his eyes once more.
Just one more rest, another few moments, and he would move. He would get up and
would protect himself so that he could protect this planet.
-
Dean groaned. Disapproval of everything—daylight, wakefulness, life in
general—was voiced in the guttural groan, muffled by his pillow. He rolled over
underneath his lumpy and worn blankets, grumbling out a “Noooo,” and thinking
that it was far too early to be awake, no matter what the actual time was. His
eyes were determinedly screwed shut as he refused to look at the cruel glowing
wall clock across the room. He knewit was too early, no matter what it had to
tell him.
His head ached dully, a flat pain that filled every corner of his brain,
reminding him that he hadn't stumbled through his front door until past nine in
the morning. He really hadn't drunk all that much, and his headache was
probably more exhaustion than the rough beer he’d been drinking.
He smiled grimly, glad he’d called it quits when he did. He’d left Benny, his
partner and best friend, in the bar that morning and staggered out into the
wet, grey day. Benny had been pouring a fresh drink for himself with some
giggling demon perched on his lap. Dean didn’t envy him his hangover this
afternoon—well, maybe a little, he thought, shivering a little in his empty
bed.
With a dry cough and a curse he finally levered himself up to a sitting
position and twisted in his nest of variously patterned throws, covers and
blankets, to finally glare at the time. Two thirty in the afternoon.
Not that it was much lighter than it had been at the end of his shift at four
in the morning, or when he’d left the bar at eight. As usual, the sky was
falling, the slashing rain pouring from the low, dark cloud cover, pummelling
the floor-to-ceiling glass wall at the side and end of his decrepit, ancient
apartment. The sky was about as bright as it ever managed to get; a sort of
miserable half light. On the rare occasions when the sky didn’t drop its load,
it almost seemed like the daylight that was described in books and on the
secondnet. People, in Dean's opinion, dressed like douches, wearing darkened
glasses, and stood with their hands shielding their eyes, watching the light
gray cloud scudding across the dry sky. Although, he grudgingly admitted, he’d
stared too, squinting in the unaccustomed brightness.
Things were better than they used to be, he allowed. He couldn't remember a
single day when it did not rain until he was fourteen years old. The harvest
had even been acceptable in the past few years, the grinning demon at the fish
market had told him. Nothing had actually been washed away, not enough rot to
worry about, almost green, rather than the unappealing yellow things usually
grew. Yet, still, no one had ever seen the sun.
He scowled once more at the accursed wall clock and dropped back into the heap
of always-damp blankets, throwing one over his head to block out the sight of
the miserable, rain soaked, gray building approximately eight feet from his
window and making up the entirety of the view.
“Two-fucking-thirty,” he groaned into the ugly yellow and pink knitted thing
covering his face. He had just over four and a half hours to kill before he
needed to be at work. Again.
“Fucking two-thirty.”
He rolled over, and over again, dragging the whole mess of covers with him and
landing with a grunt on the floor. The monstrosity that covered his head
finally flopped forward, allowing him a breath of the apartment’s fresher air
once more; dank, damp and cold.
His studio apartment didn't boast much storage. He didn’t need to move much to
drag clean underwear from a drawer beneath the bed. He flopped his head back on
the now bare mattress to stare at his work clothes where they lay on the two-
seater couch shoved against the cracked glass of his far wall. He knew how
filthy they were, but decided that he could probably get away with another
night before he had to wash them.
He made a little pleading noise in the back of his throat as he rolled his head
back around to look at the bare wall in front of him, disgusted at himself.
With a grunt and a snarl, he decided he really couldn't pretend he was still
asleep just because he was wrapped in his blankets, however much more his bed
appealed to him; work would be the same as ever, so would his morning routine,
as would his breakfast...
He was awake, and he needed to shower—because a constant downpour outside your
window just wasn't quite the same. And he was hungry, he suddenly realized,
tipping the scale in favor of getting up.
Sirens screamed in the distance, the noise filtering through the open window in
the corner of his apartment. By now, though, he found himself immune to the
sirens, a background noise, dampened by the rain in any case. They were almost
soothing.
He pushed himself to his feet, stumbling a little as the pile of blankets
tangled themselves around him. Cursing, he kicked them across the room before
sighing and throwing them back on the bed, his knees popping as he bent to grab
them from the floor.
“Son of a bitch,” he muttered and retrieved his clean boxer shorts from the
blankets he’d put back on the bed. Grinding his teeth, he stamped into his
shower room, slamming the door behind him. He argued with the shower dials as
usual, then carefully avoided the mold he couldn’t seem to get rid of. With his
eyes closed, he finally slumped under the warm water until his forehead rested
on the cool tiles.
The old feeling of inadequacy crept up on him as he stood under the pathetic
dribble of water, feeling empty. With a sneer he realized the mold between the
tiles had probably achieved more in its lifetime than he had.
Once his shoulders had relaxed sufficiently, he bent and picked up the soap and
the wash cloth, grunting a protest as his spine popped. He gave himself a
perfunctory clean, glaring slightly at his flaccid and uninterested cock. With
another sigh and an eyeroll, he decided to blame thaton the late hours and
dehydration.
He wriggled and thumped the dial as, like every morning, the water turned ice
cold before finally dissipating into a dribble, then a drip, then nothing. He
wrapped a towel around his waist, shivering and glaring at his reflection,
longing for Bobby’s much nicer, cleaner, hotter bathroom. He cursed the city he
lived in, the damn wind and the damn cold. It wouldn't be much warmer where
Bobby lived, and certainly no drier, but his home didn't have the all-pervading
sense of damp and misery that Dean’s awful apartment in the city had. The open
window, allowing wind and rain in while he slept every day, didn't help, but—
His Baby was a beauty. She was perfect, and no one could tell him otherwise.
But even he had to admit that the forty-nine year old Chevy Impala was
considered so old now that, even in his ancient, retrofitted, “classical,”
shitty, shoddy apartment, they had managed to install the modern battery
hookups, leaving him without the facilities to keep her charged.
Instead, he had to lead a cable from his kitchenette, through that damned open
window, around the outside of the building and into his garage, where the
correct fitting meant that he could charge her sleek lines while he was out
cold.
Dean pulled on his underwear, socks and slightly damp work trousers, not even
caring whether they were clean anymore. It hardly mattered. He was just a beat
cop, stuck on the night shift. He rounded up drunks and prostitutes, junkies,
drug dealers and illegal off-worlders
He had enough time to kill before his shift that he could bury himself in his
car for a few hours. She needed a polish, and there was a section of the bio-
luminescence that needed mending. It was stupid stuff, but she was his Baby,
and he wouldn't have her any other way. He threw on a t-shirt and headed to his
garage.
It was six thirty in the evening by the time Dean clicked the last replacement
tile into place on the smooth curve of Baby's roof. It was far more hassle than
it was worth, but Dean nodded in satisfaction as he stepped back, the neon blue
arc unbroken and pulsing warmly in the gloom of the garage. He stretched,
popping his shoulders and cracking his neck as he stood on his toes, fingers
brushing the steel beams of the ceiling.
It was rare to find a place like his, somewhere with a garage, in the city. He
had handed over a huge amount—more money that he had ever intended—for his
purchase, causing a disgusted tirade from his father. The man had accused him
of wasting his precious wages, before his argument had escalated into a full
blown rant about Dean's inability to do his job properly, what a disappointment
Dean was.
To Dean, Baby was worth the cash, but he was willing to admit his father had
been right about everything else. No one who had been passed over for promotion
as many times as he had been could be considered good at their job.
But, Dean thought grimly, there was a reason for that.
He grimaced and tried to clear his thoughts, knowing that thinking about John
Winchester never made for a good day, at work or otherwise. He shivered as he
opened up the garage door again, letting in the rank stink of rotting city as
the filthy rain assaulted him.
He locked the garage door, even though he would be returning to it in an hour
to drive to the precinct. He may have a garage and live in a 'classical'
building, but what that really meant was that he lived in a tiny studio, in an
ancient and dilapidated pre-war dump of an office block on the wrong side of
town. You didn't leave anything unlocked.
As he jogged around the corner, head ducked against the rain, he wondered if
there was really a right side of town anymore. Maybe there had been, once, long
before his parents had moved to the city thirty-eight years previously. They
had been excited about their future back then, just after they had gotten
married, with John’s bright prospects at the Complex. That excitement hadn't
lasted long—
He scowled and pushed his thoughts away once more as he forced his key into the
lock of the building's front door and barged his shoulder against the warped
door to enter. How glass and steel could be warped, Dean didn't know, but it
had been sticking since before he had moved in. If you squinted it could be
seen as a quirk of an old building, a ‘feature’, but was probably just ancient
bomb damage that had never been replaced or repaired. It just pissed Dean off.
He took the metal stairs three at a time to the second floor and hung a left at
the top, and walked to the door at the end of the corridor. He fumbled with his
keys again, jiggling one in the lock to unstick the mechanism and sighed in
irritation as it stuck a moment. “Stupid fucki- Ah hah!” he mumbled as the
tumblers caught and gave him access. He had to admit, as he closed the door
behind himself, that his home wasn't all that bad. It was mostly whole, and
someone did maintenance from time to time. It was full of people like himself
who earned only just enough, mostly single, some couples. No kids.
The apartments were too small for that. Besides, the moment a human child was
confirmed to be on the way, they were offered a cheap re-housing loan by the
Council.
They were always accepted, the families moving somewhere cleaner and safer. The
suburbs, closer to the farms, fresher food, lower pollution, more light.
Under population was still a huge problem. After the war there was an enormous
population collapse, caused by the destruction and the fallout afterwards. The
Councils were trying to fix it now, now that mass crop failures were beginning
to be a thing of the past. The Government wanted new, healthy, young people
groomed to join the Complex, too.
That was where Sam was, inside the Complex, the Government. Dean snorted at the
thought of the Winchester brothers’ joint failure. Sam might be a bright young
thing with a stable job inside the Complex, but he certainly wasn't doing the
kind of job they wanted filled. He was there on sufferance.
Dean stamped to the fridge, pulling off his rain-damp t-shirt and flinging it
onto the sofa as he went. He dragged dumplings and root vegetables from the
fridge, and threw them in a pan, sighing as it began to heat on the ancient
rusting stove. He wondered if he could charm old Mrs. P'all down the corridor
into making him another stew. He had eaten for a week from the last one, the
remains now heating in his pan, and she was a much better cook than he was. The
angel really was exactly that when it came to cooking, turning their miserable,
yellow, and stringy food into filling and tasty meals.
He poured the hot stew into a bowl and walked across his room. He dropped onto
the couch, shifting in discomfort until the broken spring no longer stabbed him
in the thigh.
He rolled his eyes, sighing. That's why my overalls aren’t waterproof any
more,he thought, resolving to find something to pad the seat with.
He stared at the stew, thinking that even with Mrs. P'all's excellent cooking,
it was still pretty unappetising and bland. He raised the bowl, drinking the
lot down as fast as possible, chewing steadily on the dumplings once the liquid
was all gone. He pulled a face, wishing for Bobby’s fresh food, direct from the
farm, still nothing like the food in old recipe books he’d seen in the
Complex’s library once.
With a sigh he dumped his bowl in the sink, letting it join the other dirty
bowls and spoons. He turned back to his room; dark and miserable. It was a
mess.
Resolved, he pulled on his under shirt and began straightening up the room.
Lethargically he made his bed and dumped his dirty clothes in the laundry
basket. He pulled on his shirt and waterproof outer jacket as he filled the
sink to soak the dishes.
He would strip the bed the next day after he got a decent sleep.
He scoffed at himself, who was he kidding? This day would be just like the
last, and the next. He would work, then go drinking with Benny when they
finished at four in the morning. He would only go home when Benny started
flirting with anyone who got close enough—the dishes would never get done.
Slumping his shoulders, he glared at his newly tidy apartment. He hated being
so messy, but found most of the time, he just didn't care enough, couldn’t
summon enough energy. Why worry about cleanliness when you would simply make
more mess the next day?
He found his hat down the back of the sofa, resting against the cracked glass,
and shoved it onto his head, buttoning up his coat. Dean went through his
routine, disconnecting the power for the Impala, shutting the window, and
slamming the door three times before it stayed shut. He locked it and left,
stamping back to his garage, the door of which had acquired a large scratch
since he had locked it earlier.
He thumped his fist against the metal of the door in resigned annoyance before
opening it up. The area was rife though, and the damage not the first the door
had taken. That he hadn’t heard the noise wasn't surprising either. Although
the area was largely uninhabited, like much of the city, those people who did
live there were generally poor, living from odd job to odd job. Drugs and
illicit alcohol were most people's stock in trade and favored pastime.
But, not everyone was bad. Many looked out for one another, like old Mrs. P'all
who had been left alone when her son had decided to move back home.
The area was full of the old and the lonely, those left behind and those
waiting for loved ones. They were all stuffed into the few buildings that
remained upright, watertight and heated. Much of the area was simply rubble.
No Council was rebuilding, not when so much still stood tall and empty.
-
Dean pulled up next to the block that Benny lived in. It looked eerily similar
to his own building—glass walls, steel frame. Gaping maws tucked underneath
lead to the car lot, spread wide across the whole building. But it was nearly
five times the size of Dean’s own. How it had escaped the bombing, he had never
worked out. Dean was glad, once more, that his place had an individual garage
for his own use. Despite the downside of the shared car lot, Benny’s place was
better built, warmer and drier. For those reasons, it housed a huge host of
more recent immigrants, lowly workers, and families of off-worlders, with
masses of wailing and screaming children running through the corridors and
banging on doors as they passed.
Under-population might be a problem, or least it would be in twenty years or
so, when the Complex outgrew its current scale and needed more able humans to
work behind it's closed doors, but it was only humans they were after. Not that
angels and demons didn't work there, but the Government were very particular
about who got thosejobs. The general populus, whether they had come here
looking for a more technologically interesting life, wanting the joys of
electricity and fast travel, or liked incessant rain, didn't get a look in at
the Complex.
They only allowed such a huge number of off-worlders onto Earth, Sam assured
him, because the Government simply didn't care. The Government of the Complex,
and the Council of this, the nearest city, were hardly in communication with
each other, let alone the Councils of any other city or settlement.
The Complex allowed off-worlders in if they asked, because they weren’t the
ones who had to deal with them on Earth.
If a human, on the other hand, wanted to travel through the Bridge, they had to
jump through hoops—only colonists or Complex employees got to step in either
direction; Red or Blue.
Grumbling he tapped the horn twice in an attempt to hurry Benny up.
The vamp was late so often that Dean and his car were beginning to be
recognized. His Baby had already been keyed once while he had been sitting
inside of her waiting for Benny's hungover ass to pour itself down the stairs
and over to Dean for his ride to work.
“Mornin' brother!” Benny finally greeted, a broad smile showing all of his
extremely sharp teeth, and proving to Dean that it wasn't the alcohol keeping
his friend late, but a woman. He only smiled like that when he got laid.
“Finally. Don't tell me it was that ravbaa from last night? The one using you
as a jungle gym?”
Benny grinned, offsetting his next words. “Why? You gotta thing about demons
and angels hookin up?”
Dean scoffed. “Of course I fuckin' don't. Just thought you had a bit more
class, man.”
Benny grunted out a laugh and shrugged. “Class is for those lookin' for a life
partner, not a quick 'n dirty fuck, my friend.” He grinned over at Dean again,
clearly teasing. Dean grumbled, knowing Benny had seen him strike out with the
pako-bul behind the bar. She had been beautiful. Ethereal white skin and the
curved horns sweeping back from her forehead had almost met the sharp points of
her white wings, pinned neatly to her back.
She had laughed in Dean's face when he'd tried a line on her.
“There there. Maybe next time honey,” Benny said with a wink and a pat to his
shoulder. The vamp hopped out of the car as Dean pulled up in the precinct
parking lot, slamming the door behind him.
Dean scowled and trudged into the building after his far-too-upbeat partner.
Another eight hours of cold and rain, of drug dealers and prostitutes. Another
eight hours with only an insufferable vampire and his gleeful bragging to keep
him company.
Dean sighed, his shoulders slumping. “Fuck my life.”
-
“It's Losechester and the alcoholic vamp!” leered Walt, the fat and mean duty
officer, as soon as Dean and Benny entered their place of work. “It's just
great having you two drag yourselves in every night, y’know? It's good for
morale, and for the public to know that there's filth out there that's even
lower on the food chain than they are!” he cackled. “One pathetic human and an
old soak of a demon,” he sneered, shaking his head.
The heavy doors swung shut behind them and blocked out the noise of the rain.
LED lamps, glowing too brightly against the evening blackness they'd just come
from, picked out the revolting desk sergeant’s sallow skin and mangy beard.
Dean bit his tongue and rolled his eyes. After years of Dean's refused
promotions and Benny's known inclinations, they’d run out of counter arguments
and pithy replies. They had given up swinging their fists after the second
suspension without pay.
Dean couldn't even yell at the man for calling Benny a vamp. And not least
because he called him that too. Everyonecalled vamiir vampires. Their mouth
full of pointed teeth and diet of animal's blood didn't help matters. Experts
even believed that hundreds of years ago, long before the war that caused the
Bridge to be brought into existence, vamiir may have accidentally fallen
through the gaps between worlds, causing the legends that created the vampires,
after whom they now took their nicknames. Benny couldn't really give a shit in
any case. Walt had all but pissed himself when he'd caught Benny tucking into
his evening meal once. His mouth had been smothered with the blood of the
freshly killed rat, still steaming in his hands as he’d grinned up at Walt's
horrified face. All the nicknames in the world were worth the human's reaction,
Benny had repeatedly told Dean.
“Fuck, how pathetic can you get?” Walt continued, sneering at Dean. “No wonder
he can't get promoted! Fucking wuss.”
Walt's sniggered words followed him down the poorly lit corridor and to the
locker room. The sergeant's parting words didn't even sting Dean, he was so
used to hearing them. Even his boss didn't hold back his disdain for him. He
was a joke. The lowest of the low.
Wrinkling their noses against the stench of B.O, feet and damp, he and Benny
unlocked their weapons cages. Dean pulled out his gun, the regulation smoke
bombs, taser and EMP device, inserting them carefully into each holster on the
heavy belt he wore. The cuffs, gag, and radio fed ear plugs went in the pouches
at his and Benny’s waists. Their hats were already lined with a wafer thin
layer of lead chainmail in the lining, sufficient to block out most mental
attacks.
“Go see the boss?” Benny asked when they were both loaded down with their
protective gear and weaponry. Dean shrugged and nodded. They had standing
orders, but they had to check in with their sergeant, Gordon Walker, before
they hit the streets. Walker was human. Or, at least, he wasn't on the off-
worlders' database, a requirement for angels and demons arriving on Earth.
There were doubts over their sergeant though. He was ruthless and cruel and
many had him down as a demon. Which, understandably, men like Benny took
offence to. First degree demons, the vamiir, like Benny, were as good, bad and
indifferent as humans. It was the same across all the species, found on all the
planets the Bridge had given humans safe access to.
All forty Accord planets had a range of assholes and well—“angels.”
In fact, the arrest record was slightly higher for angels, but human law
breakers superseded them all.
Gordon didn't even look up from his paperwork when they walked through the door
of his office. “Streets,” was his one word, barked order. They rolled their
eyes and filed back out, carefully ignoring the half empty bottle on the man’s
desk.
They had a set patrol, and Dean, slipping into the driver’s seat of the police
cruiser, aimed in the direction of one of the handful of locations they covered
on rotation. Between Benny and him and four other teams, they covered the
roughest parts of the city.
Every night was the same; bringing in the odd sex worker or kid peddling drugs
on street corners, breaking up occasional fights. The routine was dull, mind
numbing, the rain a constant drum beat in the background. The same faces, the
same streets, the same conversations.
After hours of quiet walking, barely a soul to be seen on the streets, both he
and Benny were cold, wet and hungry.
“Looks like it's a quiet one tonight,” Benny murmured as they rounded another
empty corner, their boots six inches deep in the puddle collecting around an
ancient blocked drain.
“Looks that way,” Dean grunted in return, wondering idly how long ago the drain
had last worked. The metal felt pitted under his heavy boot sole.
“Come on, let’s go get somethin' to eat,” Benny said cheerfully, dragging
Dean’s attention from the city’s past. His lips twitched in a smile. Benny
rarely thought of anything but food, drink and sex. It was one of the reasons
they got on so well. The demon was simple, his needs few. He was charismatic,
open and honest, and Dean couldn’t ask for a more loyal friend.
In companionable silence they walked slowly in the direction of the nearest
street food stall, avoiding the deeper potholes by rote.
Schtleff ran the cart, a tiny thing stuffed with vats of hot stew standing over
small burners. Freshly killed rats or squirrels hung from hooks and mugs of
blood sat in ice, among other things. The smell was visceral, a mix of the tang
of iron and the homely smell of gravy. Benny, like many demons and angels,
could eat human food, but he needed fresh blood to survive. Schtleff catered to
every species he could.
“Hey Jeff,” Dean nodded in greeting to the huge and disgusting cook.
For someone who stood seven feet tall with a vertical mouth that slit his
bulbous body in two from his nose to his navel, he was remarkably pleasant. He
was also a mean chef. Dean respected the man. He ran one of the best stands,
always had something edible and hot. He even managed to get hold of chicken or
rabbit on occasion.
“Fuck you, Winchester!” the demon laughed, his maw opening wide around his
chuckle. “One day you'll get my name right.” Schtleff's tongue swiped over his
vertical lips quickly, in what Dean recognized now, as the ch'u'ch's version of
a smile.
“Good to see you too, man,” Dean smiled, fully intending neverto get the man’s
name right. He nodded hungrily when Schtleff pointed at the steaming vat of
savoury stew, trusting him to give him the best on offer. Dean took the tin mug
with thanks and huddled close to the burner under the many-times patched awning
covering the stall.
“Got some squirrel blood today, Lafitte,” the repulsive cook directed at Benny,
who pulled a face, but nodded greedily anyway, holding his hands out.
“I don't know why you humans gotta insist on all your animals bein' so cute. I
can hardly stomach it man,” Benny complained in mock distress as he eyed the
dangling rodents. Schtleff just chuckled again, handing over the mug. Dean
passed the man some coins, heavy and clanking as the demon dropped them in the
till that he guarded more closely than he did the recipe to his stroganoff.
They savoured their food, passing the odd comment between themselves and the
chef, staring out at the lonely, wasted city in the rain.
-
Four in the morning and Dean placed his gun carefully in his locker. The night
had been quiet. They’d only pulled in a few hookers and a couple of kids
snorting something illicit down an alley. The long hours had been passed just
showing their presence, getting to know the locals and talking. Always talking.
It was the only way to know if something was really happening. Nothin' was—same
old, same fucking old.
Dean heaved a deep sigh.
“Beers tonight?” Benny asked hopefully, eyeing his companion with a slight
frown on his face.
“Do you know what, buddy? I'm gonna give it a miss tonight. I'm just—fucking
done, you know?”
Benny frowned harder, his gaze calculating as he leaned his bulky body against
the cage-like lockers. “What's up, brother?” he asked, gentle concern in his
voice.
Dean pulled a face and shook his head, not sure how to answer. “I dunno,” he
shrugged. “Just feelin' it, I guess. Nothing changes. Sleep, eat, shit, work,
drink, fuck, sleep, repeat.” He chewed his lip, unable to look up and meet his
friend's intense gaze. Dean never spoke like this, no matter his feelings, and
he knew Benny would be worried. But he couldn’t explain it any other way. His
life just felt like one long nothingness on endless repeat.
He felt the other man's meaty paw land on his shoulder and squeeze gently; a
reassuring weight. “You know you ain’t never gonna get that promotion, right?”
Benny's voice was calm and steady, soft and comforting. “You ain't an ass. Not
like Walt or Roy. Gordon's the biggest bag of dicks of 'em all. That's why they
got the top spots. They call you a soft touch 'cos you are, brother, and that
ain't a bad thing.”
Benny's hand left his shoulder and the built man straightened, standing tall.
“Look at me, Dean.”
Dean caught his gaze, frowning at his friend as the vamp sucked in a deep
breath. He didn’t want to hear what Benny had to say, he wanted to look away,
but despite his reputation for boozing and womanizing, he was insightful and
compassionate. Dean could trust him.  “You want out? I'll help ya. But I ain't
gonna help you turn yourself into an asshole to get a better paid job in this
dump.” Benny shrugged expressively, a derisive turn to his lip. “Back home the
cops help folk. Here they beat 'em up as soon as look at 'em.” He huffed out a
sigh, keeping Dean's gaze trained on him. “I'm proud we're only third class
cops, brother. If I could afford it, I'd go home in a heartbeat, help folks who
need helping redwards, but I'm stuck here, helpin' where I can.”
Dean looked down, unable to keep Benny's gaze any longer. “Dean, you ain't
happy pounding the streets here day after day, I'll help you move, or change
things up if you want, but I won’t help you get a promotion. You’re too good
for that, brother.”
Benny's voice, low and heartfelt, brought an unexpected lump to Dean's throat.
He simply nodded, both in acceptance and in thanks, Benny's unexpected words
striking a painful chord.
It was good to know that Benny had his back, but Dean hadn't even known how he
had felt about it—his life, himself. How had Benny worked it out?
“I, er, I need to think some shit through,” he stated, keeping his eyes glued
to the scuffed floor beneath his boots.
“Sure thing,” Benny agreed easily, lightly slapping Dean's back. “See ya
tomorrow.”
He nodded and watched Benny stroll from the locker room to the catcalls of the
girls and guys in the cells that they had taken in earlier that night.
Dean briefly leaned his forehead against the metal wire of the locker,
wondering what the fuck was going on in his own head. This was far from the
first time he'd felt the monotony of his life, the pointlessness, but it was
the first time he'd ever thought about doing anything other that what he was
doing now. Maybe he was finally stepping out from his Dad's shadow, like Sammy
had said he needed to the last time they had spoken—argued. He shrugged and
pulled himself upright, straight backed and sure of himself, at least on the
outside, ready to face the leering hookers and disdainful desk clerks.
“Fuck it,” he whispered to himself.
***** Chapter 2 *****
Dean pulled the door shut behind him as he slid into the driver’s seat of the
Impala. He glared out of the windshield at the ugly squat building he had just
left. The precinct, like almost every other building in the city, was old. It
had escaped the bombing during the war, unlike the piles of radioactive rubble
that covered the ground of most other major cities across the country—the
Earth.
He stared at his place of work, glowing lurid yellow in the lamp-lit rain. It
remained imposing simply because of the number of officers, holding onto those
they were bringing in with a firm hand—a weapon held to their neck.
Benny was right, he shouldn’t be a police officer. It did not suit him.
He would cajole, and persuade, and happily use non-lethal force, but he would
never maim or kill just because he could. He would never be promoted above
third class.
He sighed, knowing that he didn’t even want the promotion, not really. He
wanted his life to mean something, he wanted the satisfaction of making a
difference. His life, as it was now, was empty. Promotion would keep him
busier, give him more responsibility, the chance to help more people—
But Dean had no desire to brutalize his way to the top, and that was the only
method there was.
Dean had never chosen that path, even when it would have meant his father’s
acceptance; approval. He had never lived up to John’s expectations, not since
the moment he’d realized that Dean would never hurt someone, purely because
they weren’t human. Not since the moment he’d noticed that Dean thought of
demons and angels as people.
Dean slammed his fists against the steering wheel in frustration.
He had joined the force to help, and to get John’s approval. To be able to hunt
down the demons that had killed his mother. But now, he wasn’t sure he’d ever
reallyhelped anyone. John was dead, and Dean had never found a trace of the
demons that had killed his mom.
All he’d discovered was that demons weren’t evil, angels weren't good. It had
simply been bad people that had destroyed his family. And they were long gone.
He had to come to terms with the fact that he would not only never get his
father’s approval, but that he didn’t actually want it.
He started up Baby with a scowl, feeling angry and lost.
It hadn’t been until he had been waiting for Sam to leave his interview in the
Protection & Rights department, that he had stumbled across a book in the
Complex’s library on twentieth, and twenty first century history. He had
laughed openly at the concepts of homophobia and racism, until he’d remembered
some of his earliest memories. John ensuring they rarely met a demon or an
angel, never saying a good word about them, listening intently as the Charter
thumping extremists ranted about human’s rights. Humans hating humans for their
sexual preferences or skin color was a thing of the past. But instead of
racism, it was speciesism, and John had been a terrible offender.
Dean drove down empty streets, veering across rain washed roads, avoiding huge
piles of refuse. He scowled at them, and wondered why demons and angels ever
tried to travel to Earth.
He lived in one of the only large cities that wasn't razed to the ground during
the war, and yet everywhere was degradation and filth. The Government was well
known for focusing almost entirely on the Complex and The Doppler Bridge that
sat within its circular limits. The local Councils, even the one based in the
city closest to the Complex, were only just able to keep up. Immigrants,
humans, failed harvests, poor health, lack of industry, no money, little
infrastructure, not enough skilled people and poor education. What was the
appeal?
On either side of the road, piled on the sidewalks were veritable mountains of
refuse. The road was more pot-hole than smooth tarmac, with deep puddles that
never dried out. Half the street lamps were broken, either willfully or just
from old age, the LEDs waning and petering out one at a time. A dead cat was
being slowly washed down the gutter with small piles of unidentifiable litter,
and probably, Dean thought with a disgusted wince, literal shit. The drains no
longer did their job in most areas of the city.
Dean cursed under his breath as his wheels dipped into another pot-hole he
couldn’t see under the reflective surface of the water covering the road. He
grumbled, thinking that he should have taken the main route. With the rain a
little lighter, the back roads knocked ten minutes off his journey. He wanted
to get home, washed and dry, warm. He wanted to sleep. The poorer quality
roads, even considering what they were doing to his suspension, were worth it
for a whole eight hours of sleep.
He swore, long and loud, when the Impala’s wheels dipped into another pot-hole
and refused to move forward. He hit the gas, knowing it would do no good, and
watched with malicious pleasure as a plume of water was thrown up.
The rain hit him the moment he stepped from the car in a sheet of freezing
misery.
He walked to the rear of the car, grateful for his mostly waterproof uniform,
and kicked up the water from the huge pot-hole his back tire had fallen into in
irritation. It was just lucky the front had avoided the hole. He opened the
trunk and retrieved the board he kept for those exact situations, and wedged it
under the tire.
Dean walked back to the driver side and half sat, nudging the gas with his
toes. The back wheel gripped the rubber covered board and sent the car from the
puddle, aquaplaning in a wave of filthy water before he regained control and
brought her to a standstill, all four tires on solid ground.
He splashed through the standing water again to grab the board from the hole.
His toe caught on the edge of another rut, sending him shoulder first into the
trunk of Baby. With a groan he slumped back against her slick side. Rolling his
head to the sky in frustration, he bit off the curses that were on the tip of
his tongue. Gripping the board, he turned back to the trunk, his eyes landing
on a rotten side alley as he rolled his aching shoulder. On the ground,
suddenly visible between sheets of the increasingly heavy rain, lit by the weak
streetlamp above his own head, was something...unusual.
Dean frowned. There was a shape; too smooth for the general crap that littered
the alleys between crumbling buildings. It seemed to be glowing, pink-orange in
the dying white light.
It almost looked like skin.
In the trunk of his car Dean kept hidden an illicit firearm. He lived in a
rough neighbourhood, drove a beautiful car, and took more risks with his safety
than was ideal, had a lawyer for a brother and a dead police captain for a
father. He reckoned a gun was something he could probably get away with if the
situation called for it.
He inched backward, keeping an eye on what he was fairly sure was a body,
hidden by the obscuring rain and dull lamp light. It didn't move once, but from
the distance, and the pounding rain, Dean couldn't tell anything more about the
shape. He dropped the board inside the trunk once he had it open, wiping water
from his face, and rummaged for the gun, kept hidden under the spare tire.
He checked it was loaded and quietly closed the trunk before scanning his
surroundings. All was quiet. It could be a trap, but it seemed a little
elaborate if it was. A little-used back road between the police precinct and
his rough part of town. No one would know he would be using the road that
morning. Nonetheless, he approached the mouth of the alley slowly, carefully,
ears pricked for any noise out of the ordinary, any foot falls, the cocking of
a gun, anything.
Taking small steps, avoiding sloshing too much water up around his boots, he
crept toward the filthy alley. He kept his eyes fixed on the object on the
ground.
He paused, breath held, waiting for movement, for someone to reveal themselves,
for an attacker to announce their bait successful.
All was quiet.
Dean gasped when the rain parted once again, finally showing him flesh. Acres
and acres of naked, bleeding flesh.
Dean did not rush in. It could still be a trap. He had heard of stranger
things.
Another ten careful paces and he was standing above the body.
He didn’t wait any longer then. Dean dropped to his knees. The man was pale,
blood spread in a large arc from his body, staining the cracked asphalt bright
red. If he were alive, he wouldn’t last much longer. He pressed his fingers to
the man’s scruffy neck, just where his dark hair was slicked down over his
skull and face, stuck to his pale skin.
The man was curled up, one arm thrown out, the other trapped under his body. He
was too thin, covered in goosebumps.
Dean bit his lip, repositioning his fingers—he sighed in relief as he found a
pulse, strong but erratic.
The man was injured, all over. His ear was a bloody, pulpy mess, the cartilage
raw and mutilated, the shell torn right through. He was covered in grazes and
bruises. And—he was still unmoving. Dean couldn’t even see the rise and fall of
his breath.
He wasn’t even shivering.
Dean was certain that the goosebumps were a good sign, but he should be
shivering—lying on the cold ground in a never-ending rain storm. He was too
still, too pale, too close to death.
[castiel in an alley for the doopler bridge by cenedra riva]
Near frantic, Dean got back up and jogged along the alley a little, looking for
anything that belonged to the man; clothing, identification, anything. When he
only saw the refuse gathering in heaps along the ancient road, he hurriedly
turned back to the man—and instantly stumbled to a halt.
“Fuck,” he hissed under his breath.
Dean threw himself forward once again. His view from behind had shown him what
his approach from the front had not. The man's ass cheeks were lacerated, raw
and bloody. Thick white come still clung to his skin, mixing with the blood
despite the rain, and smeared from his ass down his thighs, creating a puddle
on the asphalt.
Dean stopped thinking. He only acted.
Dropping to his knees in front of the unconscious man again, Dean’s first
thought was that he had to be a prostitute, raped and robbed and left to die in
the street. He wouldn't be the first, or the last, either— After that, Dean’s
thoughts were simply about getting the man to safety.
He shrugged his jacket from his shoulders and clamped it under his arm as he
gently lifted the man’s head from the pavement. He froze when a groan escaped
the naked man, and Dean let out a breath that he hadn't known he had been
holding. The man wasn't past saving if he could groan in pain. The man's
eyelids flickered, but didn't open.
“Come on buddy,” Dean whispered, wrapping his hand around the unconscious man’s
upper arm and pulling him gently from the floor, his other hand supporting his
head, like a newborn baby.
He lifted him into a seated position and shifted to support him by the
shoulder—the man was as light as a feather. As he moved, Dean regretted his
action immediately, realizing the mistake he had made. The man’s head was
injured; a huge bloody mass of skin extending from his hairline to his
prominent cheek bone.
He bit his lip, wondering if he should move him further. The man had probably
run from his attackers and fallen. But if he had, he’d fallen hard. Hard enough
to get gravel in the wound, a second matching one marring his shoulder.
“Shit.”
Supporting the man from his neck, he maneuvered his jacket over his shoulders,
making him groan again. His lips moved, trying to speak, but no sound came. His
eyes flickered and a deep frown began to cut his features, but Dean was only
encouraged. He already looked more alive than he had moments ago. Dean got his
feet under himself and pushed upright, pulling the mostly unconscious man with
him. He had to get him out of the rain. He spared a thought to Baby’s
upholstery, and sent her an apology in advance.
“Up we get, man,” he grunted, flicking his soaked hair from his eyes, blinking
away the rain that ran in rivulets down his face.
The man flinched, whether from Dean's manhandling, the new warmth of the
jacket, or simply the amount of pain he must have been in, Dean couldn't tell.
But Dean sighed in relief when his eyes flickered open briefly, a flash of blue
visible, before he closed them again, mumbling too quietly for Dean to hear.
“Come on, let's get you in the car. It's dry in there. Warm,” he babbled,
hoping that his voice would help to ground the man, to rouse him. His head
lolled on his shoulders though, his eyes opening, unseeing as he mumbled
inaudibly again.
“Just one step, okay?” Dean muttered, pacing forward himself and hoisting the
man with him, supporting him under the armpits.
“That's it, there ya go,” he said encouragingly as the man's leg stuck out on
reflex as Dean's movement pulled him off balance. “Come on, just another few
steps.” The man's head rolled again, a little more controlled, and his just-
parted eyes rested on Dean's face. “Hey there,” he smiled tentatively, voice
just loud enough to hear as he took another step, lifting the man's leaden body
another foot forward.
This time the man made an effort; shifting his own weight the tiniest amount,
finally more help than hindrance. He pulled in a rasping breath, eyes blinking,
a little more aware. Dean could see the blood seeping down the his neck,
though, staining his jacket. Their movement must have got his heart pumping;
sending blood to his head. And his raw, open ear.
“Got a name?” he grunted, as he pulled them both forward again, the man still
mostly hanging off him, fingers weakly plucking at his neck. The man's eyes
rolled, looking around before settling on Dean's face, a little more focussed.
He didn't seem to understand, his face blank, but nevertheless he drew in
another rattling breath.
He hissed out a string of garbled words, too quietly for Dean to catch, but the
man's blue eyes and darkly bearded face were imploring, desperate.
“I'm sorry,” Dean huffed, beginning to find it hard to catch his breath as he
supported a man, however skinny, who was around the same height as himself. “I
can't hear—” the man dropped his eyes, his head lolling forward again, as he
continued to gasp out pained little words, thick and accented.
With a worried twist in his chest, Dean finally realized that it wasn't even
English that he was struggling to communicate.
Dean leaned in a little further, hoisting the man higher in his grip, adjusting
his thinking to the native tongue. Since the Bridge had first been controlled,
around fifty years after its creation, a common language had been created. It
was developed quickly, after the first scientists had stepped within the Bridge
and been faced with two directions; a maelstrom of red one way and blue the
other. They had stepped redwards, and been met with the vamiir.
The vamp's version of America, teetering on the edge of an industrial
revolution, had never been settled entirely by the English, Spanish, Dutch— The
incoming nations had melded and merged with their native inhabitants and
created a mashed tongue that represented most of the countries on their globe.
Most of the Accord planets had a version of a Native American dialect as the
primary language where the Bridge was located; in the centre of the American
continent. So the pidgin native had become the lingua franca.
Dean frowned, listening intently to the man's garbled and muttered words, but
he couldn't make out anything he recognized. The man was human; demons and
angels were pretty hard to miss, but he wasn't speaking a language Dean
recognized. He would have shrugged if he hadn't been carrying the man. The man
must be from another country on Earth—something amazingly rare in these times.
He began mumbling in the Native in anycase, hoping that the man would recognize
at least a few words of the universal language. Even if he hadn't been in
America long, you could hardly get by without it. “Just a few more feet, man.
Come on, it's okay. We'll get you warm, I gotcha.”
The man stopped his own mumbling and pulled his head up a little from his
shoulders. His pained eyes met Dean's, and for the first time he seemed to
actually focus and seeDean.
“They're coming,” he gasped out, a hot puff of rancid breath hitting Dean's
cheek before his head flopped and hit Dean's shoulder. He nearly halted his
slow walk in surprise at the gruff, deep voice articulating understandable,
clear words, but he bit his lip instead, silently urging the man onwards.
Something in that voice had a shiver run up his spine.
“They—they're coming. Must—must warn—” the man's muttering broke off, his
accent thick. Dean couldn’t place it, and not least because of his pained,
tired, broken voice.
But, Dean thought, at least they could communicate.
“It's alright, don't talk, I'm the police, I'm here to help, we'll just get you
to the car. All right? Warm, okay?”
The man's face screwed up in confusion, filthy and blood smeared. “Help? Warm?”
Dean nodded, trying to keep his face honest and open, “That's right. Warm. I
help.”
“Help, yes,” the man trailed off on the 's' noise, a relieved look on his
features before he went limp in Dean's arms. In surprise, Dean nearly let go
and dropped him to the puddle covered ground.
“Fuck!” he swore viciously, tightening his grip around the man's ribcage,
pulling his body up as high as he could. Dean could feel his bruised shoulder
protesting the weight. Biting off a snarl at the pain, he ducked down and swept
the man up into a bridal style hold. It wasn't an easy carry, but easier than
dragging the injured man the rest of the way.
He stumbled the last few feet to the Impala, the man limp, dead weight in his
grip, the rain water collecting in the dip of his belly. Dean rolled his eyes
upward, suddenly embarrassed as he truly acknowledged the man's nakedness for
the first time.
“Okay, Buddy, we really doneed to get you warm, huh?” he asked the unconscious
man, focussing his eyes on the gleaming shape of the Impala in the rain.
-
Dean shuddered as he sat in the driver's seat, squirming in discomfort as his
wet, cold clothes stuck to his skin and the seat at his back.
Next to him, in the passenger seat, sprawled the unconscious, naked man. His
head rested against the dark glass of the window, blood already smeared beneath
his forehead. Dean refused to look at the state of the seat under his thighs.
It had been too much of a struggle to get him into the seat, let alone trying
to get the jacket underneath him too. He sighed. Even he had to accept that the
man’s protection and safety were more important than his Baby. Not that he’d
admit it out loud.
He’d done his best to keep him wrapped up though, the jacket pulled tight
around his torso, keeping his arms tucked inside. Dean winced in sympathy as he
reached across him to fasten the seatbelt, his pallid, ice-cold skin too stark
in the car's interior light. He turned the heater to full as he started the
car, hoping the extra warmth would do something for the man, would help to
revive him.
Dean drove back to the main road, careful of the pot-holes, and tried to keep
the ride as smooth as possible. He wasn’t sure the man’s head could take being
bumped against the cold glass window as the Impala dropped into the road’s pits
and troughs.
It took a few long moments at the slow crawl he was driving at, but the
interior slowly warmed up. It made the aroma of sex, trash, road grit, and
blood more obvious. Dean wrinkled his nose.
It wasn't a long journey back to his apartment once he got back on the more
maintained main road, but the man woke up before they were even halfway there.
Dean sighed in relief, pleased his efforts had done something to help the
vulnerable man.
“They—they're coming.” The man’s deep voice rasped into the quiet of the car.
“Need to warn. Can help? You help? Must warn. Must help—Earth. Help. Must—
They—“ he trailed off into silence once more, his voice getting fainter and
fainter. Something cold sunk into Dean's belly at the man's words.
Who was coming? Why did a raped prostitute feel like he had to warn someone of
something so badly? And warn who?
In his distraction, the car dropped briefly into another small pot-hole. It
bounced back out, but not before the man's head had knocked against the window
with a hollow sound, causing him to moan and whine out the words “Sick,
spinning.”
He sounded utterly miserable.
Dean, feeling guilty, bit his lip; fearful the guy would throw up all over
Baby. He needed to distract him from his concussion—from the symptoms, the
spinning, the nausea. “Who—who do you need to warn?” he asked, fear for his car
lending his voice more urgency than he’d intended.
The man rolled his head to look at Dean. A sweaty, bloody smear was left in his
wake where he still rested against the glass. “Leader? King? Governor?” He
sounded unsure, an edge to his voice. Dean bit his lip as he drove the last few
streets, feeling the man's eyes on him. Those words worried him, not just the
meaning, but the tremor, the desperation.
He pulled up in front of the garage, and with only a quick, tight smile in the
man's direction, hopped out of the car. Swiftly, he unlocked his garage before
he slid back into the seat and inched Baby forward into the dry. “C—cold,” the
man muttered as he shivered violently, weakly tugging the jacket even tighter
across his belly. Dean averted his eyes as he looked over to the man quickly,
wincing as he realized he'd left the car door open, letting the heat escape.
“Sorry, but we'll have to go out again in a second, okay?” he asked, his voice
gruff with sympathy.
The guy pulled a face—fear, surprise—as Dean unclasped his seat belt before he
slid back out of the car. He moved around to the passenger side, opening the
door slowly,  and crouched down to look up into the bloody man's bearded face.
His skin was white and his lips drawn beneath the dirty, ragged facial hair..
“Do you want me to carry you? Or can you walk? There are stairs...” He left the
sentence hanging, hoping the man would understand.
He bit back a smile as the man's face screwed up into something offended,
affronted. “Walk,” he stated darkly, glowering despite his obvious pain and
exhaustion.
Dean did smile then. “Alright, let's get you up.” He offered a hand and
politely looked away as the man slowly pushed himself forward on the seat. Dean
expected him to take his hand so that he could help pull him to his feet, but
the grip never came. As he looked at the ceiling, he heard a grunt, a sob and a
chest-deep whine. But the man never took his hand.
“Dude.” He finally looked down and found the man stubbornly gripping the edge
of the car door, trying to pull himself up off the seat. The coat had fallen
from his shoulders. “For fuck's sake, you stubborn bastard,” he whispered under
his breath in English, rolling his eyes.
Slowly he reached over,pulled the jacket back up onto his shoulders, then
uncurled the man’s fingers from the door. Letting the man see his every move,
Dean wrapped his hands gently around his too-thin forearms, and pulled him
upright. He received a furious scowl for his trouble.
He bit down on another smile, beginning to wonder what had got into him.
Shrugging off the thought, he began maneuvering them from the garage.
It took too long to get inside his apartment building. The man was reduced to
quaking shivers, so bad that his walk was nothing but a stuttering stumble.
Once inside the man seemed to quail when he noticed the metal grille staircase
to the second floor. His breath was coming in short, hitching gasps and he was
sweating under the rain still dotting his brow.
“Shit,” Dean began, realising how difficult getting him up the staircase was
going to be. The man’s attention snapped to him, worn out and resigned, but
still with that earlier spark boiling in his eyes under a frown. Dean read
confusion and curiosity in those eyes, desperation, pleading. resolve. He
switched back to Native. “Put your arm over my shoulder, I'll help lift you
most of the way, alright?”
The man glowered at him a moment, but then seemed to deflate and, nodding, did
as he was told.
They took the stairs slowly, with the man muttering the occasional “Spinning,”
and “sick,” as they went, his voice nothing but a miserable moan.
With a sigh of relief from both of them, Dean finally got them into the
apartment. He helped the man across the small room and into the singular chair
at the small table against the glass wall. He decided against letting him sit
on the soft, low sofa. He wasn't sure if he would be able to get him back out
again; he would need to in order to help get him clean, fed and into bed so
that he could rest properly, warm and comfortable.
It took longer than Dean had anticipated, shuffling across the room and
lowering him down, careful not to jar his injuries as he sat. He walked to the
bathroom and grabbed the towel from the rack, draping it over the man's head,
earning himself another glare as it slid into his bare lap.
“Dry yourself?” he suggested, wondering if the man had the strength. He glared
up at Dean for a moment, making him think he hadn't understood, until he
shrugged and nodded slowly. With a quaking hand he began rubbing the towel down
his uninjured side.
Dean dug out underwear and socks, an old pair of jeans and an oil stained t-
shirt he didn’t mind giving away. He looked up to throw them to the man just in
time to see him dabbing the dry coarse towel along the insides of his thighs,
smearing the cream towel with an obvious mix of bodily fluids.
“Woah!” he said in alarm, raising his full hands in a calming motion, making
the man pause, concentration and pain mixed clearly on his face. “I can get you
a cloth for that okay? It won't hurt as much if it's damp alright?” The guy
frowned, clearly completely perplexed. Dean shrugged and shook his head to
himself, figuring the injured man simply didn't understand. He motioned to him
to stay where he was, dropping the clothes and turning back to the bathroom.
The man inclined his head slowly, watching Dean, clearly biting down on
chattering teeth through his curiosity, reminding Dean to turn the heat on. It
was thankfully one element of the place that Dean could keep working himself,
and did so, even if he often didn't bother heating it just for himself. He
sighed, thinking that it probably wouldn't be so damp if he kept it warmed
properly.
He flicked on the switch to the heater as he passed through to the bathroom.
His knees clicked as he bent to grab the washcloth from the floor of the
shower. With a curse he dropped a tiny drop of soap on it, mindful of the man's
injuries, and soaked it in hot water. After wringing out what he could he
walked back to the man, passing it over with the word “Wash.”
He fetched the clothes he had picked out, grabbing a sweater he hardly wore and
didn’t mind sacrificing. He put them on the table next to the man, who looked
at them blankly. “Get dressed when you're done okay? You need to get warm, get
food in ya, then you can shower okay? Get you clean and warmed through.”
The man looked up at him again, that same bewildered look on his face, before
he held the cloth slightly away from his thigh, his foot propped on the edge of
the chair, and nodded at the clothes, an open, grateful expression on his face.
“Thank you,” he rasped.
Dean just nodded, keeping his gaze averted from the man’s form, bloody and
mutilated, and went to make some toast, wishing he had something more
substantial to offer him. He looked too thin and wiry, underfed underneath all
that scar tissue and the open, bloody welts.
As Dean pulled the butter from the fridge, he looked back over at the man,
where he stood fastening the jeans with clumsy fingers around his bony hips. He
had a look of wonder on his features as he moved his fingers almost reverently
across the coarse fabric, his lips hitching at each button, each seam. Dean
looked on, transfixed by the man's soft and heartbreaking smile.
Until, that is, he turned his back to pick up the t-shirt.
“Holy shit!” Dean yelped, as he saw clearly in the bright light of his
apartment, the state of the man's back.
The wounds, the blood, the scars, he had expected—but not the bruises.
Spreading across his back, from his shoulder blades, up to his neck and down to
his waist, either side of his spine, was black, purple and dark red mottling,
staining his skin, visibly growing as he looked.
“Your back!” he exclaimed at the blank, quizzical expression that the man threw
over his shoulder.
In answer, he rolled his bruised shoulders, wasted muscles moving under the
tormented skin. He grimaced, but grinned, wide and exultant, showing every one
of his teeth. His eyes gleamed brightly before he pulled the shirt on over his
head, hiding everything from Dean’s sight.
Shaking his head, Dean turned back to the toaster, and in English muttered
“You're fuckin' crazy, man,” confusion and admiration mixed in his tone.
With a plate piled with buttered toast, he turned back, finding the man sitting
back on the chair, wriggling and wincing, but once again sober faced. He was
slowly rubbing his hair with the towel, making it stick up in every direction.
Dean watched with amusement as the man's round eyes tracked the plate as he
walked past. “Eat.”
The scrawny man didn't need telling twice. He dropped the towel and picked up a
slice, inhaling deeply before taking a huge bite, chewing rapidly with a glazed
expression on his face.
Dean huffed a laugh; awe, wonder and bemusement right alongside raging
curiosity.
He forcibly turned himself away to search the bathroom for anything that
resembled medical supplies. He knew he had bandages of some kind at least.
“Oh,” he threw over his shoulder as he walked away, “what's your name?”
There was a pause before the man answered and Dean smiled as he heard the
gulping noise of his swallowing. “Cas—” he coughed around the food stuck in his
throat, but continued, a little stronger than Dean had yet heard him.
“Castiel.”
“Nice name,” Dean commented as he kneeled in front of the bathroom cabinet,
wondering where it came from. It almost sounded Off-Worlder in origin. He
glanced over to the man, to Castiel, who was sitting back in the chair, clearly
in discomfort, but holding his belly, the plate empty and a smile on his face.
He stood, the roll of homemade bandages, cloths and rubbing alcohol in his
hands. “I'll get you some more food, okay?” he said with a slight laugh in his
voice, nodding at the empty plate, “Then you can get washed up properly. I'll
do what I can for your injuries—” he shrugged, waving the bandages in the air
slightly, “and then you can take the bed alright?”
The change was instantaneous.
Castiel flinched and stood, stumbling back against the chair. His eyes were
wild as they flicked between Dean and the bed, fear obvious, his face even
paler that it had been, the terror pulling his mouth wide.
“Hey! No— I—” he held up his hands, but before he could even get a real word
out, Castiel snarled at him, practically hissing, eyes near closed in terror,
anger.
“No!” he all but screamed in Dean’s face before he bolted to the door, moving
with surprising speed considering he had been unconscious in an alley just over
an hour previously.
Dean was running across the tiny room, dodging the bed before the door had even
banged back in the frame behind the terrified man.
By the time he reached the top of the landing, the main door a floor below was
banging closed too. Dean couldn't believe how fast he was. He hadn't been able
to walk not half an hour ago!
He ran down the steps, desperate to catch up, desperate to explain, to help. He
didn't want the injured man to end up back in the cold and the rain, alone,
injured, raped, hungry. He wanted to help look after him. He wanted to see that
blinding smile again.
“CAS!” he yelled the moment he burst into the alley between his building and
the next. “CAS! For fuck’s sake!” he spat, kicking in fury at a puddle. Castiel
was nowhere to be seen. Dean couldn't even hear the pounding of his feet above
the pounding of the rain.
He spent the next half an hour trawling the streets, calling his name, hoping
to catch a glimpse of the man he had clearly terrified.
“You fucking idiot, Dean,” he berated himself as he tiredly climbed the stairs
back to his apartment, dispirited, depressed, cold, soaked through and
miserable.
He mournfully looked at the empty plate, bloody towel and washcloth, thinking
he had failed Castiel before he had really even had a chance to help the
vulnerable man.
He flopped on to the bed, face buried in his hands.
“Fuck.”
***** Chapter 3 *****
Castiel groaned as he stretched his wings for only the third time in his life.
He revelled in the sublime pain blooming down his back—and flew.
He landed with a grunt back on Earth, returning from where he had run to, the
wind knocked from him, but at least he remained on his feet this time.
When he had fled that man's room and flung himself off the world to one that he
knew—that felt familiar—he had landed among cold rocks on the barren wasteland,
tearing holes in the leg coverings he had been given as he had fallen to the
ground.
Now, back on Earth once more, Castiel felt those coverings, and those for his
torso, too, begin to dampen with the rain hitting his sore shoulders and
soaking up from the sodden ground. Even so, he shivered in delight at the
pleasurable feeling, the pull of the coverings against his skin, the joy of
being allowed to hide his body from view for the first time in his life.
Just like when the human had handed him material to dry himself with, and
another square of fabric to cleanhimself with.
He had never been allowed to remove the semen before. Nor the blood.
He sighed as the soft and pleasant memories soured suddenly with the knowledge
that the human had been just like the menenth, and every other race he had come
across. He had thought, when he had been in the moving thing, that maybe the
humans were different, that here, he would be safe.
The man had certainly made him feel as if his body was his own—for the first
time. Up until, that was, he had indicated the bed.
Castiel had rarely been put on a bed for sex, but it had happened. He knew what
it was for.
He shuddered, grateful once more, despite the pain and the tumult of emotions,
that he was free.
He looked around himself, taking in his rain soaked surroundings, grimacing as
his dry coverings soaked through in moments, chilling the skin underneath.
On the world he had fled to, where the moon had been big and yellow in the
clear sky, Castiel had picked his way carefully over the sharp and pointed gray
rocks. He had walked and walked, letting the gentle pull in his gut lead the
way to the point he wanted to return to on Earth. He could feel it. He had
stared at the sky, where the stars had been drowned out by the brightness of
the moon. But he did not need them to navigate, that pull, that feelingwas
enough. And even if he had needed the stars, like the menenth did, he had never
seen them from the Earth. The rain had poured continuously, with cloud covering
the sky, coloring all his memories of the place.
And now he had returned to Earth once more; the rain hammering on his spinning
head and the nausea rising if he moved too quickly. The food the man had given
him had helped him a little, helped his Grace to revive, as had the coverings
that would protect him from the lowest temperatures of night and early morning,
but the chilled rain still took its toll. He was in another narrow path lined
with towering buildings. He had only ever seen trees reaching so high, so
precipitously. The menenth's buildings never rose more than twice Castiel's
height, built in haste from the materials surrounding them when they arrived
from the Bridge. Always arriving, always leaving, always going fire-ways.
He sighed and ducked under the cover of an overhang, gritting his teeth against
the pounding in his head, the shiver trailing up his spine, the sharp pain from
all his wounds. The throbbing in his hole and wrists and ankles were just
background noise, especially in comparison to the screaming agony still
sounding from his ear.
His feet squelched slightly as he stepped on the drier part of the smooth gray
ground, his stolen foot coverings soaked through.
His ear burned hot, despite how cold he was once again. He didn't dare touch
the area. What was left of his flesh was beyond tender, and he didn't want to
know the extent of the damage he had done. But, it had been the only way to
escape. Tearing the eyelet from his own cartilage provided him with freedom.
The ragged remains of his ear would just have to stand testament to his past,
he would wear it as a badge of honor.
Castiel watched the dawn break from his secluded spot. The blackness above gave
way slowly to a dark gray. The gloom never lifted, heavy clouds obscured the
sky. He already missed blues and greens. But this was better. This was freedom.
He leaned against the wall behind him, a cold and smooth expanse of glass. It
was just like the glass in the man’s dwelling, so different from the small
glass bottles some worlds produced, beyond anything he could have imagined.
With the cold surface behind him, and the chill wind to his front, he finally
felthis Grace beginning to heal his body, just by the smallest increments. He
felt his blood staunched a little more, the head injury that made his vision
spin, dulling and calming even further. But it was slow, nothing like the tales
Gabriel had told him.
He grimaced at the hot pain of his ear. That would take much longer to heal,
and almost certainly never fully, it would always be a mangled mess. He
shrugged and tucked his cold fingers under his armpits, gripping the cloth that
swaddled him, warmed him. He smiled at the luxury.
He replayed the previous few hours in his head, as he stared vacantly at the
gray wall in front of him. Rain whipped against the surface and wind whistled
between the high walls. He had awakened to something hot being pressed to his
side, to warmth enveloping his shoulders, but the sensation of the rain still
pelting his head, his legs still cold and wet. There had been words, a deep
voice, warm and worried sounding, but he hadn't really understood it. It
sounded vaguely familiar, but too different. Twisted and wrong.
He remembered talking, and trying to walk, and he remembered vividly when the
man switched to talking American, or a garbled version of it, anyway. He
remembered trying to warn him, but the rest of his memories were vague until he
was seated in the warm moving carriage.
He remembered refusing to be carried to wherever the man had wanted to take
him, and he wondered at the ease of his acceptance of that. He had just escaped
captivity, and he should not have allowed his wounds and his depleted Grace to
make him weak of will, to so easily follow a human blindly into his dwelling
without demanding answers, without ensuring his safety first.
Castiel scowled at himself, furious. He was a fool, and should take his second
chance at freedom more seriously. He tightened his arms around his chest and
winced at the pain in his back where his atrophied muscles had strained and
torn at the use of his wings.
His movement dragged material across the grazed skin on his shoulder and hip,
and most of his leg. With the stab of pain he looked down and pushed the leg
coverings down off his hips to inspect the wound there. It was bloody and red,
filled with black grit. He figured his other wounds were in a similar condition
if the pain was anything to go by. He nodded, understanding the man's
repetition of the words 'clean' and 'wound' now, his strange accent and garbled
speech taking time to understand.
Castiel huffed out a deep breath, leaning against that solid cold wall at his
back, frowning deeply at the contradictory nature of the human. He had
definitely tried to help him, and yet; the bed.
The bed was where the alpha took him, and hammered into him until he screamed
in agony. Only then would the menenth's leader release; filling him. Only then
would he throw him back in his cell, where he would curl up on the floor,
whether it was dirt, rock, sand or grass, and sleep until the pain was simply
an ache once more, or until he was picked up and used all over again.
He absently picked at the gravel lodged in his hip as he remembered once again
the warmth that had stolen over him, physically and mentally, when he pulled
the coverings on. They had a name, the menenth, and other angels and demons
too, when he saw them on their rare appearances, had coverings. Each species
wore something different, and they were seldom referred to. The menenth wore
something they called a breecclouth, but what Castiel had on now was far more
covering. Soft, warm, and smelling pleasantly of things he could not describe.
Castiel had never been covered before; the sensation was almost overwhelming.
He bit down on his desire to collapse, to scream—clamped down on those
emotions, just like he had always done. He was free now, he had no excuse. He
had achieved what no one else ever had, what he had failed to do so many times,
and now he had a task—one he could not fail at.
He pulled the leg coverings back up to cover himself, blinking, allowing
himself to revel in the ability to do so. He scowled at the growling of his
stomach, though, disgusted that he was hungry again so shortly after the huge
meal. But, he had been hopeful for more of the tasteless, butter smeared food.
He had been certain the man had said something about more, but then; he had
indicated the bed. Castiel had fled.
His memory of that moment was confused. Shock and rising terror; the
realisation that he had been wrong, too trusting, foolish. The human hadn't
been helping him, he had only wanted the same thing as the alpha, the generals,
the guards—everyone. He had wanted to rape Castiel, hurt him, thrash him, just
like almost everyone he had set eyes on since he had hit puberty.
At the man's mention of the word bed, he had not thought, he had simply left.
Despite the spinning nausea, he had run, thrown himself tripping and hopping
down the stairs, and out into the rain. Before his hair could even be plastered
to his head once again, he had spread his wings and flown to the first planet
he feltwas safe, uninhabited, known. Somewhere he had been before. Somewhere he
knew was barren, empty.
But—he had come back.
He could not run. He had a task to achieve.
He had to warn the humans’ leader—had to tell them the menenth were coming. And
not only them.
-
Castiel walked. He walked until night fell once again, and then continued to
walk.
He ignored his hunger. It was nothing new.
He had a goal in mind. A path. A course of action. That, and a burning memory
of Gabriel’s face, his words imprinted on his mind.
He clung, however, to two words. Two words that the man had said aloud, that
had spurred him on, even though he had had to run from him. Two words. The
first he did not understand, but believed it to be qualified by the second.
'Police' and 'safe.'
He needed to find another police and tell them that war was coming.
He did not know where to begin looking.
He walked deeper and deeper into the mess of paths between terrifyingly tall
buildings, some rotting like an old tree trunk, others gleaming in the light
from the false suns lighting the gloom. Everything was dark, fetid, rancid. The
stench was unbelievable, the noise of the constant rain distracting. The whole
world was a maze—a bleak, unnatural forest, twisting and impenetrable.
He did his best to avoid any humans he saw. They were few enough, and easier to
avoid since the throbbing in his head had subsided—since the spinning had
calmed. He could concentrate again, make his eyes focus properly; discern their
shapes flitting from door to door, bent double against the wind and rain.
There was one thing to be grateful for, he thought with a grimace. The report
he had heard given to the alpha so many long seasons ago, appeared to be true.
They had described the enemy—humans—as being as disgusting, repulsive, just
like the hath, no wings, no halo, no horns, no designation of their power. No
manifestation of their true selves.
With his own wings and halo hidden as they always were, Castiel looked human.
It gave him anonymity, something he desperately needed to hold on to. It was
the only way to remain free. It was his only true protection. If anyone knew he
was a hath, he would be locked up once again, made a pet and raped or beaten
daily. He shuddered, and clamped down on his Grace even harder, knowing that
his wings and halo were invisible; they felt differentwhen they were
manifested, but he was terrified nonetheless.
With a jarring sigh, he realized he was too tired, sore, cold and wet to
continue his search in the never ending paths between buildings. He needed to
rest before he continued to look for a police, for help. He needed his Grace to
recover, his pain to subside.
He walked down another few paths, eventually finding a deserted one, filled
with rubbish, but with a bright yellow, broken cube, sitting alone in deep
shadow. It was of a material Castiel didn't know, lying with an opening at the
side, only a little smaller than his cell, but open—he was still free. The
thing had wheels spinning slowing in the wind, facing the shining wall behind
it. Inside, the rain made a noise like a drum as it hit the surface, allowing
Castiel to curl up, dry, only a little refuse stuck in the far corner to mar
his refuge.
He screwed his eyes closed, feeling that old tension rising. He was exhausted,
but as ever, when it came to trying to sleep, all he could focus on was the
slightest noise, the slightest suggestion that he was about to be picked up,
slammed down and used, or abused. He gritted his teeth, remembering Gabriel’s
face, his words, his warmth. The knowledge that if he fought long enough and
hard enough, he would eventually be free, he would eventually make Gabriel
proud.
He shuddered and purposefully redirected his thoughts to his pain, like always.
This time though, glorious in the freedom that the pain was testament to.
As his muscles screamed, he finally began to relax, still listening intently to
the rain, and any sound beyond. He thought back to the one bright point of his
day, of the time spent travelling through this strange world.
He had found two or three buildings with walls like the man's dwelling.
Impossible glass spread side to side and lit from within with more unnatural
glows. Inside had been many different things, most of which he did not
recognize or understand. But, he had discovered, many of the items had writing
on them.
In one building, he had seen bottles, and as something familiar, he had stood
and stared long and hard, sounding out the words written in a scrawled hand
upon the glass. There were different words, different languages, but once he
whispered the words aloud to himself, he began to realize that one of the
languages was the first the man had spoken. Not his native tongue, but
something resembling one of the tongues the menenth could speak, repeated
across many of the worlds they had stamped through.
The pronunciation was very different, the spelling and sentence structure, too,
but seeing the words written, he believed he could pick it up easily.
The American tongue, his native language, was mangled here too, but much easier
to make out. The man had spoken many words he recognized, and seeing them
written down made the transition easier. The structure was a little different
too, but simple enough. He would only need to listen hard to understand. He
thought that the man, talking to him in his dwelling, would have been
understandable if only he had slowed down a little.
He shivered and curled up tighter against the strange yellow material, wrapping
his arms closely around his chest, ignoring the errant thoughts of being crept
up on and the hairs on the back of his neck rising.
Gabriel had always taught him to be a fighter, to never give up. And no matter
what, Castiel would fight. He might never see his brother again, and after
sixty seasons he had given up hope entirely, but he had fought for his freedom
and achieved it. He had to hold onto that, that glorious, hot feeling as it
swelled in his chest again, bubbling up into a grin.
He was free. Free to save the worlds—
That wonderful feeling didn't fade, not for a long time. It felt just like the
moment when the human had brought his attention to his own back. He had not
understood all the words, but he knew what that aching pain in his muscles
signified, those torn muscles evidence of his first insane, uncontrolled,
flailing flight.
He smiled even as he considered the mission he would not abandon, falling into
his first heavy sleep in years, filled with dreams of freedom and huge
responsibility.
-
Castiel awoke, instantly alert, to the wailing screaming noise he vaguely
remembered hearing in one of those first confused memories after his botched
landing on earth.
He got up, crawling from the yellow box and stretched his cramped, stiff
muscles. Taking the briefest of moments to revel in the absence of rain hitting
his bare head, he stepped back onto the path between the decaying heaps of
rotting detritus to began his search once more. He needed to find help, needed
to warn the human's leader, needed to make Gabriel’s memory proud.
By noon, at his guess, through the perpetually dark gray sky, he was almost
bent double with the cramped pain in his gut. He was hungry, thirsty too,
having not dared to drink from the filthy puddles that covered the gray ground
everywhere he walked.
The nausea caused by days with nothing more than the dry, bland, but salty
bread and butter the human had given him, made his head spin once again.
He cursed the amount of time it was taking for his body to heal. He assumed it
was the  lifetime of suppression and the three flights he had been forced to
take, but it was frustrating, knowing that his body was supposed to be capable
of much more than it was currently doing.
The flights had expended far more Grace than he had expected. The first; long,
arduous, and uncontrolled as he bounced from world to world, flickering between
forest, mountain, plains, fire, desert and encampments. Many encampments. None
as hard walled and highly built or gray as this. Mostly earthen shacks, tents
or wooden dwellings. Sometimes woven huts among the trees, sometimes doors at
the end of grassy mounds, but encampments nonetheless. This— This was something
else.
Something he had no word for. Something massive.
He was yet to see a boundary, a horizon, a tree. It had not escaped his notice
either, that he was yet to see the sun, the rain constantly pulling grit and
dirt from the heavy clouds overhead.
What had happened to this world? he wondered, aghast, as he took in the piles
of rotting filth, things he could not identify, but dead animals too, and
brightly colored pieces of the same material that he had slept under. There was
glass and ceramic and bone, bits of twisted and contorted metal, rotting wood,
torn and shredded fabric, and many small pieces of the various building
materials they used. Nothing was cared for, everything degrading, falling,
drowning.
Castiel walked the paths the entire day, his head tilted upward at a painful
angle, intermittently picking grit from his cheek and shoulder wound under the
wet coverings he wore.
He wondered how a world, a people, could make something so awesome and take so
little care of it.
He saw humans, demons, and angels alike, on the paths, each looking nearly as
worn down and broken as the buildings that surrounded them, just and worn down
as the man who had helped—and then all but threatened to rape him.
He almost certainly looked no different—just as worn down, just as broken. Not
that he knew what he looked like, he had never seen himself—not really.
He understood—he knew the hard reflective building material would show him what
he looked like. But, he could not bring himself to look, could not bring
himself to look properly at the dark shadow that was reflected back when he
peered inside, the shadow that was clearly him.
As he walked, the sun setting behind it's seemingly permanent bank of cloud, he
started to see more people walking or standing on the various paths without a
purpose. He saw a child tear a bag from a woman's shoulder and run off down the
gap between two towering buildings. He saw a youthful demon down a small path,
alone, stabbing a needle into his arm, pushing a liquid deep into the flesh. He
saw people coupling out in the rain— That last made him turn and retch, dry
heaving up yellow bile until there was nothing but burning in his gullet. They
had both been smiling, laughing even. He couldn't comprehend what there was
about thatto smile about.
Later still, he witnessed a fight between two humans. One smashed one of their
brittle bottles, spewing foaming liquid on the ground, and used it to cut at
the neck of the other. A female angel, a species he had never seen before,
wailed in the background. He walked the other direction, wondering why he
should bother to save this world, why he shouldn’t just let the menenth fall
through the Bridge with an army made up of the creatures of so many worlds.
The almost familiar screeching noise, rising and falling, hit his ears once
again, this time louder, piercing and close. A carriage sped past, similar but
different to the one the man had taken him to his dwelling in. It flashed past
him so fast, blue and red light hurting Castiel’s eyes as it went, taking the
wailing noise with it, modulating and seeming to slow before the noise stopped
along with the carriage. He stared at it, stationary right by the bleeding man,
the broken bottle and the crying angel. The car had words on it, which he
sounded out once again, hissing under his breath.
“Po-li-ce. Pol-ice. Police.”
With a surge of pride and ferocious drive he turned and started walking in the
direction it had come from. When the wailing started up again, screaming
behind, around, then in front of him, he followed it, on and on, until it
stopped.
It didn't take much searching of the area to find a building with a board
outside of it, with the now familiar word written in blue and white.
-
“Ugh—here we go,” were the grunted words that greeted Castiel as he walked into
the building, his head cocked, listening hard, not comprehending the meaning,
but understanding the tone.
The human that had spoken—eyes rolling—was sitting behind a tall table in front
of the doors, at the end of the hard, stone lined room.
For the first time in his life he felt conscious of his appearance.
He walked forward carefully, placing each wet, squelching, covered foot on the
slippery surface, head held high, hair soaked, moisture clinging to his beard,
blood stained. He could smell himself, an aroma of filth, refuse, and damp
material following him in.
People were staring.
He was used to being completely ignored, a part of the furniture, simply
somewhere to ram an erection or slam a fist. Nobody ever looked at him. He was
disgusting to the menenth, their followers acted the same. But he looked human,
here he should be accepted as normal, neither worth noticing, nor deserving of
being ignored, he should be just like everybody else he had observed that day.
Here, though he was being outright stared at.
The words the human had spoken had been said in the language he could not
properly understand, could only just read. He hoped that, like the first man,
this one would understand him when he spoke American.
“I need to speak to the leader,” he croaked out, his throat dry, but his voice
steady, despite the hunger gnawing at his belly and the feel of the eyes boring
into his back.
The man, fat and gross, like some tribal leaders became before the menenth
overran them, leaned forward and laughed. His eyebrow raised in obvious
question. Castiel wondered briefly if this wasthe leader. Fat from eating the
best of the crop and hunt, taking more than his fair fill.
“There is an army coming. You must prepare. I must warn the leader.”
He repeated the last phrase, wondering if his words were falling on deaf ears.
As he repeated the words, the man's features screwed up in red faced amusement.
Castiel knew the first man—the one he had fled from—had understood him, at
least a little, why did this man laugh?
“Look buddy,” the fat man spat in his garbled version of American. Castiel
frowned at the second word, knowing the first man had used it too, and still
not understanding it. “I'm only gonna say this once.”
Castiel canted his head to the side, concentrating, desperate not to miss a
word. “Get your drunk ass outta here, you homeless piece of shit.” The man
sneered, sending a hot gush of breath over Castiel's face, making him wrinkle
his nose, despite the lack of rancid stink.
Castiel felt frustration swell in his chest, filling him up, with nowhere to
go. He had not understood every word, but the meaning had been plain. He wasn't
believed, and he had to leave.
He tried again, slowly enunciating his words, hoping to finally be taken
seriously, trying to remain calm—something he was not always very good at. He
bit down on his Grace, refusing it to let shine through, and biting down on his
anger, too. A beating would not help this accursed world.
He could not, would not, hurt these people, and without the bindings, it would
not be difficult to do so if he lost control. He was to fight, yes; Gabriel's
words were instilled deep, but he was to fight for good. He must not hurt
innocents, whether they were ignorant and rude, foul and fat, or not.
“I must speak. Your leader,” he all but begged, edging toward the inner
entrance that led further within the stone lined building.
Biting his tongue deep to stop from reacting, self preservation at the very top
of his list, Castiel found himself wrapped up in the hold of three large
humans, far bulkier than his own underfed frame. Whistling sounded from off to
his side, yelling, shouting, laughing, a tumble of words he couldn't comprehend
before he found himself lying on the soaked, hard, gray ground outside of the
building.
He sat for a moment, stunned, not at their physical actions, but by the fact
that they weren't even interested in saving their world.
Staring mutely at the door, every single jagged and angry wound seemed to vie
for his attention once again. Even the phantom pains in his wrists and ankles,
where the manacles had been from his earliest memories, came back ten fold. But
he made no sound, neither groaned as his weight shifted on his behind,
reminding him of his torn hole and flayed skin, nor sobbed as his torn ear,
missing half the cartilage, stabbed pain through his head with burning agony.
He just sat and stared and tried to find the momentum to stand, to try again,
to warn someone, anyone, to do anything at all.
“Castiel?” A warm, worried voice sounded behind him and he spun, wincing a
little as his movement aggravated the wounds across his behind.
There, standing tall above him, wrapped up against the rain filled night, was
the first man—his rescuer come would-be-attacker.
Castiel watched, shocked, tired, bewildered, and confused, as the human dropped
to his knees onto the rain covered, hard ground right next to him. “Thank god I
found you,” he muttered in his broken American, face tense, a frown cutting his
forehead deep. “I was so fucking worried, man.” He looked like he wanted to
touch Castiel, but he held back, his hands hovering in the air where he
crouched. “I just wanted to help. I didn't mean—“ he took a breath, breaking
off, shaking his head.
“I didn't mean sex, okay? No sex. I promise. I'll never make you do that, god,
I just wanted to help you— Do you understand? Heat, help, food, clean, sleep.
That's all.” His words were fast, but low pitched and earnest, just clear
enough for Castiel to make them out. He nodded slowly, believing him, for the
moment at least—
He took a chance.
“You. You'll help me?” he asked, wincing at the dryness of his throat, despite
the constant never ending, bitterly cold rain. “I need to warn the leader, I
have to. Tell the leader a war is coming.”
He spoke slowly, staring into the man's eyes, trying to get his message across,
begging internally that he would be understood.
He watched as the man seemed to consider, biting his lip and frowning, looking
away, down at the gray floor Castiel still sat on.
Castiel gritted his teeth, tired of yelling, desperate to be heard.
Finally, the man’s eyes flicked up to meet his again, a passing beam of light
illuminating the clear glowing green there, the long eyelashes. He nodded.
Castiel nearly sobbed in relief.
His head dropped back on his shoulders, eyes closing as he felt a tremendous
burden lift. He wasn't finished, but it was a start. The man would help.
He sensed the human rise back up, and he opened his eyes, blinking away rain
and tears of relief as he focused on the human's outstretched hand, once again,
offering him help.
“Come on, Castiel, let's get you inside.”
Castiel took his hand.
***** Chapter 4 *****
“Alright buddy, what's your last name?” Dean asked the sodden man sitting
across from him at the small table in the interview room.
Castiel tilted his head at him, confusion written across his face. “Castiel.”
He responded flat and tired, as if stating the obvious.
“Right,” Dean sighed, “your first name then?”
The man's head tilted even further over, his frown becoming even more
pronounced, as if Dean was an idiot. “Castiel,” he reiterated slowly.
Dean took a breath, silently pleading for patience. “Riiiight,” he drawled.
“Castiel Castiel. Of course.”
He closed his eyes, letting the breath out slowly.
He wasn't sure how this man had insinuated his way into Dean's life in a matter
of a few hours two days ago, but he had, and Dean had spent those two days on
the lookout for a mass of dark hair, a scruffy beard, and his own gray sweater.
Two days of terrible sleep and an even worse shift in between.
Two days that had brought the man to Dean's feet right outside the precinct,
minutes before he was meant to begin work for the night.
He should be grateful, but what he really wanted were some straight answers.
“Okay dude. You see, here, we got two names, sometimes more.” He paused to make
sure the man was following him. “I'm Dean Winchester,” he held his hand to his
chest to help the meaning get across, then stretched his hand out to Castiel.
“It's a pleasure to meet you.” The man simply looked at at his outstretched
palm, making Dean sigh again. “You take it, hold it,” Dean said, and nodded at
his hand.
The man’s expression contorted into a disbelieving expression, clearly stating
'What the hell?' without the words. Nonetheless, he reached his hand out and
lightly gripped Dean's palm.
His hand was cold, still wet from the rain. Dean noticed, for the first time,
red welts running around his wrist. “Okay, then you introduce yourself.” And
with that he shook Castiel's hand gently and indicated to him expectantly with
the other hand.
“Cas—Ti—El.” he said, even more slowly, his voicing grating and low.
“Of course,” Dean sighed, “no second name at all?”
Castiel just shook his head and looked at his hand strangely when Dean released
him.
“Naturally,” he huffed, rolling his eyes a little and shifting in his seat to
get comfortable. “Okay, Cas. I just gotta run a search, 'cause I'm meant to be
charging you with drunk and disorderly, seeing as I walked in just as they
kicked you to the curb—” he paused to tap the man's name into the old computer,
whirring boxes stacked on the table. “But without a last name, it'll take a
moment.” Dean eyed Castiel. He sat there, eyes taking in the room, shivering
and rolling his shoulders absently.
“Those still hurt?” he asked, snapping the man's attention back to himself. He
frowned and cocked his head in question, a quirk that Dean had to bite his
tongue not to smile at.
“The bruises. All over your back? You were pretty badly beaten up. You got
scratches and cuts and—y'know. Before you— Before I freaked you out and you
ran, I was going to see what I could do to help. With your injuries.”
The man swallowed thickly and licked his cracked, bloody lips, still staring
intently at Dean.
In his thick accent, speaking clearly, he asked; “You were helping? I need to
speak to the leader. War. War is coming.”
Dean did not hide his eye roll this time, in response to both his first and
second statements. “Yes. I was trying to help.” He nodded, a half smile on his
face. He slowed his speech a little, to help the man understand. His frequent
blank expression proved he did not understand everything Dean said—they clearly
spoke the same language, the native, but it seemed to be a different dialect,
as if he came from a long way from the Complex. “And yeah, I get that you feel
you need to warn someone. We'll talk about that, I promise, but I'm meant to be
arresting you, so I need to get you processed first.”
The man frowned. “Processed?”
Before Dean could explain, the computer bleeped, making Castiel jump, as a box
popped up on the screen listing every 'Castiel,' or similar, in the system. The
list was short, most of the names that popped up belonged to angels or demons
and none of them were close enough to how he thought Castiel's name should be
spelled.
“How do you actually spell your name? You're not coming up,” he looked up at
the man, away from the screen and found him shrugging and shaking his head.
“You can't spell your own name?” The man half shrugged again, beginning to look
impatient, chewing his lip.
“Never seen it written. I probably could—” and with that he spelled it out,
letter for letter as Dean had typed it, clearly making it up as he went.
“Shit,” he muttered. “Are you— I dunno, from some commune or something? I mean,
angels and demons got some strange habits, but they gotta be registered to be
on Earth, and you clearly ain’t one in any case—” he broke off and sighed.
“I mean, some escape, 'n we pick 'em up, unregistered. Most humans register as
well though. Some religious folks don't, some people still believe in God...”
he trailed off realising he was rambling and the man's expression was sitting
somewhere between confused and fearful, his blue eyes wide.
“For fuck's sake,” he huffed under his breath, berating himself for scaring the
man again.
He eyed the pulped mess that was the man's ear and made a decision.
“I'm not gonna arrest ya. I doubt my boss would notice, he's just glad he don't
have to deal with ya, so I'm gonna take you back home again. You need a fucking
shower man,” he said as he clicked out of the records program, shrugging off
the mystery of the man's identity. “We need to get your injuries clean, with
what you've been through in the last few days.”
Dean looked up in time to see the Castiel's eyes widen, in anger this time. “I
need to warn! War. Is. Coming.” He enunciated each word, leaning forward in his
chair, a deep scowl cutting his features, sending foul breath Dean's way.
“Woah!” Dean recoiled, from Castiel's impassioned words more than his homeless
aroma. Dean could smell blood and come still clinging to him, too, in the
warmth of the office they were in. He desperately wanted to help this man.
“Yeah,” he held up his hands, placating, “I'm not ignoring that. But you need
to get cleaned up, or you ain’t gonna last long enough to get a chance to warn
anyone!” He pushed to his feet, leaning on the desk, fixing Castiel with a
stare. “You had concussion two days ago, you've been raped, you're still
fucking bleeding,” he spat, glancing at the man's ear again. “I want to help
you get better, I want to help you get warm, and fed and healed, okay?”
He stood straight, less imposing, less confrontational, remembering his
training finally. “I am not going to touch you,” he promised with emphasis,
before continuing, “you can sleepin my bed. While I'm at work. I can clean your
wounds. You can tell me all about this war, okay?”
As the man sat back, mollified, Dean found himself thinking that he must be
crazy to believe this man. Everything he spouted, from not having a surname,
and not knowing how to spell the one name he did have, to clearly having been
raped yet completely disregarding his own wounds— They screamed crazy to Dean.
Except they didn't. They should, they should do exactly that, but something
small, something Sam had once talked of, something his father had laughed off,
spoke to him.
This man had a mission, this man wanted help, and this man might have been
tortured or imprisoned. Almost any other police officer would have shrugged him
off, left him out in the rain to go back into the night. That, or they would
have given him a kicking, or brought him in for target practice for their
tasers.
Who would notice? Who would care?
Dean would, damn it.
“You wouldn't last two minutes in a cell here, anyway,” he muttered, under his
breath, knowing the typical inmates would eat him for breakfast, torment him
for fun.
Castiel's reaction proved to Dean, too late, that his words had been spoken too
loud. The man's chair went skittering back, falling to the floor with a
clatter, and he stepped back, eyes wide and angry.
“Police have cells? Imprison people?” he yelled, frightened—god, did he look
frightened. Frightened, furious and betrayed.
“Sometimes. Yes. Bad people. Not you, Cas, not you. Okay? You're free to go.
Will you go withme?”
He watched as the man calmed a little, that look of betrayal still vivid on his
face, anger narrowing his hard gaze. Shit, Dean thought, that was a nail in the
coffin for his imprisonment theory. The man got more and more fascinating, just
as Dean got more and more concerned, an itch building behind his ribs to care
for the shaken and confused man, injuries, fear, fury, aroma and all.
-
Castiel was disgusted, nauseated. This human in front of him, one he had
stupidly put his trust in a second time, turned out to be part of an
organisation that put people into cells, just as he had been.
The man, Dean Winchester, had told him that the police helped.
Bile rose again, burning the back of his throat, but the man's hands rose in
surrender.
Castiel relaxed a little as he man reiterated that he was free to go, that he
wouldn't be put back in a cell. The declaration gave him a moment to think, to
try and work out whether he was doing the right thing trusting the police with
this information, whether they would do something after all to save the world,
whether his information would be able to prevent the menenth and tak taking
every world as their own.
When Dean Winchester asked him if he would go with him, Castiel felt himself
waver. He eyed the man once again, trying to ascertain if he should trust—allow
this man to help him. He did not like that he had kept mentioning the bed when
he had first come across him on the floor, and again in this small room, but
even he had admit that the other words; clean, heat, food, sleep, sounded
appealing. He had slept—in the yellow box—but to be clean? He remembered the
feeling of the damp fabric the man, Dean Winchester, had given him before, how
nice it had been to wipe away the dirt. He would like to wipe away more of the
dirt that had built up on this filthy world, and the process had been far nicer
than having a bucket of cold water doused over his head once a season. The man
kept mentioning healing and wounds too. He couldn't fathom how the man could
help with that. He healed in time, or the wounds were constantly aggravated.
Now he was free though, his Grace would be able to recover in time, and the
wounds would close over eventually.
It was the deep, but inaudible, rumble of his belly that swayed his decision.
The man was correct. If he remained in the state he was in for much longer,
dehydration and starvation would finish him before he could help to protect the
Earth from the twin armies working to push through to the outermost of the
worlds closest to Earth, on the Wind and Fire sides simultaneously.
He hesitated a moment longer, trying to push his Grace out, trying to see the
man's soul, trying to discover the truth past the man's words. But something
blocked his senses. He slumped a little in defeat, feeling exhaustion creep up
on him once more. His Grace must be even more depleted that he had believed;
days of hunger and cold, the two flights he had made to escape the man in front
of him, who he was willing to believe once more, willing to follow and trust.
He inclined his head to the man, silently letting him know that he would go
with him, just as he had asked.
The smile that covered the man's face pulsed something warm inside of Castiel.
Something that made him believe he was making the correct decision, if just for
now.
-
Castiel was shaking with an exhausting mix of fear, resignation and anger as
Dean Winchester led him back through the building, out into the rain-filled
night, so heavy that he could see only the glowing lights that everything on
this world seemed to have. He still could not work out how they illuminated
without fire, Grace or something natural.
He had capitulated silently to Dean Winchester's pleading promises, and allowed
him to place manacles on his wrists. He had bitten the inside of his cheek
bloody with frustration and suppressed anger, mostly directed at himself as he
had willingly let himself be captured once again. To be chained, even if his
captor had promised that it was a ruse, that it was the only method to get him
out of the precinct, as the building was known, without getting him locked in a
cell.
He had not spoken, not trusting his voice to remain calm, not believing himself
capable of restraining his depleted Grace from lashing out. So he had nodded,
and blinked back tears when the police had not been looking.
One of Dean Winchester's hands was resting lightly on his shoulder, the other
gripping one of his forearms, just above the metal binding his wrists together
behind his back. The metal was not iridium, it could not contain him, yet he
was not strong enough to break free of it, despite how loosely the man had
fastened the cuffs.
They had stepped through the doors into the narrow pathway through the
precinct. Through each door, Castiel presumed there were more rooms like the
one he had sat in with Dean Winchester, maybe each holding a man just trying to
save a world full of ungrateful and disbelieving humans from certain
destruction.
He had limply allowed the police to shove him along, the grip on his shoulder
more reassuring and supporting than restraining.
Once through another set of doors, he found himself in the first room he had
entered upon finding the precinct, with the tall table and the fat man still
leering.
“It's Losechester!” he called out as they passed, and he felt Dean Winchester's
grip tighten almost painfully on his arm and shoulder.
“What are you doing with the hobo, huh? I thought you were puttin' him in the
cells? Gonna take him around back for a beatin first?”
Castiel understood enough of the words, spoken in the American language, to get
the meaning of the man's words, but the tone of his voice had been enough.
“Finally grown a pair huh, Winchester? Finally realized you need to step up if
you wanna help keep the streets clean. Your daddy mighta finally thought you
worth somethin'” the gross man continued, a smirk plastered across his face.
Castiel had tensed up, wondering if, once again with this particular human, he
had misplaced his trust. Had he allowed himself to be put back in manacles just
to be beaten?
“Yeah yeah, Walt,” Dean Winchester had answered, false bravado ringing through
the words he could not understand, if the tense grip he had on Castiel was
anything to go by.
“Laugh it up. I’m taking him to the fucking hospital.” He had grumbled the
words out, but Castiel hadn't been able to twist to look at his face, to try
and work out what the words meant, to see if he was safe or not.
Castiel was getting tired of only half understanding anything that was spoken
around him, lies on top of lies, half truths—
In his cage, he was either ignored, fucked, or beaten. No one spoke to him,
unless it was an order. He never had to try and discern if anything was real or
not. This place left his head spinning.
“Even you'd get reprimanded for lettin' a suspect die in the cells, Walt,” Dean
had spat back over his shoulder as they passed the tall table. Castiel had
stumbled as Dean Winchester's elbow had connected with his back, nudging him
harshly toward the doors. His possibly-captor had grumbled and, with gentle
fingers still, had yelled “Move!” in his ear.
Through the doors, Castiel was half pushed, half supported down the steps and
pushed across that dark, rain filled, flat space in front of the building.
Before he could feel any relief at recognizing the same black carriage that
Dean Winchester had put him in that first night, a deep lilting voice rang out
across the space, bringing Dean Winchester, and his restraining hands, to a
halt.
“Brother!” Castiel heard Dean Winchester groan a little as he turned around,
dragging Castiel with him, the rain pounding against his already soaked head.
“What's up partner? When I got in I was told you were interviewin' and now
you're leaving? We not on patrol tonight?”
Castiel listened to the words that the two men spoke to each other in their
native tongue, the rumbling tone of Dean Winchester's voice, and the soft,
musical tone of the other as he picked out the occasional word that sounded
almost familiar to him.
“I”, “take” and “home” he recognized, garbled words sitting between them,
“hurt” sprang out, then a whole stream of unintelligible syllables. He watched
as the bulkier man nodded in understanding, a sympathetic expression on his
face. He slapped Dean Winchester on the shoulder, and nodded at Castiel, making
eye contact for the briefest of moments before speaking again. The only word
Castiel understood of the second man's speech was the repeated word “you” which
didn't give him any meaning of the whole.
Dean Winchester nodded and put gentle pressure on Castiel's shoulder to turn
him around again, toward his carriage. He looked around worriedly before
opening up the door and pushing Castiel forward into the seat. He landed in the
seat with a thump and found the door already closed on him, his body weight
resting painfully on his arms twisted behind him. Panic rose yet again as he
was left alone, restrained and captured, until the door on the other side
opened and Dean Winchester slid into the seat beside him. He began poking at
bits of the carriage until a quiet humming reached Castiel’s ears, and the
police looked around them once more, before making the carriage move away at
speed.
Castiel remained silent, chewing the inside of his cheek, the subsided panic
rising again, and higher, knowing that he was still manacled, leaving his chest
tight, his muscles taut.
It took long moments of nauseating fear before the man looked across at him and
raised his eyebrows in surprise. “Oh fuck,” his captor spat out in American,
making Castiel jerk back in fear against the door.
“No, no. You're good,” the human muttered, making Castiel confused on top of
everything else. How could he possibly be good, under the circumstances?
“Don't worry,” the man spoke again, flicking his gaze from the path to Castiel
once more.
Castiel watched Dean Winchester’s hands turn the wheel to the right and the
carriage slowed to a stop. The man got out. Castiel prepared to fight, his
meager Grace rising.
The door behind him opened, toppling him over a little until hands braced his
shoulders and pushed him until he was leaning forward. He couldn't help the
whimper that rose in his throat as he summoned his Grace to fight, ignoring his
shock at nearly falling, at the prone position he was being forced into.
“Crap, calm down, Cas. I'm going to unlock the handcuffs okay? Okay? Shit. Do
you understand? I'm freeing you.” He did understand. Or at the least, most of
the words made sense to him, but he was past trusting anything, past believing
that the words he knew meant the same to him as they did to the police. He felt
a warm hand grip his own gently, felt the rain splashing from something onto
the back of his neck, and pressure at his wrists. He felt an old familiar fear-
anger boiling under his skin.
Suddenly his hands were free once again, those same warm hands pulling him up
by the shoulders, straightening him around so his back pressed against the seat
comfortably. He looked at the man, illuminated in the glow from within the
carriage, worry clearly etched across his face as he crouched next to him out
in the pouring rain, looking up at Castiel. “I'm sorry, man, I didn't mean to
frighten you. I had to keep up the charade, uh, the lie, for Walt back in the
precinct. They wouldn't let me just free you. I had to make it look like I had
really arrested you and was really taking you to hospital. Do you understand?”
He looked concerned, and more than a little tired of the constant effort of
getting through to Castiel. He could understand that, at least.
He nodded slowly, keeping eye contact with the man, flexing his hands in front
of him. He watched as the police's eyes tracked his movement. “You are free.
I'll never imprison you Cas,” he stated slowly, fervently.
Castiel finally opened his mouth to take a breath, to speak for the first time
since the human had convinced him he would help him. “Thank you, Dean
Winchester.”
The man's lip ticked up a little and his eyes suddenly became warm rather than
worried. “My pleasure, Cas,” he answered, and Castiel smiled the tiniest amount
at the shortened version of his name and the sentiment behind the statement.
The human closed the carriage door softly and moved around to the other door
once again, sitting behind the wheel and the buttons, drenched from the
constant rain. The light was instantly extinguished as the door closed, and
Castiel, finally feeling safe enough to allow his curiosity to peak, let his
mind wonder and his mouth open.
He took a breath before looking over at the human. “Dean Winchester, how does
this carriage move? Nothing pulls it,” he asked, speaking slowly so that his
meaning did not get lost.
Dean Winchester frowned briefly before sparing Castiel a glance.
“Er, it's Dean, just Dean. You don't need to use my second name too. And, it’s
a car, not a carriage.” Castiel frowned as the man made a disbelieving face at
his silence.
“It runs on electricity?” Dean raised his eyebrows, his tone incredulous.
Castiel shook his head a little, indicating that the man's words were not
answering his question, they meant nothing to him.
Dean looked over again, flicking his eyes from the path they were moving down.
His frustrated groan at Castiel's confusion made him feel a little guilty, but
he was curious, and finally had a moment free from terror where he could ask.
The first moment, really. His first curiosity.
“Electricity. Made in an anti-matter reactor. You know, like in the Bomb?”
Castiel had no idea what the human was talking about.
“Jeez, how do you not know this stuff? The Bomb? The reason the world is
fucked? The reason for the Bridge? Basic history, man!” Castiel just shrugged,
until some of the meaning of Dean's words filtered through.
A bomb, whatever that was, caused the Bridge?
He knew that the Bridge had not always been there. The creation of the Bridge
was the reason he was here, trying to warn these dense humans that a war was
coming, the reason for the war in the first place.
On the menenth's home world, the legend said that a dust cloud had spread,
felling every tree in a fifteen-thousand length radius, evaporating people and
burning the ground. Lucifer, the king, the leader, their alpha,their God, had
approached, had stepped inside and had been torn from the world.
Days later he had tumbled back to the barren ground, his wings twisted and
torn, his halo ruined, his body broken and his mind gone. Their most powerful
angel had been destroyed by the half-sphere of heat haze sitting low to the
ground, half the sky-wide.
It took years of experimentation, of throwing the weakest of their kind into
the Bridge to learn what it really was.
When a person entered, they were thrown from one end to the other, bouncing and
rebounding in a maelstrom of light and color, battering and breaking their body
and soul. The least powerful angels came out alive, because they went in with
so little. Some fell to the ground on the opposite side of the Bridge,
discovering the tak. Others bounced back to the menenth's world, still others
landed at a neutral world in the middle. Some of these re-entered the Bridge
and returned to tell their tales. Many died or went insane, the source of their
power; their wings, their halos, broken beyond any ability to heal.
Years of sending slaves though the bridge, and hoping for the best, in order to
communicate with the tak, demons whose leader, too, was consumed by the Bridge,
resulted in a discovery that made the Bridge stable enough to step through to
the next world, in the direction of either Wind or Fire.
A ring of iron links, surrounding all forty-eight thousand lengths of  the
Bridge.
With that stability, the menenth and the tak moved, stepping from world to
world, seeking revenge on the neutral planet they believed had lured their
gods, their best and brightest, from them.
Castiel shook his head and focused on Dean again.
“Crap,” Dean grunted. “So, there was a war. The whole world was fighting, no
one knows why now,” he continued, settling himself back in the chair, eyes
glued to the path he was maneuvering the cardown. “Bombs were dropped on so
many cities, the explosions razed them to the ground, millions of people died.
Billions. The bombs were nuclear—” he quickly glanced at Castiel, who was rapt,
but not understanding, “—uh, that is to say, kind of poisonous. Like, uh,
poisonous, um, meteorites? Huge ones? They physically destroyed things, but
also made people, animals and the land sick.”
Dean took a deep breath before continuing, looking back at the path. “Then a
man's invention was hijacked—stolen. He had wanted to make electricity, power,
without burning coal or oil or gas, because we’d nearly run out.” He looked
over at Castiel to make sure he understood. He did, for the most part and
nodded for Dean to continue. “Well, his invention made lots and lots of power,
and they somehow turned it into a bomb. They dropped it in the middle of
America.”
The human heaved a sigh. “It ended the war. It was an explosion so many times
bigger than anything we’d seen before. It, along with years of nuclear bombs
being dropped everywhere, turned the sky black, what with the amount of ash
that was thrown up into the air. It raised the temperature of the Earth, which
made the sea rise. The black sky made the Earth cold again. That's why it never
stops raining, that’s why the sun never shines through the cloud. It's why
there's hardly any people—not enough food…
“So, although the Bomb ended the war, it destroyed our planet even more fully
than we had already managed. From all that though, the Bridge was made,” he
broke off again, muttering to himself that he couldn’t believe that Castiel
didn’t know it, before sighing and starting his tale again. “The Complex was
built around it in a huge ring, something like sixty-five miles around. It took
about fifty years for all that to happen though, for them to learn to control
it and jump anywhere they wanted.”
Dean shrugged, a sad expression on his face. “I guess the inventor of anti-
matter got his wish though. They finally built power plants using the
technology. That's what makes the car work.” He looked at Castiel briefly
again, “It also makes light and heat and the secondnet work and, well, pretty
much everything.”
Castiel's head was spinning from the huge influx of foreign terms, but he
generally got the gist. A large explosion had killed the Earth, and the humans
had tamed the power of it to make cars move and lights glow. He was stunned.
-
Castiel watched with interest as Dean strolled across his apartment,as he had
discovered it was called, and stepped into the ceramic tiled food area.
He finally had a moment to take in the room as he watched Dean retrieve the
same fluffy bread as he had given him before. His eyes slid from the bed,
despite what Dean had said about sleeping on it, and he suppressed a shudder,
hugging his hands around his damp chest. On the other side of the bed was a
door that led to the room where Dean kept the cleaning material. In the corner
was the food area and behind him were a chair a table and the wide soft looking
chair that Castiel very much wanted to sit upon.
Dean walked across the room with a dish in his hand, the hot bread, as before
slathered in salty butter. Eyeing the table where Dean had placed the dish
suddenly reminded him of Dean putting the coverings there that first time, when
he had been sick and disorientated. His curiosity rose once again, but he
really hoped that the answer would be less convoluted than Dean's explanation
about the car.
“Dean?” the man turned around at his voice. “What are these called?” he asked,
tugging at the torso covering and then gesturing to the rest of his body.
Dean's eyes widened before be frowned and tilted his head almost questioningly.
“That's, uh, a sweater, Cas,” he replied looking confused and Castiel frowned.
He may not have a complete grasp of the tongue, but he didn't think Dean had
answered his question properly. He tugged the gray thing again. “Sweater?”
Dean ran a hand through his hair. “Shit, yeah, man. I'll get you clean clothes
in a bit okay? I have another sweater somewhere.”
Castiel swiped his hand across his body again. “These are called clothes?” Dean
just nodded dumbly, a horrified look on his face.
Castiel smiled, pleased to have the correct word. “I like them,” he stated,
hoping that Dean's expression would be tempered by his words, as he turned to
his meal.
It took a moment before Dean turned back to the food area, wiping at his face
for some reason as he stood with his back turned to Castiel.
Over the next few moments, Castiel focused entirely on eating the hot bread,
then devouring the broth he was given, and then more toast,as Dean announced
it, that he placed by his elbow. His attention was only restored to the man
helping him, when he crouched down in front of him on the floor, looking
intently up into Castiel's face.
“Hey, I gotta go back to work soon okay?” Castiel nodded, grasping his meaning,
hoping for more toast. “I'll show you the bathroom. You need to shower and
shave and things. Not sure I can do much about your wounds now, but I'll show
you the cleaning stuff for them.” Castiel's attention drifted slightly to some
squares with small colorful paintings inside of them fixed to the wall, until
Dean stood up abruptly, and took his hand, dragging him to the bathroom, where
he proceeded to show him everything, point to it, name it and tell him how to
use it.
It seemed like an age until he heard the door to the apartment close, Dean
having gently nudged him back into the bathroom and closed the door on his
face.
He turned with a bewildered sigh to the array of things he was meant to do; the
toothbrush, the razor, the shower, the toilet.
He shivered and decided that he would turn on the shower first, Dean had said
it would be hot. He wriggled the dial and waited as he had been instructed,
turning to the toothbrush with a grim expression on his bearded face.
By the time he was done with his teeth, which had stung and bled, and made the
back of his throat feel cold, he was already tired of cleaning and washing
himself. He turned to the now steaming shower, unimpressed, and stripped,
deciding to get the chore over with.
He stepped under the falling water and gasped with pleasure.
-
“So, Brother.” Benny began, an eyebrow raised. “I reckon we both got stuff to
be doing tonight, yeah?” Dean looked across to his friend and just waited.
Benny had been dropping hints since Dean had rejoined him at work, patrolling
the slick and scummy streets and getting gently mocked for taking the injured
“crazy hobo” to hospital.
He and Benny would normally head straight to a bar after finishing their shift,
but Benny knew he wanted to get home to look out for Castiel. Benny clearly had
a plan for the evening too. “Go on,” Dean prompted, fishing his car keys from
his pocket.
“Mmmm… Andrea,” was all Benny said in reply, a dreamy look on his face.
“Please, not the one who was using you as a jungle gym the other night?” Dean
asked. She’d been cute, but annoying, and not girlfriend material for Benny. He
liked them fiery, not cutesy and clingy.
“Hell no!” Benny retorted, his face morphing to a comically appalled look. “Nah
brother. She's a vamiir; met Andrea on the front steps as I waved the ravbaa
off!” he grinned, and with a nod, sauntered away before Dean had a chance to
congratulate him.
There was not one single recorded instance of a conception between mixed
species relationships. If you wanted a blood-related child of your own, you had
to find a partner from your own planet. It was cruel and painful, but it meant
that the adoption rate was high for mixed species couples, despite the
picketers standing outside of the orphanages. Dean was pleased, he knew Benny
wanted a wife, kids, despite his bachelor lifestyle and regular hook-ups. He
hoped this Andrea worked out for him.
Dean threw himself into the Impala, pulling his hat from his head and shaking
off the rain that had dampened his hair despite the protection. He started Baby
and pulled away, enjoying a lighter patch of the rain as he sped down the same
side streets where he’d found Castiel earlier that week.
He jogged up the steps to the apartment, a smile on his face as he pictured
seeing the fiery man curled up in his bed, finally warm, comfortable and well
fed.
His smile fled his face as he got to the door, which swung open on it's hinges.
Inside, the apartment was cold and dark and completely empty.
Dean's heart squeezed in his chest, his lungs felt solid. Why had he gone
again? All Dean wanted to do was go straight back outside and search the
streets, find the man, bring him back home again, look after him. If anyone
needed looking after, it was Castiel, quiet, naive, damaged— He had promised to
help. He desperately wanted to help the man.
Dean sank to the end of the neatly made, untouched bed, his head in his hands.
He didn't know why this man had managed to make Dean care for him when all he
did was run from Dean's help, while begging for it at the same time. He was
confused, confused about the man's actions, but also his own feelings. How
could he miss a man he’d met twice? How could he miss a man who’d probably been
some kind of sex slave, who was spouting nonsense about a war coming? He didn't
know how, but that disappointed sensation at finding his home empty, was real.
He had wanted to see him again, talk to him, help him; and now that he was
gone, he missed him.
***** Chapter 5 *****
Castiel closed his eyes as he felt the hot water sluice over his cold and
aching body. His numerous wounds still stung, itched and ached, but the hot
water was pure bliss, ecstasy, sublime, divine pleasure. He grinned, and arched
his body, turning his face up toward the pouring water.
He had to concede, for all the faults this world had, showers made up for many
of them. The pullthis world had on his Grace was nothing compared to the
pleasure he felt in this moment, as a reason to stay on this rain soaked, sky
scorched planet.
He stood for long moments under the deluge, just letting the heat sink into his
battered body, watching the spray hit his bruised and sore skin, sluice off and
disappear down the hole.
Eventually he remembered Dean's words about soap and shampoo, and he found the
correct bottles sitting in the corner of the shower. He poured out the creamy
liquid, finding the aroma pleasing, without being able to place it. He rubbed
the stuff into his hair, giggling aloud in delight as the bubbles appeared,
coursing down his body. The giggles turned to sharp curses when the stuff got
in his eyes.
With more caution, he poured out the soap and scrubbed at his skin with the
washcloth. He wasn't sure what emotion he felt as the water turned pink when he
attacked the skin of his rear, the searing pain of reopened wounds stabbing at
him. The water, when it wasn't pink, had been gray-brown. He continued,
reapplying soap, scrubbing hard where he could, avoiding the scabbed wounds on
his shoulder, head and hip, until the water ran clear and cool.
With a sigh, revelling in the refreshingly cold water, he wriggled the dial
like Dean had told him until the shower stopped. He wrapped himself in a towel,
enjoying using the correct terms for the things Dean had showed him. The fluffy
fabric felt soft on his smarting skin.
A touch of doubt dropped into his mind as he made use of the toilet and turned
back to the sink, washing his hands carefully and refilling the sink to shave.
He understood that Dean had promised he would talk to him, when he returned,
about the war, about the menenth, about the tak. But, Dean was a police
officer. The police put bad people in cells, they imprisonedthem.
As Castiel fumbled with the scissors that Dean had told him to use, he wondered
what that made him, if he had been born in a cell, to a mother who had been
born in a cell too. Doubly damned, he supposed.
He sniggered at the strange foam in a metal tube that was meant to ease
shaving, he didn't really understand why, never having shaved before. A menenth
slave usually hacked at his beard once a season when he was chained fast to the
bars of the cage. He prefered it short, because it was harder for the alpha, or
any of the others, to pull his head around while they pounded into him, hurting
his neck too—he bit his lip, banishing the thought.
As he very slowly, and very carefully dragged the sharp blade down his cheek,
concentrating far too hard on his actions to take in his whole reflection, he
wondered if he really ought to trust Dean to warn the king or the leader of
this world about the coming war. The angels and the demons had been shuffling
from one world to another for more than five generations. All they wanted was
revenge on the place and the people who made the Bridge, the neutral planet
that, even now, with the iron chains, still drew the more powerful tumbling
through the void, spitting them into the terrifying place where the ground was
hard and the world was hemmed in by white walls which nearly obliterated the
sky.
Castiel rinsed his face clean, and wondered if those rumors were actually
faithful reports by the survivors. If their muddled descriptions were actually
this Complex that Dean had mentioned surrounded the Bridge on this world.
He looked up and stared blankly at the person in the glass.
He had occasionally seen fleeting and distorted glimpses of his reflection;
cell bars, glass bottles, knife blades. He had never wanted to look closer—to
see the image that was himself, the captive, the prisoner, the slave, the
victim. Pale skin, dark hair and beard. That was the extent of the knowledge of
himself. He knew his body—what he could see of himself, but beyond that?
He stared, blinking slowly at the face that was, and was not, his. He did not
associate himself with the face. He was built proud and fierce, strong and
resilient. He knew he would look like the humans, but he was not prepared for
the softness. Under the grazes and bruising, the nicks from the razor and the
red, angry stubble where his beard had sat, his skin was soft and clear. His
eyes were large, yet hooded, wide and open, where he felt closed and hidden.
His jaw was wide and angular, his cheeks sunken with sharp bones, all covered
in gentle looking, easily damaged skin.
He looked nothing like his captors, with their bone-like wings protruding
solidly from their backs, their wide glowing halos hanging above their heads
and pulsing softly with Grace. They had forceful arms, protected with more bone
at the knuckles, and four lower limbs ending in glowing points, moving on
invisible feet, giving the impression of floating. Their faces were bony like
their wings, and nothing like his own newly revealed one. Their eyes sat behind
the bone-like mask, glowing from deep within, closer to the way Castiel had
believed he should look than his own true face.
He noted the gray smears under his eyes marring his scrubbed, pink skin,
merging with the bruising from the graze on his face. His blue eyes were
bloodshot and heavy looking. He tried to see his wings, but they were too well
hidden. After his flights, the expenditure of his too-tired Grace, he didn't
have the power to bring them into a place that he could seethem, let alone
manifest them completely. The reflex to keep them hidden was too ingrained,
too, after something nearing one hundred and twenty seasons. Too strong was the
habit of keeping his Grace invisible.
Of course, that was why the menenth had imprisoned the hath in the first place;
their disgust over the fact that the hath’s Grace was hidden, was not on show
to see. The menenth were repulsed by the seeming lack. So they punished and
used the hath, until there were almost none left. Until Castiel was the only
one left.
He chuckled darkly as he wondered how the menenth would react when they finally
discovered that the humans truly had no Grace nor Wroth within them. When
survivors from the Bridge finally tumbled back to their home planet, reports of
the Graceless and Wrothless humans were just put down to the insanity the
Bridge caused, to the injuries it inflicted. It was simply not believed that a
creature could have no such power within them.
Castiel gave himself a last, long stare, trying to link the vision of him—his
face—with the feeling; the knowledge of himself, his personality, his Grace,
his soul, his purpose. Blinking slowly and shaking his head a little, he
stepped back into the main room of Dean's dwelling, doubt beginning to gnaw at
his insides.
He wondered what Dean had been so insistent that he be clean for, and he eyed
the bed in fear, where fresh clothes had been placed. He could not pretend it
did not feel amazing to be clean, though. He snatched up the clothing, pulling
it on, and revelled once again in the textures against his skin, where he had
only ever felt metal bars or invasive touches before—at least, not since his
brother had been taken.
Wrapping his arms around himself he suddenly felt at a loss as to what he was
meant to do. He turned to look at the pictures on the wall that had caught his
attention earlier. His face felt cold without the beard filling out his cheeks,
his body was warmed through and loose, he was still, always, hungry, and he
needed to warn these stupid humans that a mass of angels and demons were coming
to the Earth.
He had managed to escape just as the menenth were nearing their last few steps,
the last of the worlds that needed their iron linked chain in order to cross
the Bridge. They had intelligence from their Bridge-fodder that the next planet
they would have stepped onto was linked to every single one that followed it,
on both sides, to the Neutral planet; the Earth. The alpha had believed that,
should the armies make it through to the next world, all they would have to do
was step right back in and they could skip the next planets entirely. They
could jump straight across to the world that had started it all. They could
have their revenge. Revenge and control. It was an unspoken expectation that
once the menenth had the Earth, they would be able to continue their occupation
of every world that fought them, every world they enslaved, every world who
fought forthem, every world the humans had taken as their own and every world
the tak believed they had conquered too.
Castiel knew the hath were not the only species the menenth would be pleased to
end inside of their cages or mines.
Castiel stopped staring at the pictures on the wall of Dean's home. Many had
smiling faces of humans within, but it was the one of a grinning Dean and the
police officer who had almost stopped them while they left the precinct that
galvanised his will.
He had warn the humans now. Or it would not simply be this world that was
destroyed. There would be no more smiling humans. There would be no more
smiling anyone.
It took mere moments for Castiel to work out how to feed the fluffy bread into
the heating machine, like he had seen Dean do, and clumsily smear butter on it
with a spoon he found in the sink. He idly wondered, while he bit deeply into
the first of the stolen food, why a home needed two sinks. He had never known
one in a dwelling before, let alone clean or hot running water. He felt awed at
the Human's ingenuity even as he felt the lingering horror of what that
ingenuity had caused.
He placed more bread in the heater while he searched the apartment for the hard
foot coverings Dean had worn. He hadn't much liked the feeling of wet sockson
his feet.
He eventually found a pair at the same time the toast was done. He prioritised
his belly over his feet and shoved the food in his mouth, wondering if there
was anything he could take with him. He knew that on other worlds, natives or
foragers could harvest wild or cultivated food, and hunters could take down
animals, but Castiel had not seen anything living in this world of water and
gray hardness, other than people. He wasn't sure how long he would have to go
without food once he left in search of— Of what? he suddenly wondered.
He gave up searching for more food in favour of knotting the strings of the
foot coverings so that they couldn't fall off. They were different to the ones
Dean had worn, spongy in places and hard in others, colored pale gray and blue
and cutting off at the ankle. They were a little too small and pinched as he
stepped.
As he resumed his search for food, he started planning. Dean had mentioned the
Complex, and if it did tally with the reports of the all but wingless slaves
the menenth sent through the Bridge, then that was the epicentre. Surely the
humans would keep their leader there? And, if not, he could warn the keepers of
the Bridge to be on guard, be alert to the army. Perhaps humans had an army
too?
He clutched the pieces of buttery toast to him and looked about the apartment
sadly, wishing that he believed Dean would help him. He wanted to stay, to talk
to the kind police officer, but he had to warn the humans, and he had to warn
them now, not wait, not potentially be put back in a cell where he undoubtedly
belonged.
Taking a final look at an image of a younger Dean smiling softly out at him, he
turned and walked out the door. He left the building and strode down the street
outside of Dean's apartment, ducking under every piece of cover he could find.
He twisted his face in confusion, thinking that, for a race so capable of
building and ingenuity, that they would have thought of covered paths to
protect from the incessant rain.
-
After sleepless days and longer nights spent searching for the missing Castiel,
the last thing Dean wanted or needed was this—yet he ducked forward and fired
his taser into the last standing… person. At this point he wasn't even sure
what the fuck he, Benny, and three other teams of police officers, were
fighting. It was a group of three species that none of them had ever seen
before.
The massive, hulking creature toppled slowly to the ground, letting out a
surprisingly high pitched groan as it joined its brethren on the wet ground.
Benny slapped him on the back, sporting a grin, a bloody nose and a blossoming
black eye. The eight of them had managed to take down the five off-worlders who
had refused the standard identity and permit checks that third class officers
did on a regular basis. All off-worlders accepted the inconvenience. It was a
part of applying for citizenship and getting the permit. It was the only way to
keep tabs on the influx of off-worlders, as so many angels and demons were
capable of flight. The Complex, sadly, couldn't contain every person who jumped
through from any one of the hundreds of presumed planets out there. Only the
first twenty worlds to blue- and red- were controlled by the Complex and the
sister buildings built around the Bridge on each of those planets. Those worlds
had agreed to, and adhered to the Accord, unless they were empty, in which
case, humans had colonized, taking advantage of unspoiled worlds, abundant with
natural resources, clean air and plant life. The Complex was gearing up toward
creating a tourist trade for the short term, and planning the release of
control of Earth entirely in the long term, having given up on the rain and
cold, the dark skies, lack of food, too few people, poor education, mass
unemployment but with thousands of unfulfilled job positions. The world was a
mess. The Government no longer cared, and the Councils struggled to improve
things alone.
“Let's get these bastards loaded up, huh brother?” Dean nodded, wiping gingerly
at his cut eyebrow, and moving toward the van that the third backup pair of
officers to arrive had turned up in. He and an officer he vaguely recognized
grabbed the stretcher that was kept hooked behind the metal caged seating, and
between them they hauled it toward the five off-worlders, piled in a bruised
and groaning heap on the floor.
Dean concentrated on maneuvering the unwieldy board next to the largest of the
fallen. As he crouched behind their head to lift them from the shoulders he
finally took in what the other man was saying under his breath.
“Did you just say ‘You've been Garthed’?” he asked the gangly police officer,
incredulously.
The man looked up at him, all wide honest eyes and a grin splitting his face.
“Hell yeah!” he answered happily. Dean just shook his head, wondering how such
a chipper person could survive third class policing for as long as this man
had. He had been knocking around the precinct as long as Dean.
Despite the other man's scrawny frame, Dean knew he could pack a punch, and
between them they had no problem moving the stirring bodies onto the stretchers
and transferring them to the van. They had all five locked up within ten
minutes, and Dean banged on the side of the van to let the driver know he was
good to go.
Benny caught his eye and Dean nodded. They had to get back to the precinct and
file the reports, and, more than likely, sit in on the questioning that the
boss would do. Third class officers rarely got the fun of interrogation,
especially when it came to species no one had seen before. Dean, though, was
mostly just pleased that he, Benny and the others had come away with only minor
injuries, and that they’d not had to use unnecessary force to take the
uncooperative off-worlders down.
Dean and Benny walked back to where they had left their police issue car, tiny,
economic in its use of metals, even more economic in its use of plastics, and
filled with the terrifying Anti-Matter cell. He shuddered dramatically in
disgust as he slipped into the passenger seat, letting Benny have the wheel.
“Some fight, huh?” Benny asked, cuffing at his bloody nose.
“Yeah, man,” Dean answered, kneading his shoulder as he leaned back in the hard
seat, “I could barely understand what they were sayin', I don't envy the Boss
his interviews tonight.”
Benny grunted in agreement. As unknown species, they had to be from non-Accord
worlds, which often meant their language would be harsh on human ears until
someone found the root language. Many, as they were slap bang in the middle of
the continent, were formed from the Native American population, on whichever
world they came from. Some, like on Earth, had another main language, such as
English, Dutch or Spanish. Only one world so far, the nineteenth degree Blue,
had a completely original language. What linguists still existed on Earth had
had a field day, and travelled in from all over to study and learn before
hopping in the Bridge and all leaving for the Kyaalmya's planet. That had been
about fifteen years ago. The Government had only moved one more step to the
twentieth, both blue- and redwards before halting the expansion. Not
permanently, but to reassess and strengthen, both the Accord with the other
planets and the colonists on the empty worlds.
Dean fretted that the interviews would take all night. It was close to three
now; he was meant to be off in an hour, but with five uncooperative off-
worlders, he figured he would be required to stay and document the interviews.
At least find out how they got through the Complex without being halted at all
by the miles of white walls, the Army, the Police, the Gates, or locks.
The main failing of the Complex, and of the Bridge, was that it was enormous,
and therefore humans had yet to devise a method to box the Bridge in entirely.
A roof spanning a circle twenty miles across would be no mean feat, and there
was simply not enough manpower or materials, even if the technology was there.
So, on a fairly frequent basis, Dean and his colleagues picked up unregistered
off-worlders with impressive wing spans.
Dean idly wondered how the Complex and the Government dealt with the miles and
miles of empty land, full of newly grown, anemic-looking forests, stunted
farmland and rubble, because it was certain that not all off-worlders flocked
to the only city within flight distance.
Bobby had certainly picked up a few. They were usually confused, with no idea
what had happened—it seemed that if you used the Bridge without the safeguards
that the Complex had somehow created, the ride was more than bumpy. It was
violent. Bobby’d had to 'put down' a few of the more injured off-worlders;
wings snapped, heads crushed, minds unravelled… It wasn't pretty.
His thoughts returned, with a groan, to the fear that he would be stuck in the
precinct all night, filling out forms and trying to make sense of the guttural
grunts and growls that the newcomers made. He wanted to get back on the
streets, as he had done every night since Castiel had left.
That hollow feeling welled up inside of him again, the feeling of defeat, of
having let someone down.
He cursed and blamed himself for not having taken a moment to ask what Castiel
had been so worried about, what war it was that was supposedly coming. Maybe he
could have calmed his fears, maybe he could have placated him and comforted
him. Maybe he could have shown him that it was probably just the mad and
terrible people who had held him captive, who had raped him and left him,
bloody, to die in the street.
He had been looking through files and leads and open cases in his spare time in
the precinct too, hoping for an indication as to where Castiel had escaped
from— or been chased from, he just wasn't sure. But there was nothing, no
commune, no religious group, no other strange, heavily accented, naked men
turning up. He was at a loss, and so, once he finished work, he picked another
part of the city and either walked or drove, trawling the streets. He was
looking for a man wearing his clothes, in his sneakers, with a dark mop of
hair, and a badly shaved, heavily stubbled face, if the blood splatters and
hair left in his sink were any indication.
Being forced into overtime ruined his chance of a sleep after a few hours
searching for the man that he felt was now his responsibility, the man that he
had failed.
Benny knew that Dean was worried. Dean’s friend did not share his fears, did
not understand, and had gently mocked him until Dean had lost his shit and
yelled at his friend for being an ass. Benny had backed down, realising that
Dean felt his duty was to the wounded man, and he had apologised.
He looked over at Dean now, as they pulled into the parking lot alongside the
other Officers' vehicles. “Don't worry brother, I'll do my best to make sure
you're out on time.” Dean smiled tiredly at him, wondering, not for the first
time, if Benny just thought him insane.
He just nodded his thanks and hauled himself into the precinct after his
friend.
-
“Well. I'd say they're insane. I think the Bridge got to them,” Sergeant Walker
announced as he stepped from the interview room with the last of the angels.
Dean shook his head. It was quarter of five in the morning, and he was itching
to leave.
“Stupid assholes keep going on about an invasion for heaven's sake! They keep
tryin' to taunt us.” Gorden sniggered, although the linguist on staff, Ms.
Bradbury, looked serious and concerned.
Dean's head snapped up at Walker's words. An invasion? He looked at Benny. He
hadn’t shared everything that Castiel had told him with his friend. Up until
that moment he’d believed that Castiel had probably been fed false information
or that his captors were insane, rather than Castiel making it up. He had not
really, trulybelieved that Castiel might be telling the truth in the way that
Dean would see it…
He had not taken Castiel seriously.
“Shit,” he swore viciously under his breath. “I need to go, now, Benny,” he
said quietly, determined to redouble his efforts. He would search again until
dawn and then the next day, he would put out a warrant with the man's
description. He needed to speak to Castiel. Now.
-
Castiel, in a fit of frustrated anger, yelled to the black sky, an inarticulate
wail of impotency and annoyance as he smashed his fist into the metal door he
was leaning his forehead against, hidden from the rain by the tiniest of
overhangs above him.
Tears ran down his face, mingling with the rain, and a shudder of cold met the
shudder of pain rising up his arms.
He had never learned swear words in the hath's language, and the American
tongue's words didn't have the same wrath behind them. He swore fluently and at
length in the menenth's native tongue, hissing and spitting the satisfying
sounds out at volume, cursing the humans’ complete lack of desire to help
themselves, the disgust they could hold for someone who should be seen as one
of their own. Even fellow vagrants only shook their heads, refusing to talk or
help.
He spat on the ground, like the menenth slaves did in derision of their alpha,
to show his disgust for this planet and every forsaken inhabitant of it.
Gabriel would have been disgusted with him, had he lived, had he still been
with his forty-season younger brother.
Another hot tear over flowed his blurry vision, clearing it for a moment,
allowing him to see the red and blue reflection of flashing lights that
signified another police car.
He slumped in defeat.
He had been the only human who had given him the merest hint of interest in his
pleas to help this terrible planet.
***** Chapter 6 *****
Dean rubbed furiously at his face and decided to call it a night. He had driven
to every location on the South side of the city that he could possibly imagine
Castiel going to look for help. He’d even contemplated calling his brother and
asking if Castiel had made it to the Complex. At that point reality had hit,
brutally, as he realized that no one could walk that distance; it would take at
least a week, if not longer. And no one, absolutely no one, picked up vagrants
on the side of the road.
He started the Impala, already thinking ahead to the next morning when he could
start looking around the shelters and in what remained of the churches. He
revved the engine and pulled out, driving home through the fat, heavy rain
drops and icy wind.
Dean stepped out of the car in the dryness of his garage and flopped forward,
resting his forehead against the dimly glowing arch of the roof.
Rather than return home before heading out to look for Castiel, Dean had begun
his search straight from work. He’d spent the afternoon before work trawling
the secondnet looking for any references on the news sites to Castiel. Dean
knew he ought to begin looking for reports of invasions and wars, unusual
angels and demons too, now that Gordon-bloody-Walker had laughed off the
threat, just as he himself had originally done with Cas. The guilt stuck yet
another claw in his belly, twisting. “Shit,” he cursed, hating himself for
writing off the man's worries.
He sighed, knowing that bitching and moaning wasn't going to help, and slammed
the door of the car shut—apologizing to his Baby before hauling on the garage
door to close it against the rain.
He shivered, yawning hugely as he walked around the corner of the building,
head tucked into his chest against the downpour. The rain was only getting
heavier as the dawn broke, making the black night look slightly sick in tones
of gray, green and orange. He looked up to glare at the oddly colored,
flickering street lamp, wondering how LED bulbs could fatigue and turn green,
even if they werepractically ancient—and stopped mid-stride, his foot hanging
stupidly in the air.
“Fuck,” he hissed under his breath, catching sight of the hunched figure on the
steps to his apartment's main door. A twist in his gut was the only indication
he needed to knowthat this was Castiel. “Cas?” he asked aloud, his voice
carrying through the sound of the rain, hesitant and uneasy. The hunched figure
didn't look up, its head obscured completely by a hood pulled low, the clothes
so darkened with rain that Dean couldn't be certain they were even his own—but
somehow he knew that this was his man.
He ran the three or four paces to the steps, and simply fell to his knees
before Castiel, who sat on the third step up. He could look up under the hood
from that angle, non-threatening, lower, vulnerable. He needed Cas to trust him
this time. He wanted to help. Neededto.
He blew out a breath when he saw the man's face, relief coursing through him as
he realized it was indeed Castiel. Half a second later a healthy dose of
electricity shot through his belly straight to his groin at the sight of the
man's darkly stubbled face; all angular lines and a sharp jaw, all but
unrecognizable from the bearded, worn out and broken man from before. “Fuck,
man—” He swallowed and tried to continue but found he didn't have words to tell
Castiel how relieved he felt, how pleased, how guilty, how sorry. He simply
leaned up and wrapped his arms around the pinched looking, quaking and
shivering man.
Castiel's entire body went taut, and Dean remembered, too late, his hypothesis
that the man had been kept a prisoner, that he may have been tortured. He’d
even forgotten the evidence he’d seen with his own two eyes, that the man had
been raped, in his relief at discovering Castiel’s return. Physically touching
him probably wasn't the best of ideas, but, he figured, he couldn’t undo it
now, so he held on, no force behind the hug, simply holding the other man
against him.
The hug went on too long, but Dean stayed there, biting his lip, trying not to
cry or laugh at the mix of emotion he felt at finally having another chance to
help this near stranger. This man who was finally relaxing, still silent, his
arms still wrapped around his own torso; but Dean could feel his shoulders
lowering incrementally, his breath no longer stuttering in his chest.
Dean gave him a brief squeeze before peeling his arms away. He rocked back on
his knees, ducking his head to make eye contact. Castiel's face was mostly in
shadow, the merest sliver of blue on show under his furrowed brows. “Hello
Dean,” he said, hoarse and gravelly, the exhaustion plain.
“Let's get you inside, huh?” Dean asked, although it wasn't a question. He was
already pulling Castiel to his wobbly feet.
By the time he had helped the freezing and soaked man into his apartment, Dean
had decided on a course of action. Being restrained and patient had resulted in
Castiel leaving him twice already. Communication and a direct approach seemed
to be his last remaining option. He bit his lip against the discomfort he felt
already settling in his gut at the thought.
He dropped his arm from the shivering man's back the moment they were in the
door and he was sure that Castiel's balance was good enough for him to remain
standing. Giving the man a chance to see what he was doing, Dean reached up and
pulled the sodden hood from Cas’ head. He ducked low to force him to make eye
contact, and the thought crossed his mind, for the second time in ten minutes,
that he was beautiful. His eyes, ethereal as they had been before, now stood
out, accusing, terrified, stubborn and frightening all at once. They were
bright and bloodshot against the pale skin of his cheeks. His cheekbones were
high, his jaw strong. His lips suddenly stood out, too—without the halo of dark
beard surrounding them, they were wide and generous, dried and chapped despite
the constant rain.
That thought snapped him out of his thoughts and reminded him what his mission
was. “Shower. Now,” he said, snapping the other man's dazed attention back to
his own  face. “But first,” and he turned toward the kitchen, “you need to
drink. You look, well, fucked.” He poured a tall glass and handed it to
Castiel, whose eyes widened and, still without a word, he downed the entire
glass.
“Thank you,” Castiel rasped, looking at the empty glass mournfully. Dean
dutifully poured a second glass and handed it across with a slight chuckle,
watching as he drink it all once again.
“Go use the shower man, you can drink more afterwards. Get clean and warm. I'll
find ya some moreclothes okay? And then I wanna talk to you, alright?”
Castiel looked at him, solid, stoic, shoulders square despite the shivers still
wracking his body. “And I you, Dean.” Cas nodded at Dean, and then edged toward
the bathroom.
Dean heard the lock slide slowly across, and he smiled a little, remembering
the first time he had nudged Castiel inside; his bewildered expression, the
amazement at the concept of being allowed to lock himselfinside, of Dean being
unable to get to him.
He shook his head in sorrow before pulling himself back together again. He had
a mission to accomplish, and a tightly constricted chest, filled with happiness
and terrible sorrow, would not actually help Castiel.
He placed a pan of gray-brown stew on his stove and set it to warm slowly while
he cut bread into thick slices. Yet again he dug through his things looking for
clothes that Castiel could wear. He ended up pulling out the same jeans that
Castiel had discarded the last time he had showered, then fled. He found a long
sleeved t-shirt and fresh underwear from his drawers too.
Finally he cranked up the heat and sat on the two seater couch, staring off to
the side through the glazed wall, watching the raindrops splatter against the
glass in the dark gray dawn. They slid slowly down, dragging ancient ash, grit
and grime along with them.
He slid with them, drifting to thoughts of his mother, her warmth, the amazing
aroma their home had always seemed to hold. Despite the weather being worse
back when he was a child—the food even more scarce—their home had always
smelled of roasting meat and baking pies. He’d wondered on a regular basis as a
kid how his parents had managed to acquire such food, but when he joined the
force, trying valiantly to follow in his father’s footsteps, he’d discovered
that John had used the privileges of rank to get his hands on meat and fresh
milk and the more expensive, sought after items. It had put a new light on a
massive argument he remembered witnessing between his parents, which resulted
soon after, in a dearth of rich tasty warm foods, and a surplus of root
vegetables all tasting of ash.
That had only been a few short years before his mother had been killed, and
after that, John had done little to care for his kids, let alone intimidate his
way to better food for them all. After that moment, the only fresh meat he got
was straight from slaughter on Bobby's farm. Still a rarity, scrawny chickens,
too old to lay, were still considered a treat.
Dean started from his thoughts at the sound of the door to the bathroom
opening, turning to see it letting out billowing clouds of steam, and a very
pink Castiel wrapped tightly and defiantly in a towel. There was a slightly
hesitant look on his face and his knuckles were white where they clutched the
towel to his waist.
“My—” he swallowed convulsively. “My clothes are wet and cold,” he stated,
glaring daringly at Dean.
Dean felt his cheeks heat up at the sight of Castiel's naked torso. He
swallowed thickly before nodding at the bed. The man's eyes went wide and he
flinched backward into the safety of the bathroom before Dean could unstick his
mouth to speak. “They're on the bed, man,” he managed to say before Castiel
could slam the door protectively.
He watched as Castiel looked slowly between him, lying back on the couch, and
the bed, a few meters away. He was clearly calculating speeds and distance, and
how likely he would be to get away if Dean decided to tackle him. To put the
man at ease, Dean raised his feet on to the arm of the small sofa, and relaxed
back, his arms behind his head. “Take your time, food will be ready when you
are, okay?”
The man's startled blue eyes seemed to calm as his shoulders dropped a little.
He darted forward with surprising speed, grabbing up the small pile of clothing
and disappeared back into the steamy bathroom. Dean smiled a little sadly and
threw himself off the sofa, going in search of some liquor. The stuff was
hideously expensive, and pretty damn awful if he admitted it to himself, but
sometimes a little hard whiskey was needed.
He poured a tiny measure into the bottom of a crystal glass he had found hidden
deep inside a ruined building, miraculously unbroken, when he was fourteen.
He’d kept it and treasured it ever since. He liked to think it was hundreds of
years old, and if people still cared for old things that were of little use,
then it would have been worth a lot of money. As it was, the glittering, cut
glass tumbler was only useful for drinking things out of.
He sipped the warming liquid, rolling it across his tongue until the back of
his nose tickled. Leaning his elbows on the small kitchen counter, he savoured
the drink until Castiel reemerged from the bathroom. He swallowed the final
drops and turned to the man he couldn't help but feel pleased to have back in
his home.
He had a smudge of white foam in the corner of his mouth, and was still
sporting the stubble he had gone in with. He was skinny, pale, tired and still
wounded, his ear a mangled mess where the cartilage should have been. He also
had an expression of steel, a will of iron, and a stubbornness to match Dean’s
own.
Dean smiled widely at him.
“Sit down on the couch, I'll grab you some food okay?” Castiel eyed him for a
moment, as he placed the tumbler far back on the counter against the wall.
“Okay Dean,” he agreed quietly before he walked hesitantly toward the couch. He
groaned in pleasure as he lowered himself to the soft cushions and folded
blankets, covering the broken springs.
Dean precariously balanced the bread, two bowls of stew and spoons in his arms
and walked toward the other man. He handed Cas a bowl, then sat down beside
him. There wasn't much room between their bodies, but he squeezed the plate of
bread onto the sofa between their knees; not only to make it easier to share,
but so that there was a divide between him and the hurt, abused man.
“Dig in, Cas,” he grinned. Castiel frowned in confusion until he saw Dean start
to spoon the steaming hot stew into his mouth, dipping in bread between
mouthfuls.
Dean swore—silently—to himself, that the man almost smiled at his terrible
table manners.
There was silence for a long moment, only filled by the scraping of spoons over
chipped china and slurping from Dean. Finally, after second helpings for them
both, and a third bowl for Castiel, there were only the grunts of satisfaction
as they both lay back on the sofa holding their distended bellies.
Dean chuckled at Castiel's blissed out expression. He looked relaxed and
comfortable as he looked up at Dean, his blue eyes contrasting with the flush
of pink his cheeks had finally taken on. Dean smiled with satisfaction that the
warmth and food he’d provided had done that.
“I am sorry Dean,” Castiel finally croaked out, after matching Dean’s gaze. His
voice was less rasping, but just as deep as it had been, accented just as
strangely.
Dean sat up straighter, twisting and frowning down at Castiel. “What for?”
Castiel pulled his mouth to one side before answering, seeming to close in on
himself. “I stole food and water and foot coverings. I am sorry.”
Dean snorted, slumping back onto the couch cushions. “Fuck the shoes and food
'n stuff, man! I'd rather you were sorry for running out on me!” He smiled to
soften his words, causing a look of pure bewilderment to cross the other man's
face.
“You are annoyed that I left, but not that I stole?”
Dean sighed, trying to word things in a way the man would understand, his
imprisonment or seclusion probably affecting his grasp of modern Native. “I'm
not annoyed. I wanted to help you, but you didn't give me a chance. So, I
suppose I'm, I dunno, hurt? Like, upset? But yeah, I don't care about the other
stuff. You can help yourself to whatever you need.”
Castiel just looked blank, almost as if he couldn't really comprehend what Dean
was saying. He sat there, face vacant, still holding his flat belly as if he
had never been full before, staring at the wall past Dean’s head, where his
collection of photographs hung.
Dean decided to wait—it looked as if the man was processing—he figured he
deserved a little time.
He got up and cleared the bowls from their dinner, eyeing the lightening sky
beyond the rain lashed window. It was nearing dawn, and he was conscious that
he ought to try and sleep— But, what was one more too-long day? Why change the
habit of a lifetime?
He turned back to face the man sitting on his couch, still gazing at the wall.
He truly was breathtaking to look at; his hair drying in the warmth into a wild
mess of spikes, all different lengths. Dean's clothes swamped him, baggy on his
hungry-looking frame. Even his mangled ear and the prominent graze across his
cheek didn't detract from Dean’s impression of the man, adding ‘badass’ to the
list of properties that made it difficult for Dean to tear his eyes from him.
It was wrong of him to think that way, but he couldn't help it, he liked a man
who could just shake off a punch to the face, or in this case—a fall to the
ground after he was—
His unfinished thought sobered him, like a dousing in a winter rainstorm.
With a shiver, he squared his shoulders and took a breath. “So, I was looking
for you,” he began, forcibly changing the direction of his thoughts, as he
tried to drag Castiel back from wherever he’d gone mentally too. “When you left
here, I tried to find you.”
The man stared at him a moment, blinking slowly until his eyes seemed to focus.
“I—I didn't think you actually meant to help.” He shrugged a little
apologetically, “You are a police officer. You told me the Police lock people
up. I do not wish to be locked up again.”
Dean strode back across the room and knelt on the floor in front of Castiel. He
wanted to take his hands, but held back, not wanting to crowd the man. “I've
already told you Cas, I will never lock you up. You are free.” He smiled softly
up at the man's intent expression. “I mean, I'd like you to choose to stay with
me, uh, here—safe,” he grimaced and shrugged, “but you are always free to go.”
He caught his own breath on his next exhale, realising how true the throwaway
statement rang for him.
He did want Castiel to stay.
With him.
The loaded sentence hanging in the air between them seemed to completely escape
Castiel's notice. Dean found himself able to breathe again as Cas pushed
himself up slightly on the sofa. “I need to war—”
“You need to warn, yes. I need to talk to you about that too. Honestly. But—”
and Dean wriggled where he sat on the floor, not wanting to get down to
business so fast. He wanted to take a moment to make this man feel appreciated,
cared for. “But, will you let me take a look at some of those wounds for you
first? I want to check they're healing okay.”
Castiel frowned and looked down at himself, as if his ripped skin would be
visible through Dean's t-shirt. Dean breathed out in relief as Castiel inclined
his head in silent agreement, even though his expression had lost none of the
ferocity of his desperation.
Dean jumped up from the floor, glad to be given permission to help. His abrupt
movement caused Castiel to flinch back, and Dean paused to apologize before
turning back to the bathroom. He collected the meager bandages and rubbing
alcohol he had stowed in the back of the cupboard, almost expecting Castiel to
be gone when he turned back to the couch.
He decided to ignore the flutter of relief in his gut as he found Castiel still
sitting on his couch, looking discomforted and anxious.
“Sit up on the chair, man. It'll be easier for me to check you out.” He rolled
his eyes at the double meaning, but hoped it would go right over Castiel's
head—like so many of his words did. He put the medical things on the table as
Castiel heaved himself back out of the sofa, a grunt of dissatisfaction leaving
him with a scowl. Dean smiled at the grouchy man a little. “You want coffee or
anything before I get started?”
Castiel just looked up at him blankly. “Erm, it's a black dri- Ugh, you know
what, never mind. Just… give me a minute.”
Dean dug into his precious store of expensive luxury items, thinking that if
anyone deserved them, Castiel probably did. He poured out water first, and
turned the stove back on, busying himself—all the while, feeling Castiel's eyes
boring into his back. It took him a few long minutes, but when he turned back
around, Castiel was sniffing the air appreciatively, an anticipatory look in
his eye. Dean placed the mugs on the table and told Castiel to wait a moment as
it was hot. Dried milk was easier to get hold of than fresh, but still
difficult to find sometimes. Chocolate was in the realms of whiskey for
expense. Nonetheless, in front of the two of them were hot chocolates, each
with a dash of whiskey.
Dean picked up some some of the soft, clean rags and soaked them in the rubbing
alcohol before he perched on the arm of the sofa so he could get close enough
to Castiel's cheek. Castiel's attention kept wandering to the hot chocolate,
and he laughed, giving up for the moment, letting Cas take a sip. The wide eyed
wonderment on his face was more than worth it.
“Wuh-” was his articulate response, which made Dean snigger.
“Wow, I think is the word you're lookin' for there my friend,” he answered
jovially. “Brace yourself,” he muttered, before swiping the soft fabric over
Castiel's grazed cheek. The man flinched, but otherwise made no response except
to sip more of the hot chocolate.
Dean's smile grew; he couldn't help it. The dude was badass.
Castiel's eyes flicked back to Dean's face, watching him as he paused, adding
more alcohol to the blood stained, gritty cloth. He was caught by the man’s
gaze. “What?” Castiel asked, all gravel voice and chocolate breath.
Dean bit his lip to stop from laughing. “Sorry, you're just— No, never mind.
You want me to take a look at those other scabs? You did a pretty good job
getting the gravel out, but I'd like to check if that's cool?” The man frowned
on the last word, but shrugged and stood, lifting the shirt and pulling down
the jeans and boxers just enough to reveal the grazed hip bone and the
thickening hair leading down the crease of his hip.
Dean said nothing and focused on the wound. It's not like he hadn't seen the
guy completely naked already— But somehow it was different now.
Now, he kind of had feelings for the guy. He was strong, stronger than Dean
could ever hope to be. And determined, robust, but childlike—like when he
sipped hot chocolate from a mug, and had the thick stuff stuck to his top lip.
Dean spent the next fifteen minutes carefully digging and prying out tiny
pieces of asphalt from the rest of the man's wounds, carefully avoiding the
lacerations on the man's lower back, ass and thighs. He was not qualified to
deal with that kind of thing, and would take the man to the hospital before he
went to work. Although Dean had to admit with surprise that, as the man took
his seat again, he showed no discomfort at putting his weight on the wounds.
He took a fortifying mouthful of his own hot chocolate before getting Castiel
to turn so that he could deal with he mangled remains of his ear. “Jeez, what
the hell happened here?” he muttered, as he finally got a close look at the
ruined cartilage.
The man's head twitched in an aborted shrug as Dean's fingers hovered over the
gaping hole where the ear was supposed to form a complete shell. There was
still dried blood sticking to the remains of the lobe and pooling in the bottom
part where Castiel had clearly not tried to clean the wound. He wasn’t
surprised, it looked astonishingly painful.
“Something was ripped out,” Castiel finally stated, which Dean could damn well
see, but he only nodded.
“Okay, okay,” he began soothingly, and mindlessly ran his fingers through the
hair at the back of the man's head, like he used to do with Sam when he was a
child and had hurt himself. “This is gonna hurt like a bitch, Cas. But I gotta
clean it up—it's already infected.” He could see the yellow stuff sticking to
the edges of the wound and the angry red color to the puffy skin of the whole
ear and some of the surrounding flesh.
Castiel nodded, his eyes closed and a soft expression on his face. “Just do
it,” he answered, letting Dean's hand at the back of his head take the weight
as his neck muscles relaxed. Dean smiled and huffed out a laugh at the man's
behaviour. He was like a cat—well, like cats were supposed to be, if anyone
kept them as pets any more.
Spreading his fingers in Castiel's glossy dark hair, the gray early morning
light picking out red-brown highlights in the mess, he angled the man's head so
he could see what was left of his ear.
It almost looked as if something had taken a bite out of it, except that the
outer edges of the lobe hadn't been completely removed. He could almost push
them back in to create a circle, just leaving the back part of the ear missing.
He started dabbing at the sticky mess with a fresh piece of alcohol soaked
material, ignoring Castiel's silent flinching with a certain degree of awe. If
it were him, he was certain that he would be at least gritting his teeth. Apart
from a tiny frown sitting between his closed eyes, Castiel looked at peace.
“There,” he stated when he had it as clean as possible. The wound was old
enough by now for no fresh blood to well up, despite Dean's coaxing away of the
hardened pus and blood. Castiel's eyes fluttered open as Dean gently pushed his
head back into a comfortable position for him to be able to move away. “I'm
just gonna bandage it okay?”
Castiel nodded, a dazed smile on his face, and Dean moved back to the bathroom
to get more of the material he could use as bandages. It wouldn't last long
without the adhesive bandages that cost a fortune, but hopefully it would last
long enough for the wound to close over properly, without getting re-infected.
“We'll need to keep it clean when these bandages come off, but this'll do for
now.” he said softly as he tilted Castiel's head back again, this time pulling
his hand back as he needed them both to wrap his ear, carefully trying to
bolster the edges of the cartilage so they sat close to where they were meant
to.
Castiel merely hummed in acknowledgement, the tiny smile on his face once
again.
“I didn't expect you to find that so pleasant, Cas.” Dean finally said, almost
a whisper, not wanting to disturb the man's peace where he swayed in his seat.
He crouched down in front of Castiel when he was done, pleased with his handy
work, hoping that both of them were in a place now to discuss the warnings that
Castiel had been voicing.
Castiel's eyes drifted open to pin Dean. “It was nice to be touched softly,” he
stated, a hard edge souring his soft voice, his gaze became steadily more
calculating, the blue becoming flinty. Dean watched as Castiel's face closed up
a little, his jaw stiffened, and he tilted his head slightly, searching Dean's
face intently. “Thank you Dean. You are a kind man.”
“I—” Dean began, but suddenly found Castiel's lips pressing hard against his
own.
***** Chapter 7 *****
Dean stumbled back, his hands up, warding Castiel away—the temptation was
intense. He hadn’t realized how strongly he’d begun to feel for the stoic,
flighty man.
But that kiss hadn’t been soft, caring—no, it had been violent, desperate.
Dean found himself conflicted, simultaneously wanting to push Castiel far away
from him, to protect him, to stop this—this thing. But also desperately wanting
to pull him back in, to never let go, to show him how a kiss could really feel.
But it wasn’t right, even Cas’ wild look screamed of fear, of something… else.
Something Dean couldn’t place, something broken, unhappy. Dean wanted to hold
him, to make him feel safe. He even reached out, an aborted movement—
One he regretted, as Castiel saw, leapt on it, and smashed his face against
Dean’s again; a bruising kiss, close mouthed, his eyes drawn down in a
determined frown. No happiness, no pleasure, no desire to be seen in his
expression at all.
Dean screwed his eyes shut, battling with himself, reminding himself to treat
Castiel kindly, even as his teeth scraped across Dean’s lip. He growled his
dissatisfaction, needing to show Castiel how to do this right, and terrified at
the number of wrongs that were piling up. He barely even knew the man, and a
little gentleness shouldn't cause this reaction.
His growl of complaint did nothing to deter Cas, whose hands were scrabbling
determinedly at his clothing.
He groaned, this time the noise more of lust and frustration as Castiel dropped
to his knees in front of Dean, having given up on his own clothes, his hands
limp at his sides, head tilted back—ready.
Dean felt a little sick at the man’s easy reaction, his complete lack of
expression. Just blankness, resignation.
How could he leave him like this? When he wanted the man—when he wanted to look
after him, hold him, keep him safe and protected. He didn’t want to take
advantage of Castiel, but he did not want that broken expression on his face
either. He wanted to see those wide, clear eyes, dark with lust, smiling,
without pain, warm and calm. Dean just wanted to make him happy.
Dean dropped to his knees, coming level with Cas, his eyes widening again in
fear, confusion. Dean bit his own lip, still entirely uncertain if this was
right, if Castiel truly wanted it. But, he thought, he couldn’t allow the man
to believe that what he’d done was a kiss.
Keeping his eyes open to watch Castiel’s reaction, and letting go his lip from
between his teeth, Dean leaned in and placed a soft, careful, kiss to Castiel’s
wide and surprisingly soft lips.
He was lost.
He leaned further into the kiss, gently opening his lips and pressing his
tongue against Castiel's still closed mouth. The man startled, flinching back a
little, but he opened his mouth, just slightly, to allow Dean access. Dean
watched Castiel's face, all angular lines, so near his own. Instead of finding
flushed skin and a soft expression, Castiel was frowning hard in concentration,
his blue eyes flat, open, hard.
Dean pulled back, meeting those eyes. “Cas?” Castiel startled slightly and
knelt up, abruptly pulling off the t-shirt and then rolling to his feet,
dropping the jeans and toeing off the socks, all in a matter of moments. It was
perfunctory and brutal, and it left Dean cold.
“Cas, Cas, woah.” Dean held up his hands again, trying slow Castiel's momentum,
his disinterested expression. At Dean's words, Castiel looked back down to
Dean, catching his eyes, his placating pose.
“You—” Castiel began.
“Just come back here,” Dean suggested, his tone soft. He reached out, gently
taking the hand of the naked man standing before him. Castiel didn’t even have
an erection for heaven’s sake. Dean pulled Castiel back down to the floor to
sit next to him. “Hey,” he whispered, ducking his head forward and placing a
chaste kiss against Castiel's lips.
-
Castiel was interrupted by Dean before he could complete his sentence. “You—”
he hadn't even been sure how he had wanted to finished the sentence though—you
don’t want to fuck me? You don’t want this? You don't want me to thank you?
Dean was nice; he had been gentle toward Castiel, had shown him comforts that
he had never experienced before—how else was he meant to show that he was
grateful? He had almost always been fucked by a guard after being given food,
or told to thank his master when he was washed by being pushed down on the bed.
The only thing he had was his body.
He took Dean's hand, feeling calluses along his palm and against certain
fingers. The sensation was interesting, a marked contrast to the man's lips
that had been so very soft, and to the bony and armoured skin of his captors.
He sank to his knees again, ignoring the twang in his backside, amused
internally because he had never gone so long without being fucked, and the
constant pain had almost disappeared.
He was mildly irritated that soon he would get pummelled into all over again,
opening the scabbed wounds around his hole. Or, if Dean had a mind to, he could
use a weapon or his fingernails, Castiel supposed, as humans didn't have the
horny bone like hands that menenth did, and he could slash at the skin of his
rear and lower back too.
But he owed Dean thanks, he was worthy of it at least, for showing him warmth
and comfort.
“Hey,” Dean whispered, snapping his attention back to the man before him. He
was surprised by the softness of the kiss once again. He had been kissed
before, sometimes the guards did it, sometimes one of the other slaves, often
another menenth when they were brought to him for the Alpha’s amusement, but it
was always either closed mouthed and hard, almost painful, or biting and
tearing and assuredly painful.
This softness, this tentative exploration, was entirely new. He expected pain,
and he got heat and tenderness.
He twisted away from Dean then, rolling onto his knees, presenting his ass to
Dean, to do with what he would. He placed his forearms on the edge of the soft
seat, his knees taking the hardness from the floor.
“Cas—” he heard Dean choke off, pain and sadness all too obvious in his voice.
He turned slightly to look at the man, still fully clothed, a heated and
sorrowful expression evident on his face. Castiel didn't understand the human's
hesitation. He turned back, facing away from Dean, and tried to enter the place
where he took himself away from his body and floated.
But Dean, it seemed had other ideas, ideas that pulled him from the quiet place
with a shock.
He felt Dean's body curl around his back side, clearly on his knees, in a
position to ram home, but the push never came. Castiel had the odd sensation of
Dean's clothes, hard and rough, soft and light, tracing over his skin, from the
upper part of his thigh to his lower back. Then he felt the hot trace of
fingers, just touching his skin, drawing lines from the base of his neck, down,
between his shoulder blades, down to the point where the aching pain from his
unpracticed flight stopped. The touch moved back up, around the side of his
ribs, then in again, caressing his shoulder blades.
It wasn't the pain that brought tears to his eyes, nor made him bite his lip to
prevent a sob from escaping.
He almost sighed with relief when Dean's clothed body pulled away from his
naked one. The soft touch was almost too much, too new, too unexpected.
Dean's next action ruined that momentary relief from the unknown though.
Castiel flinched when a strange, hot-warm touch gently pressed against the skin
of his butt. Finger tips touched the other cheek, tracing horizontal lines
against his skin. Another hot damp press higher up, then another and another,
the fingers never leaving his skin until they got closer to his hole, when they
started skipping over parts.
Castiel gasped the moment he realized what Dean was actually doing. His fingers
were tracing the network of scars he had across his skin there, the jagged
lines torn by violent hands, nothing like Dean's gentle touch. The gaps in his
caress were where the newest cuts were, the touch careful despite the fact they
were all but healed.
The hot press to the other side must be Dean's lips. Leaving a trail of cool
spots of dampness in the wake of his kisses. Castiel felt a tear leak through
his squeezed closed eyelids.
“I am not putting anything near you there, Castiel,” Dean mumbled, pressing
another lightning hot kiss to his torn skin.
He sensed Dean sit up, the cooler air rushing into the gap where he had sat,
then he felt Dean's hands against his hips, gently pushing and pulling him up,
up and onto the soft seat, to sit down facing Dean. He kept his eyes shut the
whole time, too fearful of Dean's softness. He wasn’t worried, exactly, that it
would end, but almost more that it would continue.
He heard a soft huff of breath from Dean somewhere above him, then his rough
thumb wiped the tear from his cheek. He didn't flinch in response. “I'm glad I
can get you going at least a little though, man. But, please, don't cry. I
won't hurt you. You gotta tell me if I do.”
Castiel frowned at Dean's words and opened his eyes. The sight before him was
breathtaking. Dean was fully naked, his skin soft and pink and flushed. His
eyes followed the smattering of golden hair sitting between his nipples, down
to his navel, then the golden trail, getting darker and thicker as it turned
into hair like Castiel had, sitting around the base of his cock. His eyes
skittered away at that point. The human's penis was erect, and the sight scared
him, even if his body was similar to Castiel's. He was taller, but softer,
flushed and beautiful, rather than the bony, sharp lines the menenth had.
His eyes landed on his own lap, and he jumped in surprise, flinching away from
his own body.
His own penis was slightly erect.
He opened his mouth to protest, but found there were no words. He hadn't had an
erection since he was a child, since shortly after he hit puberty and Gabriel
was taken from him and he had been put to use by his captors.
His mouth fell open and Dean knelt on the floor before him, eyes soft and
beautiful. He noticed for the first time that they were green.
“If you— If you won't put anything—” Castiel tried to ask how he could thank
Dean, but Dean just grinned up at him and, if Castiel had felt capable, the
look in his eye would have sent him running. It was predatory—but not
unpleasant.
Dean ducked his head and Castiel didn't have to time to even process what the
action was, until he saw the the man intended to- bite? Was this the pain
finally?
He let out a strangled cry as Dean's mouth closed around his cock, hot tongue
pressed under the head, sucking gently. There were no teeth, no pain. “Wha-?”
He let out inarticulately, before letting his head drop back, too dazed to
respond further.
Dean was… pleasuring him?
He half wailed, half grunted, as Dean's fingers closed around the base of his
cock and massaged the skin. He felt the human's other fingers running through
the hair on his legs, the hair around his cock, then dipping to his balls, to
massage gently, ever so gently.
Castiel wanted to look, but he didn't dare. He felt Dean's mouth, pressure from
his lips, slide down his cock more fully, and in the back of his mind, Castiel
realized that he must be fully erect, that his body wantedsex. He had forgotten
that it was even possible.
A low growl sounded in Dean's throat, and Castiel once again felt half
threatened, but almost too pleasured to care. He grunted when Dean pulled off,
sucking hard at the end, before licking over the head. The air, too cold,
touching the wet and heated skin made him shiver.
“No, Cas, I'm not putting anything near your hole.” He spoke, voice deep,
amusement making the sound rich. “How about you put somethin' near mine huh?”
A sudden thrash of raindrops hitting the glass wall behind him seemed to echo
his thoughts. Did Dean— “Do you mean… Me? In you?” He barely recognized his own
voice, it growled, an echo of a crash of thunder outside. He opened his eyes to
find the room almost in complete darkness again. But he could not process it
because before him, practically glowing, was Dean. Smiling gently, lips red and
puffy, cock standing high and leaking.
A jolt of want went through him as Dean nodded his head.
Castiel was surprised by his own movement as he pulled Dean to him, spinning
him onto the soft seat and positioning him to kneel against the side, his legs
wide. Castiel kneeled up behind him, fascinated by his own cock as he moved. It
was long and hard, the tip purpled slightly, glistening a little from Dean's
saliva in the megre illumination from the outside light.
He grasped Dean's hips, trying to mirror the man's gentleness before
positioning himself and trying to push in.
“Woah!” Dean yelled and pulled away, rolling with a thump to the floor. “Fuck!
Fucking woah! Jeez Cas!” Castiel held onto the back of the seat, perplexed.
Dean had said he could, hadn't he?
“You— You don't have a clue what you did wro—” Dean began, and shook his head,
the surprise and astonished terror falling from his face in a moment. “I
thought you were gonna—”
He huffed out a breath. Castiel was surprised to find himself saddened that
Dean's cock was no longer stiff, falling between his legs as he sat on the
floor, looking up at him, a rueful expression now on his face.
“Wait there.” Dean pointed at Castiel, and pushed himself from the floor.
Castiel caught the man's sigh as he looked at the bed, shaking his head
minutely. He followed Dean’s gaze, and wondered why they were not using it. But
it seemed Dean was different, and did things differently than Castiel had ever
experienced. He had been soft, where anyone else had been vicious; he had
touched, not scratched, not to mention he wanted to take Castiel into his own
body.
Dean returned to the small soft seat, pushing Castiel back slightly, so that he
had more room. He had things in his hand, which he dropped to the floor out of
sight. “Come here,” Dean breathed out, making room next to him on the seat,
between his body, reclining, relaxed, and the cushioned back of the seat.
Castiel hesitantly reclined, confused as to why Dean wanted him to lie next to
him. The seat was so short that his knees had to bend underneath Dean’s, until
he hooked one leg over his, and Castiel’s knees touched the human's backside.
“That's it,” Dean breathed out and spread his other leg so that he was splayed
wide, one foot resting on the floor. Castiel's face was close to his, one arm
trapped underneath his own body, the other held tight to his side. He was
surprised to find Dean's arm slung around his own shoulders, his face turned up
toward his own. Castiel pulled his head back, and more surprise filtered
through his bewildered mind that Dean was once again erect, the tip glistening.
Castiel swallowed hard.
Dean's free hand reached across his body, leaning up a little and twisting to
reach Castiel's slightly softened erection. A groan sounded in the back of his
throat at the pressure and movement. He only realized that his eyes had fallen
closed, when Dean's mouth pressed against his, his tongue nudging at his lips.
Castiel lost himself to the sensations, forgetting that he was meant to be
allowing Dean to pleasure himself with Castiel's body, forgetting that he had
wanted to thank Dean for his kindness.
He simply felt.Felt things as he never had before; softness and care. Tears
welled up behind his closed eyes once again as he moved his own tongue over
Dean's, feeling that he would have to thank the man all over again, simply for
kissing him with heat and passion. He listened rapt as Dean groaned, and
squeezed slightly harder at his cock.
Dean's lips didn’t leave his own as his hand stopped stroking at Castiel’s
dick, the roughened palm stroking down his thigh to where his hand was still
splayed, resting, not-quite-relaxed against his leg. Dean tangled his fingers
with Castiel's and pulled his hand, his arm, across both their bodies, pulling
him in against his side a little more.
Dean wrapped Castiel's hand around his cock. Castiel had never felt anything
like it. On the rare occasions his hands had been unbound, it was never to
touch like this. The man's penis was heavy, hot and hard in his hand, the skin
sliding over the stiffness underneath. A moan escaped his throat, swallowed
immediately by Dean's mouth still on his.
Dean's hand left his, leaving him to continue stroking him alone. He
experimented, swiping his thumb over the head, feeling the stickiness, pushing
his fingers down through the coarse hair and squeezing at the man's balls
gently.
He ignored everything else going on around him—he was aware of Dean fumbling
with something, making his kissing become distracted. He was half aware that
the weather had turned into a raging storm beyond the impossible glass of the
wall. He knew it had returned to the near blackness of night—but he didn't
care. He concentrated on Dean's tongue moving against his own, the tickle of
his eye lashes on his cheek, the occasional touch of Dean's hip to his cock,
and the glorious sensation of bringing pleasure to the human by rubbing slowly
and firmly along the length of his solid penis.
Eventually, Dean pulled back, blinking up at him, breathing hard. “You— you're
amazing,” he breathed out. Castiel frowned. He understood the words, but the
concept escaped him.
The man huffed a laugh and pried his fingers from his dick. “Here,” he
whispered and took Castiel's hand. From a bottle that had been at his side,
Dean poured a little cold liquid onto his fingers. Castiel just looked at it,
unsure what he was supposed to do with it.
Dean craned his neck back up, and captured his lips again. Castiel felt lost
and bewildered. But he smiled into the now—almost familiar—sensation.
Dean's hand took his own again, and he led his palm down, down past his balls,
hitching his leg further up Castiel's body at the same time, opening his legs
wider. The movement trapped Castiel’s aching cock a little and the feeling was
good. He moaned again into Dean's mouth, but Dean didn't respond. Instead, he
swiveled his hand around Castiel's, and pushed his fingers down, smearing the
cold liquid against the skin beneath his balls.
Castiel's eyes opened when he finally realized where Dean was leading his hand,
his fingers. But Dean pulled back, a smile on his face. “It's lube. Massage me,
press in, massage more. It makes sex, well, good.” He smiled up at Castiel,
completely unconcerned that he had just told Castiel to enter him—to breech
him. “Go on, Cas, please,” he whispered against his lips. And, although Castiel
could not comprehend why he would want it, why he would want to prolong the
action and the pain, he, very slowly, very hesitantly, did as he was asked.
He pushed a slick digit against Dean's hole, rubbing small circles against the
tight flesh, his own chest tight with mild fear and worry. Through their kiss,
he kept his eyes open, watching Dean’s face carefully. Dean's ecstatic, loud
groan a moment later, delivered straight into Castiel's mouth, was enough to
set aside some of his doubt.
Maybe humans did not feel such pain there as the hath did. Or maybe… Sex really
was notalways the same as rape. Maybe the doubt he had harbored at those words,
told to him so long ago, was unfounded after all.
He put his mind to his task, pressing gently and rubbing and touching,
eliciting small groans and pants from Dean, until his finger just slipped
inside. The action surprised him a little and he drew back, studying Dean's
face for the agony he still half expected, but all he saw was blissed out
pleasure. “More, Cas, use two fingers, then three. Stretch me out. Oh god,
please stretch me out. I want you,” he whispered into the space between them,
his breath, smelling of the chocolate, coming in quick gasps between them.
He spent long moments doing just as Dean asked, only pausing when Dean pulled
his hand back to drizzle more of the lube over his fingers.
Dean's eyes were squeezed shut by the time he pulled Castiel's hand away, his
mouth unmoving, just panting.
Castiel knew he looked wide eyed, amazed at the beautiful spectacle of this
human, heaving in breaths, rolling his hips into nothing, a tiny frown formed
between his brows. Castiel leaned in to kiss it away, lost completely in the
feel of the lax grip around his cock, not even stroking. Lost in the man before
him, lit with the frequent flashes of lightning blasting through the clouds and
the slashing rain beyond their room—their own private space.
Dean finally stilled his movement and looked up at Castiel and smiled wide, his
eyes raking across Castiel's face and chest. He wriggled away from Castiel, and
he found that he didn't want him to go. He curled his fingers back into the
flesh of Dean's thigh, holding him close. Dean chuckled quietly, just above the
sound of the rain. “It's okay. I'm not goin' anywhere. Kneel up, Cas.”
Castiel didn't understand, but, not understanding hadn't done him any
disfavours thus far, so he knelt up, allowing Dean to push him further away,
positioning him between his knees, facing him.
Dean was spread wide below him, the red glistening hole matching the head of
his own straining cock. Castiel had to swallow, the want strong. “Just a sec,”
Dean muttered, leaning up and pulling a small metallic square from the floor.
“We gotta use this as I'm outta Sanemet and I dunno where you been.” He
continued to mutter nonsense, almost too low for Castiel to hear as he tore
open the square and pulled something from within. Castiel yelped as Dean leaned
forward and wrapped his hands down his cock without warning. “Sorry,” the man
sniggered, looking anything but, and Castiel looked down to find his erection
was sheathed in a fine layer of what appeared to be rubber, although it was
unlike anything he had ever seen before.
Dean leaned back and tilted his pelvis, exposing the tempting hole once again,
spreading his legs impossibly further.
Castiel just sat there on his heels, looking at the display. He felt his cock
twitch in desire. But he didn’t know exactly what Dean wanted of him—it was too
much, too different to anything he had experienced in his life before.
Dean rolled his eyes and leaned up enough to grab Castiel's lube smeared hand.
He pulled him down with him, dragging Castiel's body over his so that he
slotted between the man's thighs. Something clicked in his head, as Dean leaned
up again to capture his mouth with his own.
Castiel had never even consideredthat intercourse could function in this
position. But the head of his cock was undoubtedly hovering a mere thrust from
Dean's open fluttering hole.
He suddenly froze, gripped with fear—he didn't want to hurt Dean, as it had
always hurt Castiel. But the man was pulling back from their kiss muttering,
“Please, please Cas, now, do it, please,” under his breath.
He took a deep breath and leaned forward, down, meeting his lips against Dean's
again, before he felt the blunt end of his cock hit Dean's slick skin. He
fumbled down with his hand, maneuvering himself until he felt his head press
into the indentation of Dean's ass.
He replaced his hand, to find it tangled immediately with Dean's, their tongues
just moving against one another, and he leaned in, finally daring to, and found
heat—it was so hot—pressure, perfection immediately engulfing his cock. It was
so easy sliding within—no noise but a high pitched whine of pleasure from both
of them. He slid to the hilt.
“Oh, fuck, Cas you're huge, you're perfect,” Dean groaned below him.
He stared down and the man, his face contorted, panting, a slight smile
touching his open mouth.
Castiel was entranced.
Dean's eyes snapped open, “Move.” An order. Castiel obeyed.
Fearful of seeing Dean's expression contort into one of agony and pain, Castiel
slid out slowly and undulated his hips to slide home again, so, so slow.
“Fuck,” hissed Dean, his eyes wide and unfocused, the thunder sounding faint
against the man's moans and heaving breath. He rocked again, sliding out to the
tip and easily rolling back inside of Dean's tight heat. He realized that Dean
wasn't the only one panting, moaning. His own groans lost to his ears against
the pleasure coursing through his body, not only from the length of his
erection, but from where Dean's knees pressed to his sides, where Dean's hands
fisted in his own on the seat, where Dean's mouth was latched onto his neck. He
felt alive, his body thrumming with gold and sunshine, fresh breezes and
lightning strikes. He opened his eyes, throwing his head back to see the storm
that raged without, a storm that matched the one heaving within himself.
He began thrusting into Dean in earnest, constantly aware of his comfort, his
pleasure; words of praise, and thanks, adoration and amazement falling from his
lips—in what languages, he no longer knew. He looked back down to Dean to see
his eyes squeezed shut, head flung back, mouth open, fingers balled in fists
around his own hands.
Castiel had seen many people climax. It had never been anything like this. They
grunted, cursed, filled whichever orifice they had their penis in, withdrew and
left.
Dean— Dean’s eyes flew open, another rumble of thunder accompanying his moaning
gasp. His back arched, his chest heaved and his cock pulsed, sending string
after string of burning white fluid to splatter across Castiel's stomach and
his own chest.
The sight of that alone, of the obvious pleasure, his blown eyes, wide lips,
flushed skin, sent Castiel into ecstasy himself. It was the first time he had
climaxed since experiencing it in his sleep as a youth.
He flung his own head back, his eyes mostly shut. He felt Dean's hands curl
around his thighs. The glorious heat sank down his spine, collecting between
his legs. His movement became erratic, his breathing wild, his heartbeat
thumping against the walls of his chest. He opened his mouth but had no
knowledge if he made a sound or not, he could only hear the rain and Dean’s
breath. He slammed into Dean, hard, once more, sending his seed deep into the
human, pushing himself further in with each thrust. He dropped his head,
grunting, as one final wave of pleasure overtook him with a last snap of his
hips.
He looked up to meet Dean's eyes, wearing a lazy smile on his lips—
Only to see Dean's gaze, wide—not with lust or completion, but with fear and
disbelief. The man's body was taut, his breathing shallow and rapid. His eyes
were fixed over Castiel’s shoulders, flicking from side to side as he tried to
scrabble back, away and off Castiel's body, where he was still firmly within
him.
Horror rose in Castiel. It was not because he had caused him pain that Dean was
suddenly trying to flee; it was because he could see his wings.
He checked over his own shoulder in terror, knowing, knowing for a fact, that
his wings and halo were hidden. He could feelit if he manifested them, they
were not even brought forth to the point where he could fly, yet Dean was
clearly watching them move with growing agitation. Behind him was nothing but
empty space, yet Dean's eyes tracked the movement of his flapping as he pushed
himself back and off the human.
Dean's eyes finally met Castiel's. “You— You're—a-a-an ang—”
That was as far as Castiel allowed Dean's words to get.
Gently, with the utmost care, he pressed his clean fore- and middle-fingers to
Dean's forehead and asked him to sleep.
***** Chapter 8 *****
Castiel cursed loud and long, once more utilising the menenth's more guttural
language. Guilt, fear, disappointment, sadness and anger all warred within his
body. He stretched out his invisible wings in agitation, then curled one
forward to check, for the fifth time since fleeing Dean's apartment again, if
they truly were still hidden. They were. There was no possibility that Dean
could have seen his wings, or his halo, and yet his panicked eyes had clearly
tracked the movement of them…
The fear that Dean had worked out what he was had driven him from the warmth of
Dean's home once again. He grit his teeth against the surge of emotion that the
simple act of leaving had left him with.
Not only had he lost his chance with his one ally against the hoards probably
flinging themselves through the Bridge already, but he had lost warmth and
dryness, a friendly smile and a careful touch. He was angry at Dean too, for
somehow being able to see his wings, when he was certain that he hadn't allowed
them to show. And then there was the sex— His anger bubbled away and he stopped
short, biting his lip. He felt no anger toward Dean for that, he could not
blame him. He had offered himself in thanks. At a distance now, Castiel felt a
red hot feeling clutch at his chest. He realized that Dean had never intended
to take that from him, had never expected to rape him. When it was offered, he
almost had to be cajoled. Castiel felt something akin to shame, something he
hardly recognized in himself. As much as he regretted his motives, and the
outcome, Castiel found that he could not regret the action itself. Dean had
shown him that sex wasn't always hateful, filled with and fuelled by fear,
pain, terror and agony. It could be soft and pleasurable. The warmth from his
own organsm still pulsed in his gut, leaving him wanting more, wanting more of
Dean.
But he could never go back to Dean. He had to hide, for if Dean knew he was a
hath, that would be the end.
He had to disappear and yet, somehow still prevent this forsaken world from
being destroyed. If only to prevent Dean from being destroyed.
Castiel stopped in the unceasing rain. The thunder and lightning had passed
over, but the storm still raged. He needed to find this Complex, but with the
cloud cover of this world, let alone a storm, he couldn’t even begin to
contemplate true flight, even if his Grace were sufficiently strong again. It
wasn't, as evidenced by the bandage wrapped around his still healing ear, and
the cuts across his backside that Dean had kissed so tenderly.
A sob worked its way out of his chest and he bit into his fist to keep from
letting go. He would not cry again, not this day, and certainly not because he
felt like he had lost something that he had never truly had in the first place.
He ducked under an overhang across the path cut between the tall gray
buildings. A city, Dean had called this place. One of the few to survive their
war. He knew he was lengths from the Bridge, but, from what Dean had said, that
was where the Complex was. That was where he needed to be.
He no longer trusted his memory of where the Bridge was, the high buildings,
the exhaustion, and the healing taxing his Grace were disorientating him. As he
couldn't fly there over land, he would have to walk, but he could at least jump
world to check his direction before he got lost in the maze of buildings once
again, he thought.
He closed his eyes and thought of a world he knew the menenth had deserted
entirely on their path through, when he was still young, before his brother had
been taken from him. They had stayed on the planet only long enough to rally
everyone before they had relaid the hundreds of lengthsof iron chain in order
to step to the next world, taking the thousands of slaves, troops, and angels
from other worlds with them.
The planet had been completely given up; useless, barren. The shell of the
world too hard and too deep for the menenth to mine for the iron they needed,
or anything else precious.
Castiel opened his eyes and found himself on the bare planet, his wings
complaining of the strain of flying between worlds, but Castiel ignored it. It
was nowhere near as taxing as using them to move himself longitudinally through
air. That he learnt on his first flight; jumping straight from his cage and
trying to move across the world at the same time as he flitted from one planet
to another.
The bare planet before him boasted dry air, if a cool atmosphere, and he
shivered as he turned on the spot looking for the telltale arc of wavering air
that was the Bridge on the horizon.
He knew vaguely how far from the Bridge he was, but he was surprised to find
that he couldn't see it, truly, from his position on the featureless globe he
stood on, dripping water onto the solid ground. He could, however, just discern
the detritus that the encampment had left behind when the menenth had passed
through. The litter of broken tents, bodily waste, discarded weaponry,
forgotten baskets of food and the charred remains of campfires spread across
lengths and lengths of the earth in a huge swath. He wrinkled his nose in
disgust at the disregard the invading masses had for such a dead planet, let
alone how much worse, horrifically so, it had been where the indigenous
population had fought or tried to stop the marching war.
The point he found himself standing in was an encampment on many worlds; near
the fresh water sea, far enough from the Bridge, but close enough too. Castiel
knewexactly where he was now. Finding his way to the Bridge, to the Complex on
Earth would not be a problem. He sighed and eyed the distance. Too far to even
see the Bridge, it would take him days to walk, and that was over this barren
world. On Earth? He couldn't guess the time it would take.
He could fly, he supposed with a sigh. He could walk as far as he could on this
bare rock, allow another day or two for his Grace to recover from the years of
captivity and dampening the iridium eyelet and manacles had caused, then fly
across this world. All before returning to the Earth to help protect the humans
and their planet that seemed to have an intrinsic pullon his Grace.
A wind started up, chilling him through the clothes he had put back on in
Dean's apartment before leaving again.
He sighed against the freezing breeze. Who was he trying to fool? He was still
injured, torn open and sore, even after so long without fresh wounds; there was
no way his Grace could sustain him in a true flight, even if he rested for two
days straight, eating and sleeping as his body desired. He had to go back to
Earth and try to warn humans who could get to the Complex, or to acquire a car
and get there himself.
Once again, he cursed Dean for being so tender and warm, for making Castiel
lose control, for that was the only explanation he could come up with—despite
knowingthat he hadn't—that Dean could have seen his wings. Dean had been his
only realistic option to help prevent this war. Dean had even said he wanted to
help, wanted to talk.
He sat and rested—unsure what else to do—until the sun crested the height of
its arc.
He watched as it started to dip toward the horizon once again, the sky turning
inky and the stars revealing themselves to him for the first time in days.
He shook his head before concentrating on his destination once again, the place
where the sun never came out from behind the cloud, blaming himself for mis-
reading the human, for not realising that he hadn't wanted thanks in that
manner.
If he had just taken without thought to Dean's kindness he would still have an
ally, instead of being hunted.
-
Castiel opened his eyes only to have them lashed with windborne rain, and he
wondered again with a scowl, whether it was simply the pullthat brought so many
angels and demons to this world. It certainly wasn't the climate.
He pointed himself in the correct direction again, and stepped back out into
the rain with a sigh. He found himself wishing he had taken the discarded
hoodie, rather than leaving Dean’s side in simply the thin item he had given
him to wear on his top half. At least he had shoes this time, he thought,
enjoying the dryness of his feet.
He lowered his head and started trudging, stepping around the deepest puddles
and keeping his arms wrapped around his middle, trying to keep himself warm,
still chilled from the dry, cold, bare planet.
He allowed his thoughts to drift back to the morning spent with Dean; to the
moment his uncertainty disappeared in the obvious pleasure he was causing Dean.
He smiled at the thought, before the reality crashed down around him once more.
Dean now knew he was an angel, and by default, that meant he knew he was a
hath. No other angel or demon could hide their Grace nor Wroth. Most were
obviously non-human looking too, but their wings or halo, horns or tail, at
least one aspect of their angelic or demonic selves were always visible. The
menenth took exception to the fact that the hath—when they had appeared on
their planet, scared and fleeing the fate of their own world—habitually kept
the evidence of their angelic nature hidden.
The menenth found them disgusting and imprisoned them, the last of their
kind—fleeing the death that filled their planet—the only angels able to fly
between worlds without the war torn rift that was the Bridge. Not that the
Bridge existed when the hath had first found themselves slaves, alongside many
of the menenth’s own kind. Their captors allowed them to breed from time to
time, slowly raping them to a dwindling death until, with Gabriel torn from
him, Castiel was the last one alive.
A set of harsh syllables sounded and his attention snapped back to his
surroundings, the rain washed grayness. A lead weight dropped through his gut
and his heart.
His preoccupation had led to the worst possible place he could be; a rain-
washed dead end with a group composed of menenth slaves, too low in
intelligence and Grace to make it back through the Bridge.
The sight of the dimly glowing ends of their legs, their horny, bone like wings
and weakly shining halos, made the bile rise in his throat.
After the warmth he had spent with Dean these… creatures made him sick; he
could already see their erections, large and bony, displacing the breecclouth
draped about their hips.
He tried to remind himself that they did not know what he was. He blended in
perfectly as human; he was yet to see angels or demons gang up in groups on
humans, despite their lack of Grace or Wroth, their lesser strength, often
their lesser stature—
Something in his gut warned him that these were not the same as the other
angels or demons on this planet, though. Something about them had a tinge of
insanity, rising lust, of the need to hurt and take. That something that only
menenth touched by the Bridge had. That something that he had seen time and
time again.
These must be fresh from the Bridge, too scrambled to just go straight back in
and return to their original location or find their destination.
Fear struck him at a new thought— Either that, or they were the foreguard,
scouting for the humans beyond the Complex that he had been hoping to find.
Maybe he was too late already? Maybe the war was already here.
The grotesquely aroused angels were oblivious to the thoughts flying through
Castiel's mind. They spat out their syllabus, and it took Castiel a moment to
readjust to the guttural speech and thick vowels.
“You still have the weapon?” one asked another, his blue glowing eyes never
leaving Castiel's diminutive form.
“Yes,” the other leered, grinning and adjusting the cloth over his groin.
“We can take this one and leave it like we did the others,” said a third
menenth that had circled around behind Castiel.
He cursed silently. These angels were barely even people anymore. Given a free
reign, discarded by their leader on another planet when they had no hope of
making it back though the Bridge— It appeared they had decided to rape and kill
anything in their path, or so it seemed, going by the gore splattered across
the two in front of him, and the blood smeared on the cloth barely covering the
large one's straining, bony cock.
It suddenly dawned on Castiel that he would not escape this without a fight. A
longing shot through him for the warm arms of Dean, his soft eyes and easy
smile, but, with a growl in his throat he turned his gaze to his would be
attackers, assessing and cruel. He wouldn't go down easy, he had too much to
fight for.
The one who had readjusted himself now had a metallic… thingin his hand. A tube
attached to a handle. Castiel did not know what it was, but had seen one
before; when he was in the Police precinct, sitting in belts attached to
humans’ hips.
His stomach jolted again as he realized this was the weapon the first had
spoken of. Even though he did not understand how it could maim, he did not
doubt that it could.
He widened his stance and brought his arms up to protect his face and chest. He
wondered at the irony of having just run from Dean, lamenting the fact he would
never be allowed to see him again, to almost certainly never being able to see
him, because he would soon simply be so much meat on the ground.
The breecclouth-hitching-one lifted the metallic tube, and with glee on his
face, pointed it at Castiel. He eyed it warily as the large angel stamped
toward him. He didn't dare move his eyes from the first two, but he could hear
the third moving behind him too. He swallowed, fear suddenly prickling across
his skin.
A scratching laugh suddenly filled the narrow path, making the hair rise on his
skin, he knew that sound. It didn't last long though, a terrifyingly loud bang
filled the space between the towering buildings. Castiel blinked, watching
smoke get pulled to the ground by the rain.
It was not until arms gripped him from behind that he felt the pain.
He looked down at his body, wondering why his torso was screaming at him like
it never had before. He saw blood. Blood blossoming and blooming, falling and
staining his torso; flowing down. He absently thought that Dean would be
unhappy it had ruined his clothes.
Time slowed, and he almost stepped from the world— But he knew it would not
help with the angel holding him from behind, he would only take him with him,
draining his Grace even further. His left arm was useless, heavy at his side.
Pain screamed through him, dulling his other senses.
The bloodiest one reached him, a foul grin spread across his flattened, bone-
like mask of a face. The glowing stumps of his legs illuminated the tent of his
coverings. Castiel's vision swam and he finally felt his tired Grace kick in,
trying to mend the hole in his shoulder. He struggled slightly against the hold
of the one behind him, feeling the hard length of his talon like penis dig into
his lower back. One advantage to being a seventh shorter than the menenth he
supposed, deliriously.
He watched his own arm rise up—the uninjured one—as if someone else had control
of it.
He didn’t even think—a reflex.
He touched his palm to the menenth's forehead, grimacing at the cold armoured
skin, and simply thought 'die.'
Light flared, heat rushed, his sanity returned with the stabbing pain in his
shoulder as the angel fell in a heap behind him, wings burning in the steadily
pouring rain.
The other two angels paused in their advance, and Castiel cursed that his
depleted Grace wasn't remotely strong enough to take advantage of their shock.
The first raised the weapon again, and this time, Castiel saw him squeeze his
finger, another bang, more searing pain, only no—not so bad, just a jerk to his
arm, the heat of blood, but whatever it was hadn't entered his body, had only
grazed it.
“Hath!” the second screamed in his face, his foul breath choking Castiel's
senses. How had he never noticed how utterly repulsive they were before? Dirty,
rancid and grotesque.
He advanced, no longer fearful of detection, he had outed himself, he had to
finish the job. He saw the first squeeze his finger again, but Castiel
continued to advance, wincing when he expected the bang to happen—but nothing
did.
The angel looked perplexed, the sunken eyes glowing in confusion as it looked
at the human weapon. He tried to dislodge it from his horny fingers but the
silver thing was stuck. Castiel almost laughed at the absurdity of it—when he
suddenly hit the ground. The other angel, massive but quick, flew into his
side, landing on top of his as he hit the ground hard, his rigid, terrible
penis digging into his hip from behind, the creature’s weight pushing his
stomach and chest into the cold wet ground.
“I have something for you hath,”he hissed into his face, saliva spattering
Castiel's cheek, leaving slimy trails on his skin.
White hot pain seared deeply into the back of his shoulder and radiated out in
sickeningly hot waves.
The menenth laughed.
Castiel could not move.
His grace was gone, the pain one hundred, one thousand times worse than the
first pain the weapon had caused, stabbing through his chest, freezing his
heart, through his belly, clamping his muscles, stabbing trails of cold through
his limbs, catching hold of his brain and clenching.
In front of his face, near choking on rain water, the menenth’s hand took his
weight, long spiny fingers covered in blood—Castiel’s own. He didn't know why,
but in that faltering view, his vision wavering, he knew that the angel had
pushed a shard of Iridium deep into the first wound.
He hoped it was a lump a similar size to the toothed eyelet he had ripped from
his ear before he has escaped, but he feared it was something tiny, too small
to ever retrieve, so small he would be forever bound to this world, his Grace
once more dampened and hidden inside of him.
To his own disgust, tears leaked from his eyes.
The pain was too great to do anything. His body was wrecked, and the duo had no
difficulty holding him to the ground, ripping the jeans from him and spreading
his legs wide.
The first lifted his hips. Castiel's arm was too damaged to support him in any
way and he found his chest and face dragged across the rough, hard ground, his
eyes lining up with the empty pools of black where the smote menenth’s eyes
used to be; now nothing but ash. He lay, mouth open, horror still etched on his
bony face, death mask judging.
Castiel smiled at the dead angel as the first menenth pushed in, ripping him
open, the bone and spines along the huge length of the menenth ruining what
progress his Grace had made in putting him back together.
His last thought before the first angel opened his mouth to sing—the pain
causing him to blissfully pass out—was that he hoped that Dean would fight when
the armies finally descended. He hoped Dean would survive.
***** Chapter 9 *****
Dean stretched out luxuriously, a pleasant ache suffusing his body, a smile
tugging at his lips, warmth surrounding him.
That— That wasn't right. He always woke up cold, with a dull ache in his
ribcage, not his lower back…
“Fuck,” he hissed out, the memories flowing through his mind at a lightning
pace, dread sinking low in his gut.
Castiel… Castiel was an angel.
He sat bolt upright, confused as all hell.
Where was his angel? The apartment was obviously empty. Stiflingly warm. Hours
must have passed since— Since Castiel had put him to sleep? He remembered being
surprised and confused, looking at the glorious display that were the man's—no,
the angel's—wings. He remembered the misery and terror on Castiel's face as he
gently touched two fingers to Dean's forehead, and then nothingness.
“Fuck!” he yelled at the top of his voice, glaring at the cracked window by the
table. This time, he took in the mess of his clothes on the floor, the cushions
scattered and battered, the condom discarded on the floor next to the bed, the
bottle of lube wedged in between the sofa cushions.
Tears welled up in his eyes. Could that messy fucker not stay? Not even once?
he thought to himself.
With raised eyebrows he finally realized that, if Castiel had just up and left
like he had initially assumed, he would still be curled on his back on the
couch, come—an awful lot of come—smeared all over him, sweat dried and chilling
his skin.
Instead he was clean, dry and warm, he discovered, as he traced a hand across
his chest and belly. He had awoken in the bed, clean and covered with his
blankets. The room was still being heated the way Dean had set it for Castiel's
benefit.
He flopped back onto the bed, blaming himself. If he had kept his wonder at
seeing Castiel's astonishingly beautiful wings to himself, then he might have
stayed.
His wings and his fuckin' halo, he thought, with a smile on his face. Many
angels had halos, most of them had wings, but Castiel's were far more beautiful
than anything he had ever seen before.
Ethereal, glowing every shade of blue, insubstantial, like swirling gas,
glowing from within, or neon ink dropping into water. Never staying still,
moving with the man's thrusts, writhing as Castiel had hit his orgasam and
pumped Dean full like he had never been before.
He groaned at how good that would have felt if he’d had any Sanemet, the cure-
all anti-venereal disease pill they had finally released after years of
research about forty years before.
He would have been dribbling come out of his ass for hours. He grinned at the
thought, then sobered a little, remembering that the man had gone, wings or
not, he was back on the street in little more than jeans and a t-shirt.
He glanced over at the door where Castiel had discarded his shoes as they had
come in, and was pleased to see them gone again, even though they wouldn't help
him much. They were so old and worn he would be able to feel every stone and
bump in the road through them.
A thought flitted through his mind as he stared at the damp spot where the
shoes had sat, of sitting at Bobby's one day, when John had left them to go
work. Bobby had been reading an old book, one he had said was from one of the
other worlds. An angel had given it to him as thanks for helping her apply for
a visa to stay on the planet, her information somehow failing to state that she
was a first grade psychic.
Dean had been curious, and Bobby had handed it to him, then thrown another book
at his head, telling him to read that one first. He'd pouted, but done as he
was told. He found both books to be fables, legends and fairy tales. He could
see why Bobby had told him to read both. It was obviously where many of Earth's
tales had come from, before the Bridge, when an angel or a demon might have
fallen through the cracks, just like Benny's kind had, and started off the
ancient legend of the vampires.
The angel's book was similar. He found three tales, written in flowery Native
that clearly reference humans, before they had known what a human was. A fourth
story he had avidly sat and read, it being about another ‘Graceless angel’,
until it turned out not to be about a human at all.
Dean scrunched up his face, thinking back to that book, back to the story that
Bobby had hit him about the head with for suggesting it wasn't worth reading.
The angel, because that was what it was, was the rarest and most powerful of
all the people of the worlds. It was so powerful that it did not need to flaunt
it power on it's body, and simply was.
The story had ended by saying, though, that they were all dead and gone, the
last of their kind was locked in a cage of glowing metal, trapped for all
eternity.
Dean blinked furiously trying to remember the faint, water stained image that
had been in the book. The image had looked nothing like Cas, but he couldn't
help wonder if the story had been truer than he had ever thought. If Castiel
was one of, or thelast h— hoth? hooth? hath?
Hath.
Dean let out a huge sigh, remembering the correct word from the book, and
stared up at his stained ceiling. Cas was clearly an angel, potentially a
powerful one. One with hidden, glowing, neon blue, inky, gassy ephemeral wings
and halo.
What. The. Hell?
Suddenly anger gripped him, embarrassment and irritation, and he threw himself
out of the bed and started pacing the small room, completely oblivious to his
nakedness.
The man he had tried to save turned out to be a fuckin' hath? A fuckin' rumour?
He could have wiped Dean off the face of the Earth with a damned thought, and
yet he had looked completely adorable and helpless in Dean's too large clothes.
“Shit,” he whispered
He rubbed his hands over his face, then fell back to the bed, realising that
his anger wasn't because the man he had wanted to save turned out not to be an
imprisoned victim of some sort of weird cult, but because the rumour, the myth,
the ethereal, stone faced bad-assed fucker had left. Again.
Not only that, but he’d had the fucking audacity to knock Dean out before
running this time. And even more fucking audacity to clean him up and ensure he
was comfortable, warm and cosy before he ran away from his problems once again,
leaving Dean with that delicious ache in his muscles and no one to wrap his
arms around.
“Jeez,” he groaned under his breath. He just wanted to pull the bastard into a
hug and never let go.
He thought for a moment about Castiel's look of surprise and confusion before
he had pressed his fingers to Dean's sweat covered brow, as if he wasn't
expecting Dean to be able to see his wings. He remembered the guy had even
looked over his shoulders, his frown cut even deeper when he turned back, fear
etching his features.
Castiel hadn't understood how Dean could have been seeing his wings.
But that meant—
“Not possible,” he muttered, slumping his head into his hands. He heaved
another sigh, before checking the time— He rolled his eyes, irritated once
again. Castiel's mojo had put him out for most of the day. He had just enough
time to wash up and get ready for work before picking Benny up.
He groaned before heaving his pleasantly sore ass into the shower.
-
“What's up Brother?” Benny asked as he folded his frame into the Impala,
looking across to Dean's grim face.
Dean just shrugged, staring idly at Benny's head where it was ducked within the
car's interior. “Dean,” Benny questioned, tilting his head to get Dean's
attention.
“Hmm?”
“What's got into ya today?” Benny asked, finally getting Dean's attention fully
on him.
“Oh. Nothin'. Don't worry about it.” He shrugged off Benny's concerned tone and
put the car into drive, pulling away into the dark streets.
“Yeah, alright,” he answered, suspicion ringing loud and clear in his tone.
“You uh, been listenin' to the radio today?” Dean shook his head, not willing
to give away what had led to his lack of awareness for the day. Benny hummed
out a neutral noise. “There's been a whole load of new angels and demons
turnin' up seemingly. That group we caught yesterday weren't the only ones.
Even the farms have been reporting problems. Folks been turning up dead too.”
Dean grunted in response, his thoughts flying guiltily to Castiel once again,
fearing that the man's warnings were even more valid, now that he knew what he
was.
He blamed himself for being swept along by Castiel’s confusing seduction; he
almost felt like he’d raped the angel, albeit unwittingly. He’d found himself
scrubbing his skin red-raw in the shower, while he stared at the wet and dirty
clothes Castiel had left on the bathroom floor once again; the pitiful pile the
only evidence that Cas had even been there.
The only vindicating feeling he had about sleeping with Castiel, was that at
the end, just before their orgasms, Castiel had seemed free, happy, completely
consumed by the good feelings within his body. Dean had wondered, in that hot
breathless moment, if that was what the rapture would look like.
He huffed out a sigh and tried to remember where he was. Yet again, about to go
into work, facing potentially dangerous off-worlders and searching for a
beautiful angel in borrowed clothes.
At the Precinct, he and Benny hastily got out of the Impala at the general
feeling of urgency filling the entire area. Humans, angels and demons scurried
everywhere in the rain like ants, cars pulled up in sprays of water and light
flooded the lot.
“You! Lafitte, Winchester—” Walker yelled from the steps of the precinct, “get
your gear on, you got a call in already.”
“Crap,” Benny muttered just within hearing, clearly thinking along the same
lines as Dean. Gordon only left the building when shit was going down. “Come on
man, let’s find out where we're goin'.” With that, Benny strode into the
building, yanking open his weapons cage the moment he was in the locker room
and loading his belt up, Dean only seconds behind.
-
The call had come in from a woman who’d heard gunshots and screaming. As per
usual, as the call had come from a demon, Gordon had pushed it down on the list
of emergency responses and waited until Dean and Benny's shift had begun at
eight until sending anyone to investigate. Dean was fuming at the injustice
off-worlders received at the hands of people like Gordon. The same kind of
treatment that his father had adhered to and doled out.
“For fuck's sake Benny, the bastards are long gone by now,” he swore, surveying
the scene.
The Anti-Off-Worlder groups would have a field day with this, he thought. They
were always threatening that something like this would happen, or that it was
already happening, but they never had proof. Once they got their hands on this,
a barbaric and violent act against humans, it would make their day.
Dean looked across to Benny, who was looking a little pale in the headlights
from the Police truck that illuminated the scene.
On the ground were four bodies, in a rapidly growing pool of blood. It faded to
pink as it diluted and spread with the rain, running along the dark ground. The
splashes rebounded back up, a lurid red caught in the bright white headlights.
The bodies were grouped, three together on one side of the alley, lying where
they fell amongst refuse and rubble. The fourth body lay alone further along in
the centre of the narrow road and caught directly in the car's beams.
Dean crouched to inspect the three grouped bodies. They were all male, one
demon and two humans. The demon was a rarity, a maleAgma Seytan, second degree
Red. The males were outnumbered on their world, and many fled to Earth to avoid
being turned into a puppet for breeding. The humans were typical street scum.
Too common in the city, where education was lacking and the only jobs available
were for graduates of the Complex or apprentices. Instead, they illicitly
distilled alcohol and concocted drugs, frequently becoming dependant on their
own product. Those higher up the food chain used mules to cross the Bridge,
bringing alien product to human soil—
Dean had noted the small waxed paper packets floating in the surface rain water
before they had even gotten out of the truck. A few were split opened, the
powder or pills within long dissolved in the water.
He sighed at the pathetic corpses in front of him on the asphalt. These were
not mules, simply addicts. Filthy, bedraggled, skinny with sallow, sunken skin.
Two had bullet wounds, all three had terrible looking gashes across their skin,
the edges torn and uneven. As he looked closer, closing his nose off to the
smell of blood and shit, he noted that all three had been bleeding from their
ears too.
Dean was good at compartmentalising, something Benny, who was inspecting the
other corpse, wasn't so great at. It was the reason he was crouched with these
bodies—the one without bullet wounds had had his belly ripped out, guts and
entrails spread wide; blue, purple and red, his hands bloody, trying to hold
the mess inside.
Dean did not look at the expression on his face.
As he stood, Dean noticed a shoulder holster for a gun tucked inside the shot
human's canvas jacket. He ducked down again and, using the short baton from his
belt, moved the jacket aside a little. As he had suspected; the holster was
empty.
It was illegal to carry a gun, the ban coming in shortly after the war, with
only some professions allowed. But, he was not surprised to find such a weapon
on the drug dealers. They lived in a dangerous world.
“Anything?” he asked Benny, his voice gruff. He cleared his throat, walking
across to the fourth corpse, pulling in a breath in surprise.
“Too much, you could say,” Benny answered, still crouched by the angel. His
halo, no longer supported by his Grace, sat broken across his head, the skin
hardened, like boot leather or wood or very old bone, Dean thought. The skin
was a gray-chestnut color, and the bullet wound that had killed him was
obvious. It colored the mostly naked skin a dark red where it had poured sticky
and refused to be washed from the pits and creases in his skin by the rain.
“What the fuck isthat?” he asked, looking at the stumps of his four legs,
splayed in a pot hole. He pushed the toe of his boot to where the leg should
have continued, but the steel toecap went straight through the air and water.
The angel's wings were more like a solid sheet of horn or bone, pitted like its
face, than regular wings, and its fingers were long and sharp and smothered in
skin, blood, and entrail.
Benny made a noise of disgust deep in his throat. For a demon who needed fresh
animal blood to sustain him, Benny sure was squeamish.
“Fuck, do you reckon there were more of 'em?” Benny questioned, looking at the
scene.
“Four bullet wounds, a gun holster and no gun? I'd say so. And I think there
were more from the angel's group.” He looked behind him at the slumped figures
of the bodies in the puddled rain. “Those poor fuckers were hardly capable. If
there were any more of them, I think they would have run. If there were more of
the angels? Shit, who knows?”
He started toward the truck to begin bagging and cataloguing the evidence. No
doubt Gordon would ignore the whole lot, but it had to be done anyway. He
needed to call an ambulance to take the corpses away too. “They could be
anywhere by now,” he grumbled, cursing Walker's no-fucks-given attitude.
“Maybe the other teams have caught them? There were four active calls when I
checked in with Walker,” Benny mumbled, as he photographed the scene.
As with the evidence, the photographs would probably never be looked at. The
Council had no time to give to junkie-on-illegal off-worlder violence. They
didn't care if they all killed each other. But Dean did.
And not least because of his angel's vague warnings. It couldn't be a
coincidence that the increase in never-before-seen off-worlders and emergency
calls fell when an almost extinct species of angel shows up out of the blue
warning of a war coming. He felt that guilt clench his gut again at the thought
that he’d let Castiel down.
“Here brother,” Benny spoke softly, nudging him with his shoulder and handing
him a set of gloves. Dean continued to allow Benny to behave as if Dean was
overwhelmed by the gore on the ground, not the mess of things he had made.
Benny had been good, taking Dean's lead and not mentioning Castiel since the
night he had allowed Dean to take him to the 'hospital.' But nonetheless, the
vamiir had been a little more careful around Dean since that night. Dean hated
it, but for not mentioning Castiel and his disappearing act, he would take the
babying.
Dean watched Benny pick his way back over to the angel's corpse while he sat
back under cover of the truck to call in to the Precinct and order an
ambulance.
An unearthly screech split the night air, dimming the sound of the rain
drumming on the metal roof, and the hiss and pop of the static on the radio.
Dean felt the sound enter his head, causing his vision to swim and his balance
to go. He wanted to drop and hide, or simply die, give up and let the night
take him.
Through the haze he saw Benny fall to the ground, and he knew that had he been
standing he would have done the same. The pain chewing at his brain was
unbearable, but there was a cure. Something they had. He knew he didn't have to
just accept it, but the slicing sounds cut through his senses. A tingling in
his finger tips made him turn to look at his hand. It looked strange, unreal,
not his own. It was scrabbling at his hip.
Reason rushed back at the sight of his hand digging for the regulation
earplugs. He fought the numbness in his limbs and forced his fingers to his
will. Shaking, he numbly pushed the small blue nubs into his ears, jamming them
home so hard the pain almost equalled that of the screeching noise.
The moment the sound was cut off, he drew in a stuttering breath, bewildered by
the strength of the noise. Without a second thought he ran to his friend who
was doing his best to get to his own earplugs, but was having difficulties
maneuvering his arms from his position on the ground. He flipped open the man's
belt pouch and forced the plugs in Benny's ears, watching reason and knowledge
return to his partner's eyes in a matter of moments.
“Fuck!” he yelled, more from panic than the muffled noises bleeding through the
ear protection. “What the fuck?!” He dragged Benny to his feet and took off the
moment the man had his balance, in the direction he supposed the noise to have
come from. It was difficult to pinpoint because of the skull cracking agony it
inflicted, but of the two directions available—into, or out of the alley—he
dived further into the network of narrow streets and tall buildings.
The keening noise was still going, he could feel it battering the material of
his earplugs, trying to worm its way through. Suddenly the blood in the ears of
the victims made sense, if only mere seconds of exposure had caused him to want
to just lie there and let himself die, to numb his limbs and distort his
vision. The weapon was a powerful one, probably the most powerful he’d ever
seen.
He finally went skittering around a corner, almost losing his balance as he
dodged a twisted metal fire escape, and came to an absolute stand still;
another barbaric scene before him.
It was without conscious thought—his training kicking in, the repetitive words
of his father and his superior officers drilling through his brain—that he
moved.
He stepped forward one pace and pulled his gun from his holster, the knowledge
that these creatures were susceptible to chest shots at the least already
ingrained in him. In the second or so it took to pull out his gun, remove the
safety catch, cock and aim the weapon, he took in the scene.
Two angels. The same species as the dead one he and Benny had left in the
alley. He noted their differences alive to dead. They stood tall, about seven
foot. Their legs ended, not as the dead ones had, but in Grace-glowing stumps,
hovering above the ground. Their halos pulsed dully. One stood facing him,
mouth open, the screeching emanating from his throat. The other, back turned,
was on its knees, rhythmically rocking.
Two bodies lay on the floor. One, another angel; no Grace glow. Dead. The other
human, or humanoid, unmoving, dead or unconscious, clothes ripped and gone,
face to the ground, being raped.
Wearing Dean's t-shirt. Blood stained. Potentially dead.
Being raped.
Dean smiled. A twisted mockery of mirth.
He dropped to one knee. Fired two shots in rapid succession. Watched blood
spurt from the head shots. Heard the bodies drop. Felt the unholy wailing end.
Got up. Ran.
Dean dropped to his knees again, this time next to the body on the ground, limp
and broken. He gathered him up into his arms, rocking and crying and holding
him close. Blood was everywhere. “Oh Jesus fucking Christ, Cas. No, not you,
please be okay, please, please.
“Please.”
***** Chapter 10 *****
Castiel's first thought when he came to and realized that hearing was all he
had, wasnot again.
Instead of the unidentifiable sounds of rain, Castiel heard a whole new host of
sounds all assaulting his ear drums. They were loud, painfully loud, echoing.
Voices, a deep rumble, bells and screeches.
He gave up and sank gratefully back into the blackness.
The second time he came to, he wished that all he had was hearing.
He didn't dare open his eyes but pain crowded him, his head hurt, inside and
out, but that was the least of it. His ass screamed in pain, but it was a pain
he knew well, and easily ignored just like the last time he woke up like this.
His brain appeared to have different thoughts on the matter as he felt the
tracks of hot tears spill from his closed eyes and run down his cheeks to his
neck.
The pain that was not so easily ignored was white hot and searing, choking and
incapacitating. His shoulder, neck, arms, spine, front and back roared with the
pain, screamed with it, shrill and exacting.
He lay still and tried to drift.
Eyes closed and still as possible he attempted to work out what had happened.
His last memory was of the menenth's voice piercing it's way into his brain,
debilitating him without his Grace to protect him. At that point he had known
he would die. Why would menenth leave a hathto live? He had been done for the
moment he had smote the angel at his back.
So, he wondered, how was he alive?
Pressure and a stab of agony caused him to yelp in pain and throw his eyes open
to try and defend himself from this newest attack.
Green, terrified, red-rimmed eyes blinked back at him, wide and worried. He
dazedly trailed his eyes down, jaw, neck, shoulders, arms, bloody hands, a wad
of red stained white fabric, his own shoulder twitching and leaking blood from
under Dean's spread hands.
“D—Dean?” At that point, he decided he wasn't capable of believing his own
eyes. He was alive when he should not be. He was being tended to by a human who
should, by rights, be trying to hunt him down.
All he got in response was the back of Dean's bloody hand gently running down
his jaw and a shushing noise, before the man's hand returned to pressing firmly
on the wound in his shoulder.
“I—” he began, causing Dean's eyes to snap back to his own. “You— I didn't— I—”
A tiny sad smile flitted across Dean's face, as his eyes dropped once more to
the bleeding mess that was his shoulder.
“Don't worry Cas, you're good, now.” The man's voice sounded choked, thick and
heavy. Castiel decided to believe him and closed his eyes again letting himself
float between the sensations of searing pain, subdued panic and bubbling
warmth.
The pressure of Dean's hands on his shoulder left suddenly without warning,
taking that warmth with it. Castiel tried not to groan with the pain nor the
loss. “Nurse! Nurse. Please—” Castiel listened as Dean cut himself off. He
realized he must be in a medic's tent or building.
“Officer Winchester, Right?” Castiel heard a stern voice ask in accented
American. He chose to feign sleep, it being the easier course with the dragging
biting sensation emanating from within his shoulder. From the Iridium sitting
inside of him. Dean must have nodded as the woman continued; “Your victim is
not an emergency case yet, I’m afraid, sir. He is on the list, but with so few
resources, until he goes into cardiac arrest or similar, he has to await his
turn for—” Castiel listened to the rustling of paper, whilst he tried to take
deep even breaths. “treatment of… a gunshot wound to the shoulder, and suturing
of injuries consistent with anal rape.”
Castiel frowned slightly. The word gun meant nothing to him, but he could
assume it was the weapon that had thrown something into his shoulder causing
the initial wound. Treatment for that made sense as they would have to dig out
the projectile. It was the other pronouncement that had him confused. How could
they possibly treat rape?
Before his thoughts could get any further, the strict voice continued. “Has he
had his dose yet?” He frowned, wondering if his grasp of this mangled language
wasn't as good as he had thought.
“No ma'am, he's only just woken up,” Castiel almost sniggered at Dean's
obedient and quick to answer voice.
He felt a presence lean over him and huffed out an amused snort. He cracked one
eye open and the terrifying, white, craggy face with a plume of hair-like-Grace
and a spindly, studded halo cracked a smile and winked at him.
She turned away, back to Dean's frantic expression and hummed. “I'll have the
dose brought over and some pain killers. I'll bring a rape kit and find a
temporary room too.” Castiel had already closed his eyes once more, trying to
ignore the pain, but he felt Dean slump in relief from half a length away,
nonetheless.
Castiel drifted for a while, basking in the shock-pain-warmth-touch of Dean's
hands on the gunshot wound, trying to stanch the blood that would not stop
welling out. Seemingly that was not a good thing, going by Dean's muttering.
The human appeared to believe that he was unconscious, or asleep, and was
whispering encouragements to him, telling him not to give up, to try and get
better, that he had to pull through. He was too tired to laugh at the man, to
tell him that he would be fine, if only he could pull out the Iridium. His
Grace, though, was repressed, and the wound would not close with foreign
objects sitting within his body in any case.
“Officer Winchester, leave the poor man alone! You're probably making it worse,
poking at it like that! If he hasn't died yet, I'm certain he isn't about to
drop off the mortal plane just because you took your hands off the wound—”
Dean's palms left Castiel's chest as if he had been stung. “There, it's barely
bleeding.”
The angel’s voice became a reassuring sound to Castiel and he smiled a little,
pulling a strange hiccuping sound from Dean.
“Come on young man, let's get that bed cranked up so you can drink.” It took a
moment, but Castiel realized she was talking to him. He opened his eyes again
to find the same strange looking angel before him. “There you are,” she stated
meaninglessly and leant to the side of the bed, moving something out of his
sight until the horizontal surface moved under him, pushing his back up,
causing an almighty stab of pain to lance all the way down his left side,
through his groin and into his leg.
He merely winced, but Dean was already sitting at his side, taking his hand and
squeezing it.
When he was upright sufficiently, the woman handed him a glass of water which
he thankfully sipped at, coughing slightly, then taking a deeper gulp. “Easy
now. Take these.”
She held out a small cup made of paper, which he took curiously. Before he
could look inside she announced that she would “be back with the kit
presently,” and strode away.
Weakly, he brought the cup closer to his face to inspect the contents. Inside
were four small white pellet shapes. He looked questioningly at Dean, enjoying
the warmth of his hand surrounding his useless left one.
“They're antibiotics, painkillers and Sanemet.”
Castiel still didn't understand. “You said—” he coughed, causing white hot pain
to lance through him again, to which he simply frowned. “You said that word
before, Sanemet. And, I don't know what I'm meant to do with these.”
A strange expression passed Dean's face. “It makes so much more sense now, you
know, why you don't have a clue about regular stuff here—”
“Stop!” Castiel hissed, his fear blatantly evident in his own voice.
“Yeah— Yeah, okay. I'm sorry,” Dean apologised looking chastised all over
again, dropping his head and his eyes. Before Castiel could tell him it was
fine, that he didn’t want him to look so dejected, Dean started speaking again,
directing the words to his knees where they folded over the side of Castiel's
bed—
He focused on Dean's words and decided to let thatpanic overtake him at a later
time.
“Antibiotic. They're pills that stop infection in wounds and things, like in
your ear or whatever. Sanemet is a medicine—” Dean looked up to make sure that
Castiel understood before continuing. “It basically treats every disease that
can be passed on sexually. It's a vaccine and treatment. Prevention and cure.”
He shrugged to show that that was all he knew on the matter. “You, uh, you're
meant to swallow them. They'll help you get better.”
The man was still looking at his knees, he almost looked ashamed. Once Castiel
had swallowed the pills and followed them with the water he decided to distract
them both, Dean from his indecipherable mood, and Castiel from the knowledge
that shortly, he would have to get up, away from his place with the nice nurse,
and dig a 'bullet' whatever that was, and a shard of Iridium from his own
shoulder, because he needed to heal, he needed to get out and he could not,
under any circumstance risk being found out by someone less… accepting… than
Dean.
For, Castiel had to admit, that Dean had neither run from him nor attempted to
imprison him himself.
“How does a vaccine prevent and what does it prevent?” he finally asked, making
Dean looked up, surprise on his face, before it paled again as his gaze drifted
to Castiel's shoulder.
“Dean.”
The human blinked before answering. “Uh. A vaccine, as far as I know— Shit,
you're not going to understand. Um. If you take the blood of a person who has
survived a disease and put it into someone who could potentially get it, the
person receiving it learns how to defend themselves before they get the real
version of it. So long as the first person is no longer sick...” Dean looked
hesitant. “Er, they're helping the second person learn to defend themselves
faster essentially. It’s not done like that now. It's risky, could kill the
receiver, or expose them to other diseases, but that method basically stops
hundreds of diseases that used to kill millions of people. After the war, when
medicine wasn't so good as now, a lot of people got sick and died because they
had never had immunizations and vaccines.”
Castiel nodded along thoughtfully. “There was plague on my world,” he grunted
out, so low that Dean had to lean forward to hear his words. “On Hath.”
He stopped, realising what he had admitted. Dean knew he was an angel now, but
he wasn't sure how well known the hath were. He looked sharply up at Dean. He
looked grim faced, but not surprised, while being intently fascinated, his
mouth pulled taut, but his eyes gleaming.
He huffed out a smile at the man before him. “I don’t know how long ago.
Generations. We can leave our world. Unlike all others, I believe. So, the
people left the world, the healthy, and tried to find somewhere clean to live.
They did not wish to go far. One step, two. The worlds were uninhabitable. Then
they found somewhere green and lush, like Hath. Only, the inhabitants did not
even give warning to leave.” He took a deep breath.
“They took disgust, for they believed us mutants, without Grace. Because to see
it—” he paused, modulating his intended words in the light of Dean's intent
green gaze. “—Is to show trust; Infants, family members…” He took a leap.
“Lovers.
“The menenth imprisoned all hath they found. Their world has an abundance of a
substance called Iridium. It…incapacitates us. Tethers our Grace, weakens and
hurts us. Our kind were all imprisoned and enslaved and used.”
He looked away, unsure why he was still telling Dean anything. “The last time I
saw another hath was my brother Gabriel, who they took from me when I was about
forty seasons old. Gabe was about forty seasons older than me. My mother died
giving birth to me in that cage. Gabe did not ever see my father.
“I am the last.”
Dean's hand found his again and squeezed before he turned his perplexed face to
Castiel's “Seasons?”
Castiel shrugged. “Seasons,” he stated again neutrally. What else could it
mean?
“Oh, like four of them in a year? A turn of the earth?” Castiel nodded,
remembering the stars and sun's position on some of the warmer worlds they
stayed on for long enough to get a sense of such things.
“Huh, you were ten when you last saw your brother? Shit.
“Cas—” Dean began, a different tone in his voice, part pain, but Castiel
couldn't figure out why. “Cas, I need to ask you what happened tonight. What
you can remember of it. It won't go in the report, but I'd like to know what
happened from when you, uh, from when you knocked me out...” Dean was holding
half a breath. He looked so hurt.
“I am sorry Dean,” and he was. He did not like to see that expression painted
onto the human's face. “I was scared. I am still scared.”
“I understand. What I said still stands true, man. I will never imprison you.
I’ll do my best to protect you.”
Castiel nodded, for some reason believing the human with the green eyes fully
for the first time. He smiled softly and squeezed Dean’s hand weakly in return,
erasing the stab of agony the movement caused him.
Dean’s answering smile was like the sun he had never seen break through the sky
on this planet, and from nowhere, Castiel suddenly found he wanted to take Dean
out into the sun, to see his skin glow gold in the warm light.
He could feel himself getting weaker, the Iridium in his chest feeling like it
was digging in deeper and deeper. But, perhaps to get Dean to help him, he had
to offer the man his trust.
He took a deep breath, only stuttering slightly on the catching of the foreign
material nestled against blood and bone, and began retelling the events of the
day and night.
He told Dean of his fear of being caught and being placed back into a cell, of
his decision to find the Complex and warn the leaders there of the war. Dean
took a breath to ask more on that point, but shook his own head before he
spoke, motioning Castiel to continue, suggesting silently that they would go
back to that. He told the man of flying to the empty world, of resting while
the sun sank and of his return. He caught Dean's wistful expression. He told
Dean of finding himself surrounded. He told him of smiting the menenth.
Dean had been writing throughout most of his succinct and emotionless report,
but at that his arm stilled. Castiel looked at him questioningly. “I promised
I'd keep you safe,” was his only answer.
Castiel nodded and swallowed,staring at Dean’s still hand, realising that the
man was omitting information for his benefit.
Castiel continued, telling him of the weapon, which Dean confirmed was a gun,
and described what it was and how it worked. Castiel told him of being shot,
then the near miss, of being tackled to the floor and the agony of having
Iridium forced into the open wound.
At that Dean stopped again, his arm ceasing to write. He stood and seemed to
grow in size as his indignation grew. “You mean to tell me the only fuckin'
thing that can genuinely fuck you up is lodged in your fuckin’ shoulder!?” he
all but yelled.
“Dean!” Castiel admonished, fretting as he looked around them. One or two heads
were looking in their direction, but no especially curious looks were sent
their way. Dean swiped his hand through his hair.
“Shit. I'm sorry, I just— They know your fuckin’ achilles heel and use it
against you, man! And it's still in you?”
Castiel nodded, ignoring the words he didn’t understand. He had thought it was
obvious that the metal was still inside of him, or he would have been healing,
albeit slowly—going by how worn out his Grace was—but the bleeding would have
at least stopped.
Castiel continued his story, tone flat, stating the facts about the rape. It
wasn't exactly a rarity for him, but far more painful, for the short length of
time he was conscious, because of the few days he had not been penetrated. His
body had been healing, the torn skin no longer stretched and accommodating.
By now, Castiel noted, Dean was agitated once again, pacing in front of his
bed. The man was upset, angry, confused, and frustrated. But mostly upset, and
Castiel did not understand why. The menenth had never been considerate of the
disgusting and dirty hath. The violent journey through the Bridge had thrown
them further into madness, exaggerating their lust. It was standard behaviour.
Why should it cause Dean concern?
Watching Dean pace made something twist in the corner of his mind, but among
everything else, it was inconsequential. He needed to finish this interrogation
in order to get Dean to trust him sufficiently enough so that he could leave,
remain undiscovered and save this… fucking…planet.
He huffed a laugh under his breath. The human's swear words were nowhere near
as effective as the menenth's.
Dean sank on to the bed next to his knees, watching the floor again as if it
held all the answers.
Castiel took a moment to watch him. To gauge.
“Dean?”
The man's head shot up so fast that Castiel could not help the tick at the
corner of his mouth as Dean raised an arm to rub at the jolted muscle there.
“Cas?”
“I need to warn your leaders.” Dean held up a hand and got up again.
“Fuck, Cas, I know. I promise I'll help you. Shit's already going down—”
“Dean!” Castiel talked over him, getting his attention completely. “I cannot be
kept here. I need to remove the… bullet, and the shard, but it cannot be here.
If they can see inside of me they will realize I am not human.” He made an
effort to sit up, causing Dean to fret and hover beside him worriedly. He
twisted slightly, so that his wound was facing the wall rather than the area
where people walked, sat and lay. Dean's face went white with horror as Castiel
reached across his body with his good hand and pushed his fingers into the
wound, widening them to open the hole. Even his weakly fluttering Grace,
suppressed and held down, shone pathetically from the wound where the Iridium
was buried in his body. Dean's mouth dropped into a perfect 'O' as he realized
what Castiel was showing him. If someone were to dig around in his wounded
shoulder, it would be obvious he was not human, that he was not anything they
had ever seen before.
Dean nodded slowly, neither acceptance nor disagreement. “This war is coming
now. We do not have time. I must heal now. I must warn the leaders that can
prevent an army, worlds and worlds strong, from descending on this woefully
unprepared planet.” He paused, fixing Dean with a gaze, which, if he’d had any
strength, would have driven Grace from his eyes to emphasise his point. “And I
need your help. You are the only one—” he cut himself off this time, not sure
how to continue, not sure how the human would react.
He took a breath, daring to take another risk, daring to trust this man, daring
to believe telling Dean would be worth it. “You're the only one who will
listen, who knows who and what I am, who I can tell from where my information
comes. You are the only one who will believe me.”
-
“Okay, Buddy, Okay. Shit— I'll see what I can do.” Dean nodded at Castiel and
placed his hand gently on his shoulder, squeezing and pushing him back against
the gurney.
Dean was desperate to help this angel. The whole account had been gut-
wrenching, painful to listen to, let alone bear. And despite that, Cas had
barely blinked when he dug his own fingers into the welt on his shoulder, still
oozing blood that would not stop flowing. Dean had been around angels and
demons all his life, but Cas’s grace, even subdued, was like nothing he had
ever seen.
Dean still couldn’t believe that inside the angel burnt a flickering,
frightened looking, iron-strong Grace. He had practically been able to taste
it, raw as it was. If Castiel’s wings were like smoke, the tattered, raging
blue-white glow within him was the fuel. It had left his skin prickling and his
chest wanting.
“Do not go anywhere.” He pointed at Castiel fiercely, hoping to instill through
the haze of Cas’s worn out gaze, that Dean would not stand for finding the bed
empty when he returned, not again.
Castiel nodded a little before letting his head drop back, the sound of the
paper sheet crinkling beneath him loud, even against the noise of the busy
corridor. “Where are you going?” he mumbled, before Dean had a chance to walk
away.
“Oh,” he whispered, realizing that he didn’t know. The feeling of uselessness
was bubbling inside him, making him want to move his feet, to do something, but
there was nothing he could do for the angel, not yet. He needed Castiel’s
information, but he couldn't very well tell him in the corridor of a hospital,
especially one that had deemed a man who had been bleeding from a gunshot
wound—not to mention the rape—for four hours, a non-emergency case.
He needed to talk to Benny and Sam. But first, he needed to call Bobby. And
then maybe steal some medical supplies.
“I'm going to work out a plan,” he answered gruffly, before turning on his heel
and digging his phone from his pocket. He strode down the corridor that the
waiting area, and Castiel’s gurney, was next to. As he dialed, he kept an eye
over his shoulder as he kept moving, keeping his voice quiet, worried he would
be overheard.
“What the hell do you want at this time of the goddamn night ya idjit?” was
Bobby's response; the reception as terrible as ever, crackling and popping and
dropping out. Dean looked up at the clock on the phone’s dim screen in faint
surprise, having forgotten for a moment that it was past two in the morning.
“Oh. Sorry Bobby. What's the chance your safe house is empty, and ready for use
in about five hours time?”
He listened as Bobby grumbled and he heard the clink of a glass in his sink on
the other end of the line. “It's empty. I can have it cleaned up and good to
go. Five hours is pretty short notice though boy, how you gettin' ‘em over
here?”
Dean sighed in relief at hearing that, for once, Bobby didn't have another
angel or demon hiding with him until he could help get documents sorted for
them. “I'm driving.” He hung up before Bobby could protest. If Dean took pity
on an illegal and sent them to Bobby, it was usually by bus or by bribing
someone to take them. Dean never brought someone himself, his job would be on
the line.
But, Dean thought, Castiel was worth it.
Dean dialed Benny's number as he casually stepped inside a supply closet that a
nurse had just left unattended. He heard the key lock him inside as the call
connected. “How you doin brother? I hope your having more fun that I am,
paperwork sucks.”
“Yeah, Listen, I need some help...”
-
It didn't take long for Dean to arrange things. Benny would cover for him,
using Castiel as the excuse. He had wasted five minutes picking the lock of the
storage closet, his belt pouch filled with sealed medical supplies and his
weapons tucked uncomfortably inside his jacket.
He bit his lip as he dialed his brother’s number for the first time in months.
The last time they had spoken they had argued over Dean’s job, his insistence
on trying to stay in the role he had picked to prove himself to his father.
Dean was finally beginning to see Sam’s point, although he had no intention of
letting him know that. He ducked down another corridor, as Sam answered,
sounding confused and irritated.
“Dean?”
“Hey Sam, sorry for calling so late, but— I could do with your help.” He got
silence on the line as his answer, and he huffed a sigh, feeling the tension
between the two of them, even over the crackling phone line.
“I, uh,” he paused, wondering how to go about convincing his brother to help.
“So. There’s an illegal—”
He outlined Castiel’s appearance, and his adamance that he had to warn Earth’s
leaders about a coming war. “We need to get the Complex prepared, Sam,” he
finished, hearing the earnest tone to his own voice.
“You— You really believe this angel? He hasn’t just lost his mind in the
Bridge?” Sam asked, his voice rasping, tired.
“I believe him, Sam.” Dean stated flatly.
“Okay, Dean. Okay. You know I can’t go to the Government with this though? One
angel? No matter how rare or well informed, they won’t bother to listen. Why
don’t you try with your lot, the police?”
“We have, Sam, it ain’t happening—”
“Try again, Dean, please. You have to make sure that you’ve covered every base…
no matter what the outcome of all of this. I’ll meet you at Bobby’s in any
case, okay? And we can work out a plan from there.”
Dean grunted but nodded. He had to admit that with the influx of illegal angels
and demons on the street, Sergeant Walker might be a little more receptive than
usual. Dean didn't hold out much hope, though, and hung up, thanking Sam and
telling him to be prepared no matter what.
Pocketing his phone again and hitching up his equipment belt he walked back
toward the noisy waiting room where Cas was laid.
Dean felt his heart plummet through his chest and his breath catch as he
rounded the corner and found Castiel missing, bed and all—
A weak cough, almost lost in the noisy hospital, and his name choked out from
further along the corridor sounded, unfreezing him.
He ran to Castiel, terrified of how pale he had become over the course of the
past half hour, how sickly and tired, but so utterly relieved that he had not
run.
“I had to stop them from moving me,” he heaved out at Dean's worried
expression, brow glistening slightly with sweat. “You shouldn't have been able
to see my wings, you know?” he asked in a feeble voice, a bemused expression on
his features.
“Oh, shit,” Dean whispered in English, hoping Cas wouldn't hear the fear in his
voice. The man looked delirious, his right hand curled protectively across the
hole in his shoulder. “Oh crap. It better not be the drugs, man,” he muttered
in the Native again, wondering if they had adversely affected the angel
somehow.
Castiel's wide soulful eyes turned up to his. “No. Just— Just thinking that
it's amazing you're still helping me.” His voice was so quiet, his accent
thickening his words as the exhaustion and pain began to claim him. Dean could
see he was fading. He had to get moving now.
He didn't have time to worry about the angel's words. Because—no. He knew he
shouldn'thave been able to see them, and the fact that he did sent fear through
him like a shot of adrenaline to the heart.
It wasn't something he could spare the time to think about.
He had to help Castiel.
***** Chapter 11 *****
Castiel stared out of the car window at the rain, wondering what Dean was
trying to achieve in the precinct beyond. His attention kept drifting though,
and he found himself just staring at the drops as they hit and melded and
streaked down the glass. Dean had told him to keep a look out; he answered his
coughed-out questions patiently, no irritation in his tone as he told Castiel
what things were. He hadn't told him what he was meant to be looking out for
though. Castiel assumed that weak and bleeding men sitting in the back seat of
cars were not a normal occurrence.
He glared at the door to the squat building, willing Dean to appear, just like
he had done in the hospital. Castiel had had to fend off the kind, stern nurse
while he waited for Dean, feigning fear at the idea of anyone but Dean helping
with the 'rape kit.' He didn't know what it would have entailed, but she had
tried to roll the bed into a room alone, far away from Dean.
He felt like he was waiting to be approached again, for someone to notice him,
that someone would somehow know he wasn't human, as if his wings would manifest
of their own accord. The anticipation of discovery was making him sick in his
already weakened state.
Dean had insisted for some reason that they return to the police precinct.
Castiel was convinced that it was pointless, they had quite literally laughed
him out of the building on his first attempt, and Castiel couldn't see Dean
having more success, even if he was one of them. He had already witnessed the
man being insulted by his own kind inside that building once.
But, Dean had insisted, and Castiel was far too weak to be bothered arguing.
The man had promised to help, and apparently he was even trying to do so now.
Dean had told Castiel that he did not want to hear his warning yet, despite
going to his commander to lay out the information about the oncoming war. He
had said that it would seem more realistic if he didn't have every single piece
of knowledge, and this way he wouldn't have much to lie about, when it came to
protecting Castiel himself.
He had listened as Dean had explained that he had to try this— But if, or more
likely when, it failed, Dean had a plan; they would drive and they would see to
his wound and they would protect the planet.
-
Gordon's face erupted in laughter as Dean finished speaking. “I— I'm sorry,
Winchester. I must have misheard! You— You have received information. From an
anonymous source? And you think that there are hoards of fuckin’ angels and
demons about to blast their way through the Bridge?” He laughed again, a sick
sound that grated on Dean's ears.
“You do remember the Bridge right? In the Complex? Y’know, the highest
concentration of soldiers and police that this country has? The world? Even if
this fantasy of yours was the truth, which it ain't, they wouldn't have a hope
in Hell.” He started chuckling again, and waved his hand in dismissal, already
leafing through a sheaf of papers and reports.
Dean scowled and turned to leave, noting the faces of his colleagues pressed up
against the window to Walker's office. “Shit,” he huffed under his breath.
“Oh, Winchester?” the Sergeant said before he opened the door to face the music
beyond.
“Sir?” he answered with his back still to the Sergeant, trying to keep his
voice toneless, empty of the dread and fear he felt.
“You're on suspension. Effective immediately. I don't want your insane theories
spread through the station.” Dean simply closed his eyes and nodded, telling
himself that it was for the best. At least he wouldn't lose his job when he
left for Bobby's mid-shift.
He walked through the jeering crowd, trying to remember that he’d done his
best, he had tried to go through the correct channels—
He caught Benny’s eye through the busy shared office off the lobby, opposite
the rowdy drunks and whores in the cells. The vamp nodded reassuringly, and
Dean nodded in reply, relieved at knowing the Benny was staying true to his
word, writing up a report for Dean’s benefit. Their phone call from the
hospital supply closet hadn’t been sufficient to convince the demon that
Castiel’s warnings were true, but Benny had promised that he had Dean’s back;
the report he was writing would ensure that, should anything happen, it would
be on record that Dean had done his best.
Walt’s grinning face appeared in front of him, his coffee-reeking breath not
wasted, save to simply laugh in Dean's face.
“Fuck you too, Walt,” Dean simply said and pushed his way out of the doors.
He ducked his head into the rain, pointing his steps toward his Baby, and
hopefully Castiel within. He wondered how long it would take him to start
believing that the man wouldn't simply up and leave at every opportunity. He
peered through the darkened glass and felt relief course through him as he saw
the mop of dark hair slumped against the window.
He got into the car, pulling his hat off and looking behind him. Castiel's eyes
were closed, his breathing shallow, blood still oozing thickly from the gunshot
wound, and Dean frowned in worry. The angel was fading, and they had a four or
five hour drive ahead of them.
“Come on, Buddy,” he whispered, “let's get you to Bobby's.”
-
Castiel awoke to searing pain. He screamed, trying to jerk away from the agony
in his shoulder. He found hands restraining him, one pressed to his good
shoulder, another two were pressed one to each leg. “Castiel, calm the fuck
down. I can't get the fuckin' bullet out if you're jerking all over the place.”
He calmed a little at the sound of Dean's strained voice, even when the
stabbing in his shoulder only got worse. “I'll get the whiskey,” sounded a
gruff voice from near his feet. He forced himself to stillness, knowing that
Dean wouldn't intentionally hurt him. Castiel steeled himself and forced his
eyes open, only to see a brutal blaze of glaring light above him, only eclipsed
when Dean's face came into view.
“Heya Buddy. Good to have you back with us.” The human smiled down at him, then
frowned and returned his eyes to Castiel's shoulder. “Before you woke up, I
felt the bullet with the forceps, shouldn't take long to get it out now.”
“Wait up,” the other voice sounded, an edge to the tone that had Castiel
tensing up with more than pain.
When the other man's face came into view—a ragged beard, sharp eyes and a hat
perched on his head—an odd hot smell filled the air. It reminded him of the
spirits that the menenth brewed and drank, only to fling him around the room
harder before mounting him on their soft beds. He shuddered at the thought
before screaming again as the cool liquid hit the wound and burned like acid.
“Sorry, kid,” the grumbling voice stated before Dean pressed something to his
lips and tried to force it between his teeth. “Relax,” the gruff voice came
again as he struggled against Dean’s hand. “It’s a gag to stop you bitin’ your
tongue bloody.” Castiel allowed himself to slump against the table, letting
Dean push the gag between his teeth.
Dean’s drawn face came back into view in front of the shining light, “Just,
please don't smite me for this,” he said, before the searing pain returned.
He could feel whatever it was that Dean had in the wound grating against bone,
pushing on muscle. He refused to continue to scream, so he bit down, gritting
his teeth as well as he could and closed his eyes, letting himself feel the
sensation, but trying to ignore the pain.
He listened to Dean's muttered words and curses, spoken in his own tongue
unconsciously. He floated, eyes stinging with the pain and the fumes from the
liquid doused over the wound once again.
“Ah hah!” the man muttered as Castiel felt Dean’s probing grip something within
himself. He groaned and felt his watering eyes leak tears down his cheeks. “I'm
sorry. We're nearly there,” Dean whispered as he slowly withdrew the probe from

Castiel’s shoulder. Castiel saw Dean’s hand as he brought the item up to look
at. He saw, what looked like pincers, holding a small metallic object, flat at
one end, brass colored and pointed at the other. He sighed as he realised that
it must be the bullet Dean had finally managed to remove, not the Iridium.
Iridium glowed silver at all times, even after so long stuck inside his body.
“Halfway there Cas, halfway there,” Dean murmured as he heard the clang of the
bullet hitting a surface near his head. His nose burned again at the hot smell
of the spirits before, moments later, the burning pain coincided with the
liquid sloshing over his shoulder.
He could not stop the sound that he let out as Dean pushed the pincers back
into the wound and started sliding them around, methodically in small
movements, slipping down the hole in search of the Iridium.
It felt as if Castiel lay on the table for centuries, biting the gag hard,
refusing to let one more sound pass his lips. He dared not think about the fact
that the shard may be so small Dean might never be able to find it. He opened
his eyes, wanting the reassurance that Dean would find it, that he was too
stubborn to give up and allow Castiel to die, his body unable to heal with his
Grace repressed.
It was bad enough with the eyelet sitting in his ear, but the effect was so
much worse with the metal hidden inside his body.
He would die of blood loss long before the wound managed to heal over.
Dean's face swam into view and Castiel couldn't help but wonder what Dean had
seen that night, that felt like seasons ago now. He had never consciously seen
his own wings, not within his own memory, not even during that first terrified
flight. He remembered Dean's face in that moment, at the moment of his own
ecstasy, he had looked confused, and slightly fearful. But mostly awed. He
realised that now. Dean had been awed, not terrified.
“Did you think them beautiful, Dean?” he asked huskily through the gag in his
teeth. Dean ignored him, a bead of sweat running down his brow, a frown of
intense concentration on his face.
Yet another shot of searing agony caused his back to jolt off the table with
the pain, biting his cheek at the same time as the gag. “S'okay,” Dean hissed
as he withdrew his hand carefully once again. The movement brought to Castiel
the sweetest, blissful, calming, cool relief as his Grace surged to fill the
void the splinter of Iridium had caused.
He briefly saw the gory pincers holding the piece—a cone of silver, glinting in
the light—before he passed out, overwhelmed by the Grace trying to mend his
wounds and heal his worn out and battered body.
-
Castiel's eyes opened, a dim light meeting his gaze, he groaned at the ache
suffusing his body.
“Easy Buddy. Your body’s still trying to heal. You've been knocked around a lot
in the past few days remember?” Dean's voice came from near his knees, where he
sat on the bed next to Castiel.
“Dean,” he croaked down, his throat dry and horse.
“Hey Cas,” the man said, as he bent over Castiel and helped him sit up, his
warm hand under his uninjured shoulder. He handed Castiel a cup of water, clear
and sweet to his parched throat.
“How long have I been out?” he questioned as Dean sat back on the bed. He eyed
it, wondering why he had been put in one once again. Maybe they weren't always
meant for the violence that was—almost always—sex; lying on it had been
extraordinarily comfortable.
“A little under two hours,” Dean answered, his voice low and steady. Castiel
nodded. His body was sore, his shoulder stiff, but he could feel his Grace
beginning to recover slowly, beginning, once again, to knit the wounds of his
behind together, sealing the bullet hole in his shoulder.
“So, my brother’s maybe another hour out. He's coming here to help, just like
Bobby is already helping. You can trust them both Cas, I trust them with my
life and your secret will be safe with both of them.” Dean’s green eyes met
Castiel's and all he could read there was the man's need to convince Castiel of
his honesty.
Castiel nodded again, sipping slowly at the water where he sat up on the
cushioned surface.
He looked around the room as Dean seemed to consider his next words. He was
content to wait; while his Grace took the time to heal him, there was little he
could do, and Dean's presence was a comfort. Another strange phenomenon that he
could not explain.
“I—uh, Sam, my brother, he's a person's rights lawyer, Cas. He's the one who
convinced me to try again at the precinct. He called while you were out. He's
going to help, but, we need to know that full story now. I know you're
exhausted man, but I'm here, and listening. For once. So can you? Tell me?”
Castiel slumped slightly in relief, pleased that Dean was voluntarily keeping
to his word about listening to the warnings he had been trying to tell for
days.
He squirmed to get comfortable, to lean against the wall behind him, rather
than try to keep himself upright before he opened his mouth to speak. Dean
helped him, but then sat still, expectantly, waiting for Castiel to begin.
He sighed then took a breath, willing the residual pain in his shoulder away.
“You already know I was born in captivity, my brother was taken from me when I
was fort— er, ten, years old.” He took another fortifying breath. To make Dean
understand fully, he would have to give context to his words. “I was
essentially kept, up until I was about sixty seasons, as a… a pet? If I was
good, I was treated well. I served food, fetched, carried, washed, cleaned and
clothed my captors.”
Dean was tense next to him, a solid warmth that offered him strength. “Once
Gabe was taken, the treatment got rougher, but nothing in comparison to what
happened after I hit the change—became an adult. I think it was the day after
my second sleeping orgasm that they put me on the bed. The alpha took me.
Roughly.”
He swallowed, feeling nauseous at the memories he did his best to ignore. Dean
looked far more sickened; he was pale and shaking.
“From then on I was no longer used as a pet, I was only brought out of the cage
to be fucked. Mostly by the alpha, but sometimes his lackeys, or allied demons
and angels. Sometimes they brought in slaves or prisoners and watched. They
were violent—” He paused, realising that thatinformation wasn't relevant.
“Anyway. I was kept in a cage in the alpha’s chambers and basically completely
ignored unless someone was aroused, which was frequently.” He drew in another
huge breath.
“Because I was kept close and ignored—I listened. Gabe, before he was taken,
taught me many things, everything he knew, passed on from our mother and
father, but mostly he instilled the fact in me that I must never give up. I
must always strive to escape. In order to do that I had to learn more, I had to
learn from the menenth, I had to pay attention, I had to plan. I had to be
ready to escape at any given moment. So, I did. I learned all the languages
that I could, and I listened to their planning.”
He looked up at Dean, his gaze solid, unflinching in the face of Dean's
terrible sadness on his behalf.
“I was imprisoned not just within a cage, but with manacles, around my ankles
and wrists, mostly my hands were tied behind my back. I also had an eyelet
punched through my ear when I was a small child. It was of Iridium. It was
toothed, so that you could not remove it.” He half smiled, and cocked his head
to the side where his mangled ear was, no longer wrapped in bandages, but taut
and hot feeling. “Well, not unless you're incredibly determined.” He had to
admit, he was mildly proud, despite the mutilation he had done to himself.
“I had an opportunity, and I took it. A guard had come to feed me, the room was
empty otherwise. As often happened, he decided to take his pleasure of me
before leaving. He had just finished up, when he unlocked my chains to re-lock
them at my front so that I could eat. He was still dazed, and panicking because
he could hear the alpha returning. I waited until he had removed the cuff
before I hit him, hard.” He smiled faintly at the memory, dwelling for the
first time on how good it had felt to finally retaliate.
“I knocked him out and unlocked the other cuff with his keys. I tore out the
eyelet, taking most of my ear with it, it would seem. It was then that the
alpha and his retinue returned to the room."
He huffed a laugh, thinking of all the hours he had spent practicing the next
part, the part that had allowed him to escape. The hours spent thinking it was
entirely pointless. “The cuffs had studs of Iridium inside of them. Almost all
of the time, one part or another would be in contact with my skin. I couldn't
stop them from touching the skin on my wrists, but, if I held them correctly, I
could prevent the Iridium from touching the skin on my ankles.”
He inspected his wrists, the welts from years of contact now fading to flat red
scars. “That was what you pulled from my chest. One of the studs—removed from a
set of cuffs,” he huffed out another sigh. “Because Iridium inhibits a hath's
Grace, I was able to fly, for the first time ever, and leave the cuffs behind,
because the Grace couldn't take them, but they no longer touched my skin so
couldn't prevent me from leaving.
“And, that's when you found me. I flew, completely uncontrolled because I had
never used my wings before, but I made it to Earth. To warn you all.”
Dean’s jaw was gritted, a tick moving in his eye, but they widened in awe the
moment Castiel mentioned his flight. “So that's why you had those bruises?
They're your flight muscles?”
Castiel nodded, watching Dean's face shift back to one of tight worry. “So, now
I know why , can you tell me what’s coming?” Dean asked, voice as grim as his
expression.
***** Chapter 12 *****
“It won't work!” Sam's voice broke through the argument as he threw his hands
up in the air. “You wanted me here for a reason, and this is it! Just going up
to the front door, knocking, and saying 'would you kindly prepare for war?' is
not going to help!” Dean watched his younger brother pace the room, his suit
crumpled from his long drive.
“They will laugh in our faces, just like they laughed at you, Dean, when you
tried to tell your boss!” Dean flopped onto the couch in defeat. They had been
talking around and around in circles, only breaking to eat something when
Castiel had appeared from the cellar, where the hidden rooms of Bobby's safe
house were located.
The angel now sat hunched on the only armchair, his legs tucked up underneath
him, wearing a pair of Bobby's jeans and a flannel, buttoned up, showing the
collar bones on his injured shoulder where the shirt sat wide on his much
slimmer frame. He was picking slowly at the sandwiches Bobby had made, all the
produce taken straight from his farm.
“So what's your plan then, wonder boy?” Dean asked Sam, receiving a scrunched
up expression from the lawyer that shouted 'put upon younger brother' from
across the room.
Dean’s eyes tracked Castiel as he set aside his food and shuffled over to
Bobby, where he was sat behind his desk, flicking slowly through another of his
off-world tomes, given in thanks from a desperate refugee. “My plan, Dean,” Sam
continued, “is to talk our way in, and shut down the Bridge.”
That halted Dean’s thoughts in their tracks and captured his complete
attention, dragging his eyes from the bend of Castiel's neck as he read over
Bobby's shoulder.
“I— Wait. What?”
“I work there Dean. I can almost certainly get all of us in the building.” Even
Castiel and Bobby were looking at Sam intently. “There are huge banks of
machines that control the Bridge, make it safe, make it stable. Some of them
control destination and things like that, some force the in-comers to certain
sections so there aren't collisions, etc.” Sam was standing tall now, his
lawyers’ voice in full flow as he made eye contact with each one of them in
turn.
“I could try and speak to Frank inside. He works in Tech, so does Ash. They’re
like me— not exactly proponents of the Government. They could let us know where
we need to get to in order to shut it down. If the Bridge isn't working, how
could anyone come through?”
Dean shrugged and looked at the other two. Bobby pulled a face and Castiel
remained blank faced and considering.
“People would still be able to come through, boy,” Bobby began, no judgement in
his tone. “But, even with the complex's on the other Accord planets, they’d
have far less chance o’ making it here safely. They’re gonna overshoot, get
hurt, go mad. Not that mad'll stop 'em fightin'.” He flicked through the book
some more, rubbing a hand across his face.
“It needs to be overloaded too,” Bobby continued. He twisted in his seat to
look at Castiel who still stood behind him. The angel's eyes widened and he
stepped back a little at the calculating look on Bobby's face.
“What do you intend?” Castiel asked, his voice still raspy and deep. Dean
couldn't help but smile at the sound.
“You reckon you can smite it?” Bobby's face was deadly serious even as Sam let
out a little gasp. Dean snorted.
The angel tilted his head a little as he gazed blankly, considering. “My Grace
is still weak, but assuming I can touch the Bridge, I think I could. I don't
know if I would be powerful enough to destroy or disable something so
massive—so powerful—though. I feel—sometimes i think… My Grace might draw
energy from my surroundings? But I don't think I would be able to draw anything
from the Bridge, not when I'd be trying to use it's own power against it.”
Bobby looked up at him again. “You think it's alive?”
Castiel shrugged, then shook his head. “No… It is… An unnatural thing. Even
your electricity and your anti-matter are natural up to a point, made from
Earthly things. If—if my Grace works the way I feel—I believe it does, it
constantly renews from the energy of nature, plants growing, the sun, the
movement of rain.
“The Bridge… It feels wrong. I've been through it many times. Even suppressed,
practically non-existent, my Grace was still there, I could feel it—just—but I
had no access. The Bridge feels more like a drain of power than a source.”
As Castiel finished talking, he returned to his meal looking spent, curling
back up in the chair like an overgrown cat. Dean nodded in satisfaction as he
started to eat again.
“So, we need to feed your Grace if we're to close the Bridge,” Sam stated,
running a hand through his too-long hair.
Castiel simply nodded, if slightly noncommittally, then shook his head. Dean
supposed that was fair. The dude had been kept in a cage his entire life,
learned all he had been able to from a sibling until he was ten, and then from
his captors. It was surprising he knew as much as he did on the matter. He
sighed quietly, thinking it would have been nice to thank this Gabriel, who had
primed his brother for an escape he had never been able to make himself.
“My Grace is not, uh, infinite? I believe it has a certain capacity. Even if we
were to feed my Grace to its maximum, I believe it would fall short— Although,”
he paused, cocking his head to the side as he thought. “My Grace has only been
free for...” He paused again, looking to the ceiling as he calculated. “Nearly
seven days. So I have no frame of reference for how powerful it may really be.
The only other hath I have ever known was in a similar position.” He shrugged
again. “I don't actually know how powerful we—I can be.”
“I think I can help with that,” Bobby piped up.
Dean looked over at the creak and crunch of the spine of an old book opening.
“Y'all gotta take a look,” Bobby grumbled, turning the book on the desk to face
the three of them. Dean rose, the others following close on his heels. On the
ancient and foxed paper, delicate and so very thin, Dean saw one of the most
breathtaking images he had ever seen.
In perfect, shining gold, reds, oranges, and a blue sovibrant, was an angel.
With wings. Wings of floating, smoke-like blue. Wings like Cas'. The angel in
the picture was calling down fire from heaven, destroying everything below him
in raging, roiling inferno. Dean could almost smell the brimstone.
He heard Castiel swallow, hard, beside him. “Y— You think I could be that
st—strong?” he stuttered out, his accent choked and think, his fingers pressed
over his soft lips, an expression of fear of his face.
Bobby looked up at the angel, a frown on his face. “Yeah kid. I do, if that's
you, and my gyfodol may be a little rusty, but I'm pretty certain that that
symbol there would translate as hath, or Wing'ed Bringer of Light, in their
language, then yeah. I reckon you could destroy half the planet if you thought
on it long enough. Certainly a city.” And to emphasise his point, he stabbed a
gnarled finger onto the page.
Castiel frowned and Dean thought he knew what he was thinking. It was taking
time for his Grace to recover; how could he possibly be that strong? He didn't
look like he had the capability.
“Dude,” he began, getting Castiel's attention. “You flew to another planet,
like, seconds after removing the ear stud, while the cuffs were still
technically on you. You've been free for about a week, and you've barely eaten,
constantly cold. I mean, I dunno about you, but the fact that your Grace is
recovering thisquickly kinda shows just what it might be capable of. I mean,
how old are you?” he asked, for the first time trying to work out the angel's
age past assuming it was similar to his own.
Castiel frowned, looking at the beautiful, terrible, scene in the book. “I
think I am around one hundred and thirty seasons. I have to admit I lost count.
Your method of counting… er, years? It seems superior.”
Dean quickly did the math in his head but Sam and Bobby beat him to it,
“Thirty-two and a half.”
“You've not had access to your Grace for thirty-two fuckin' years. It's going
to take more than a week! A week without proper meals or heat, or whatever, for
it to recover.” He raked his eyes over the scrawny body of the angel before
him. “Some sleep and food might help,” he slumped back a little. “But, other
than that, what do we gotta do? Put you near a generator?”
Castiel frowned, but he clearly guessed what it was by context alone, so
continued without asking. “No. I don't think it works like that. I cannot
control it. I am taking energy from the surroundings now, I don't know how to
amplify it.” He shrugged again, looking a little downcast.
Sam patted him on the back before going to take a seat on the couch, Dean
following close behind, leaving the seat and Castiel's unfinished sandwich for
him to return to. “Buddy, why don't you finish up that,” he said nodding at the
plate, “and get some more rest. Surgery ain’t a walk in the park, even if you
didn't need god damned stitches to close the wound.”
Castiel looked with distaste at the sandwich. “I am not hungry, I am not used
to so much food,” he stated, earning twin looks of sorrow and discomfort from
Sam and Dean. “But, I will rest, for now,” he said, looking discouraged and
worried before he turned and headed back toward Bobby's cellar, and the room
hidden down there.
Dean nodded and watched him go, thinking that, with time, the man's already
attractive frame could bulk out into something truly breaktaking. He worried
slightly for his own sanity if and when that time would come. He didn’t
entertain the thought that followed; thinking of a future with the angel was
ridiculous, there was a war coming. A war that only they knew of, and only they
would be trying to stop.
It was hilarious really. An old guy who grew carrots and helped immigrants get
their papers, both legally and illegally. A people's rights lawyer who worked
within the complex, a third class cop with no career prospects, and an abused
angel, who may or may not be so powerful he could destroy a city. Even with
Castiel's supposed powers, what possibility did they have of fending off the
armies of two converging races, the ranks filled with their own, slaves,
conscripts from other worlds, willing andunwilling? According to Castiel, the
armies were vast, and that was only on the bluewards side of the Bridge; the
angels’ path through the worlds.
“Dean, you've been up since yesterday afternoon. You need to sleep too. Hell,
we all need sleep. Why don't we call it a night and we can move out in the
morning? Me 'n Bobby'll keep working another hour or so. We can work on a plan
of attack, I'll try calling Frank and Ash. We'll leave to get to the Complex
tomorrow for about five. Most operations close down for the night then.
There'll be loads of people moving around, going back to their quarters. We'll
be able to blend in. But you need to sleep. Your eyes look like someone punched
you already.”
“Nice Sammy, thanks. I'm so glad I have your support.” He said it snarkily, but
secretly he waspleased. It was late afternoon, he had been awake for nearly
twenty-four hours, with five hours of driving and a surgery under his belt. He
could do with the rest, especially if tomorrow, they had to stop a war.
He sighed and rubbed the heels of his hands into his eyes when his words were
met with silence. “Yeah Sure, Sammy. I'll head up.”
With that he stomped up the stairs to Bobby's rarely used upper floor. He
decided not to have a shower, hoping that Castiel would be making full use of
the small tank of hot water that Bobby's furnace had been heating. The man
rarely used it, but one look at the bleeding angel and Dean's tired face when
they had shown up on the doorstep that morning had led him to chuck in a load
of wood and rubbish to heat the house. Dean appreciated it as he pulled off his
work things and slipped into the narrow spare bed.
He lay awake, his mind a mess of worries, plans, and second guessing what may
or may not happen when they got to the Complex. He lay there, eyes on the
ceiling until he heard both Bobby and Sam troop upstairs, an hour or so apart.
He lay awake as the darkness became absolute, until the heat started to leave
the air, until he heard the arhythmic snores coming from Sam and Bobby along
the corridor, until he heard the rattling, groaning of the decrepit water tank
being forced to pay its load.
He realised that Castiel must have been lying awake too, or had only recently
woke up, taking a shower in the dead of the night.
Dean didn't really think as he got out of bed, pushing the covers down and
shivering in the cool air. He silently padded down the hall, bare chested and
bare footed, a pair of old sleep pants pulled up his hips. He made it down the
stairs, sticking to the sides to avoid the creaking of the old wood. He slipped
through the lounge and kitchen, lightly jogging down the metal stairs to the
basement, only making odd ringing noises as his weight moved from each foot on
to the next. In the darkness below he found the shower-room, lit around the
closed and ill fitting door from inside. Opposite was the storeroom where they
had pulled the bullet from Cas' shoulder. To the right of that, at the end of
the corridor, was the room Bobby had fitted out with the furnace and generator.
Inside that, behind a cupboard, on hidden hinges, filled with random, but
useful things like friction matches and toilet paper, was the bedroom.
Dean slipped inside, feeling a little guilty all of a sudden, his thoughts
catching up with him. Would Castiel want to see him? Why was he even here? To
comfort him? To be comforted? All he knew was that he wanted to see the angel's
face again.
The bed had not been touched, making Dean realise that, firstly, Castiel had
not slept in the intervening hours, and secondly, that he had not tried to. He
wondered what the hell the man had been doing all that time.
He sat on the end of the bed, legs crossed under him, a spare blanket wrapped
around his shoulders. He was damned if he would stand to wait for his… friend,
but he was aware of the man's hesitance about beds in general. He did not want
to seem threatening.
Dean was staring at the opposite wall, the concrete plain and bland and
utilitarian, when Castiel re-entered the room, a towel wrapped around his waist
and dripping wet.
The angel's shoulder was a mess of bruising. But the hole where the bullet had
entered his body was just an angry looking pucker against the mottled skin.
Dean could count his ribs.
“Hey,” Dean said, a half smile creeping up his lips. “'M sorry, I couldn't
sleep, and when I heard the water goin' I figured you might want some company.”
He shrugged, trying to act calm and casual. “I'm guessing it's all a bit
overwhelming, huh?” He asked Castiel, who still stood stock still, eyeing him
warily.
Eventually he slumped a little and nodded his head.
“Dude, you need to rest. Come 'n sit down.” He paused, sensing Castiel's sudden
tension, noting his eyes dart to the corner where Dean finally noted another
blanket in a heap on the floor.
“You know… Beds are actually meant to be slept on. There's no ulterior motive
here.” Castiel's eyes went wide, his mouth opening a little.
“That— Really?” Dean nodded.
“That makes some sense,” he finally gritted out, his first words since he had
walked back into the room. “Knowing that they aren’t only for… that,does help.
A little.” He sidled slowly toward the bed and perched, as far from Dean as he
could, on the edge of it.
Dean took a breath, cursing himself even as he spoke the words, unable to hold
back. “Um, sex isn't, y'know, actually meant to be bad either, Cas.” He coughed
a little, uncomfortable, finally letting go of the knot in his gut at the
thought that he had all but raped the man sitting next to him stiffly.
The angel's head turned to him slowly, a bemused expression on his face. “I am
aware, Dean. Thank you.” He smirked.“I may not have been in a good place,
mentally, when we—” He broke off, a sudden rush of red staining his cheeks.
“And, I may not have known what to do, or how it was meant to feel. But, I know
that what I experienced in the past is not right.”
At those words he slumped back against the wall, clutching to towel to himself,
showing a modesty that Dean didn't think he possessed. “I may have been young,
but Gabe knew what was coming I think. I assume he went through the same, only
he had mother until I was born. He told me that sex is for three things. To
procreate, for mutualpleasure, and to show the extent of your love for someone.
He said the first and the third were optional, but the second was imperative.”
Castiel's mournful expression flashed briefly to Dean's before staring back at
his knees. “It did not take many times— It did not take long to realise that
what was happening to me was not how it ought to be, and I finally equated the
word rape with what was happening. It made it easier. Somehow. That Gabe tried
not to scare me, but to warn me nonetheless.”
Dean decided not to get up and pace, but it was difficult the restrain himself.
The hurt and the pain that Castiel must have gone through for more than half of
his life—hell, for all of it—was beyond comprehension. And yet he sat there,
stoic as fuck. Barely a sad expression marring his face.
“Cas—” he began, but, even though the man turned to look at him with those blue
eyes, he didn't know what he wanted to say.
“I… think we should sleep. I— uh,” he started again, but not having the words,
he simply lay down on the bed, his neck crooked up where Castiel's body was in
the way. He lifted an arm in invitation and Castiel's startled expression was
enough to pull a huff of laughter from him.
“Dude. Lie down. We'll get under the blankets together. I might put my arm
around you to stop you falling out the bed. And y'know, we'll sleep. Nothing
else.”
He made eye contact again. “My promises still stand. So, you don't have to. I
can go back upstairs, and I'll let you rest here. Whatever you want.”
He waited, Castiel staring at him, clearly thinking furiously, a frown tucking
itself between his brows, until finally, he nodded. Once, minutely, but still a
nod. He left the bed and dropped the towel, to which Dean closed his eyes.
While Castiel dried off and pulled on Bobby's rejected clothing once again,
Dean shuffled under the covers, flipping them back as he heard Castiel's feet
pad toward him again on the tiled floor.
The bed dipped and Castiel lay stiffly next to him, but Dean didn't mind. Being
close to the angel had him in a stupor before he knew it. He pulled the other
man's body close, wrapping his arm across his chest, mindful of his wounds, and
tucked his nose against Castiel's neck, just under his ear. The man's damp hair
tickled his eyes, but he refused to move, finally comfortable and warm, no
longer an itch under his skin. As he drifted off, he felt Castiel's body relax,
inch by inch, as his breathing deepened.
Dean fell asleep with a smile on his face.
-
The afternoon light was already dimming as Dean's car shot through a parting in
the trees. Castiel's jaw dropped open as they hurtled onwards, finally
revealing the overwhelming sight of a non-stop wall filling the horizon, white
stone dotted with thousands of windows nestled at the base of the Bridge,
awesome in its own right.
“What the—” he began, but paused, mind blank at the vastness of the building.
“‘Fuck’ I think is the word you're lookin' for there Cas.” Dean said, amusement
filling his voice. “It ain't as grand as all that. Think of it like a city
rather than one building. It might as well be, there are quarters for the
workers and their families, schools, libraries, offices, shops. Basically an
entire society built around the Government and the scientists all involved in
everything to do with the Bridge. Immigration, expansion, The Accord,
colonists… Sam lives and works there because of his job, helping out people who
come through and find themselves in trouble, mostly because of their powers,
don't you Sammy?” Dean threw the last over his shoulder, grinning at his
brother, folded up in the back seat.
“Yeah, I help out those who face discrimination for their powers, mostly the
psychics at the moment,” he replied, nodding and eyeing the huge building to
their front too. “Right now they’re facing people wanting them tagged or
identifiable somehow. Some are campaigning for any psychic species to have to
wear lead helmets at all times. It's disgusting, they're as good and bad as any
other species, and mostly their powers are impossible to use for bad. How is
feeding off sexual energy in any way destructive?” The man pouted in the back,
making Castiel's lip twitch in amusement. He was so dissimilar to his brother
most of the time, but every now and then…
“Yeah, yeah, tell that to the rape victims whose attackers use their need as
justification.” Dean responded, a tightness in his voice.
Sam sighed, “I know, but I stand up for them too, you know Dean.”
Dean just grunted, and kept his eyes on the road. They were nearly there and
they all needed to concentrate, going over the plan piece by piece, taking the
last few moments to fill their bellies with Bobby's over-stuffed sandwiches and
drink the water from his well. It tasted much nicer to Castiel than the tepid
stuff that had flowed from the taps in Dean’s apartment.
-
“They got identification?” asked the brunette at the entry desk in a sickly
sweet voice, nodding at Dean and Castiel who stood awkwardly behind Sam.
Sam leant on the desk and Dean could see him put on his most charming smile.
“Ruby—” he began, his voice a low purr. Dean had to bite back the scoff he
wanted to make. “This is my brother, Dean, and his boyfriend Cas, I just wanna
show 'em around. Surely that's not too bad huh?” Sam continued, as Dean froze
at the mention of boyfriends.
He heard Castiel take in a breath at the question, but Dean nudged his shoulder
gently with a tiny shake of his head. It was enough and Castiel smiled at him,
a minuscule nod of his head just barely visible before turning back to the
woman behind the desk, his expression once again solemn. Dean was glad that all
the injuries to the angel's face had healed, aside from his ear, which was
hidden, just, by his tousled hair. Totally not something Dean had pulled him
aside to do gently, just before they began their walk along the wide paved path
toward the main North-East Doors.
Ruby hummed and cocked an eyebrow at Dean's little brother in a manner that
made Dean want to growl at her, but he restrained himself, just. Castiel had
obviously noted his tension, as he placed his palm on Dean's forearm, the
contact grounding him a little, remembering that they had to get inside without
trouble. Dean had ID, Castiel did not.
“I suppose not,” she tilted her head and eyed Dean and Castiel, his fingers
still wrapped around Dean's arm. Thankfully, Dean thought, it looked like a
possessive display rather than one of restraint. “Wanna hit upThe Kitchen
again, when you’re done with your tour?”
“Wild horses Ruby,” Sam whispered. Dean wanted to sneer at the wink Sam sent
the woman's way. But she was obviously charmed, a buzzing noise indicating the
automatic opening of the wide barriers next to the turnstiles, usually there
for those of a disabled or non-human physiology to use.
Castiel did not let go of his arm as they walked sedately through the barrier
and Dean jiggled his arm a little, to slip his hand down into Castiel's. The
man's skin was warm, his hand soft against Dean's weapon-calloused grip.
Castiel sent a questioning look his way before looking down to scrutinize where
their hands joined. “Hand holding Cas. It's a thing people in a relationship
do—” Dean whispered, hoping it was too quiet for Sam to hear, six or seven
paces ahead of them. “Which is how Sam introduced us to the harpie at the
desk.”
Castiel looked again and squeezed his hand a little, letting it stay within his
grip. “That was not a Harpie, Dean. Harpies are huge and terrifying. They
stink. They're unintelligent creatures that live on the Kimiziotuz's planet, if
I remember rightly. One tried to attack our cage as Gabriel and I were being
taken to the Bridge for transport once.”
Dean just looked at him. What could you say to that?
They walked for an indeterminable amount of time, Dean answering Castiel's
questions about their surroundings as they moved through one identical looking
white, boxy corridor, after another. At yet another plain door that they pushed
their way through, Sam finally came to a stop, knocking twice on an identical
door and waiting.
They all held their breath as their contact took their time in answering the
knock.
“Who is it?” Finally came through the door, muffled and angry sounding. Frank,
then, going by Sam's descriptions.
“Winchester, S, Forty-two, thirty-one,” Sam answered. The door cracked open to
reveal a craggy face, all suspicion and spilled soup.
He hummed in general disgruntlement, then opened the door and let the three of
them slip inside. “I got your message, Winchester, S,” Frank began, a sneer to
his lips. “Here,” he all but spat out passing across a small manilla folder
with papers haphazardly contained within, hitting Sam square in the chest with
it.
Dean sniggered as he watched Sam fumble to keep the file closed and complete.
“Thank you, Frank. I owe you.”
Frank's paranoid face closed in on Sam's looming above him, and poked him in
the chest. “Yes. You do. And you,” he turned to Dean and Castiel where they
were still stood holding hands. Dean dropped Castiel's palm in the face of
Frank’s glare, rubbing his hand against his leg, clad once again in his torn
work trousers.
Frank smirked and ushered them out, back into the bright corridor, from the
gloom of his tiny office stuffed with flickering computer screens. Dean asked
Sam what Frank actually did as they walked to his own office, up a level and
along another set of too-identical corridors. Sam couldn't give a coherent
answer.
It was four thirty in the afternoon, according to the clock hung on the plain
white wall in Sam’s office. The room was so small that it struggled to
accommodate three grown men all over six feet tall. Sam shuffled around the
room and sat at his desk, looking up at Dean, who was leaning against the door,
arms folded, and then Castiel, who stood ramrod straight and nervous.
Nothing was said, but Dean maneuvered his way around the angel and leaned over
Sam, not because they both needed to read the information, although it was a
secondary objective, but to try and foil any potential recording equipment in
the room. Sam knew they monitored all staff, but he wasn't sure whether every
room had it, or the ID, or what— Hence the silence. He would need his ID to
move through the building, but would leave the ID with Castiel as Dean and Sam
slunk into the shower rooms where, even in the Complex, it was deemed poor
taste to monitor people, so they could discuss their findings.
As they read through the information and memorised the maps that Frank had
given them, he and Sam exchanged looks, confirming that everything Frank had
written down was actually doable. For the first time since he’d seen Castiel's
eyes crack open again after the surgery, he felt hopeful.
-
Castiel followed the brothers down the corridor, wondering if the endless
tunnels seemed as horrifically confining to the humans and other off-worlders
as they did to him. After a while of staring at Dean's back, absently
remembering waking up in his embrace, he decided to try and use the monotony of
the walk to focus on his Grace, to find that fluttering heat trapped deep
within his chest, and bring it forth. He stared at the small of Dean's back,
mindlessly striding the miles of white corridors, and failing miserably to grip
his Grace, to force it, to feel it tangibly within himself.
When he had put Dean to sleep, when he had smote the angel, he had simply
thought 'sleep' and 'die' and willed it. That had been enough. He had not even
noticed his Grace doing his bidding. His Grace simply was, it was not something
he could control like that.
Nonetheless, he continued to try and summon more power into himself, to bring
his Grace to it's full capacity, whatever that was. Once only, when Sam and
Dean paused to hold a whispered and rushed conversation at a crossroads of
identical corridors, the electric lighting above him flickered slightly and he
felt the fluttering inside him swell minutely. He balked at the sensation,
stepping back in fear of his own body and power, causing Dean to leap after
him, a firm hand on his shoulder and a penetrative stare grounding him.
Dean took his hand after that, without a word passing between them.
He found he liked the warmth of his calloused grip.
Not long after that, they pushed open a door, plain and blank just like every
other door. Unlike the rest, this one needed Sam's ID to get through it. On the
other side was the Bridge.
The sight was not as anticlimactic as Castiel made it sound in his own head.
The Bridge. The twenty milewide (as Dean had informed him) half-sphere of heat
haze wavered steadily against the rain, a cone of distortion rising up into the
sky beyond the squat curve of it's apex. Castiel had seen the Bridge numerous
times in his life, always from the inside of a cage, and it had never looked so
terrifying, flanked by a continuous circular wall, many lengths high, a vast
space of square-patterned gray ground in every direction, shiny in the rain,
reflecting the faint light of the Bridge in the perpetual half-light. In the
distance he could see people walking towards the walls, leaving the cluster of
buildings grouped near the Bridge proper. They were mere specks, the buildings
seeming tiny and insignificant in the distance.
“Shit,” Dean whispered, awe and disbelief in his voice. Sam grunted a noise of
agreement, even though he worked there and must have seen it almost daily.
“We need to get to—” Sam paused, staring at the collections of buildings
sitting at strategic points next to the Bridge, almost abutting it. “Er, Sector
E-17, building forty-two” he finally said, reading the scrawled note on the
inside of his wrist.
“There,” Castiel stated, having spotted the huge letter and numbers of the
sector painted four windows high on the white curve of the Complex’s inner
wall.
“Well. Okay then,” Dean huffed out, taking Castiel's hand again in a firm grip,
eliciting a half-smirk, half-eye roll from Sam. Castiel cocked his head at him
in question, but only received a gentle smile in response.
It took less time than he had expected to walk across the huge space, criss
crossed with cables that led into the fortress surrounding them, and people
scurrying in every direction. According to Dean, it was the end of the working
day and everyone was trying to get back to their accommodations before the rain
fell heavier and the true darkness of night fell. Castiel couldn't see that
there was much difference between day and night on this world, with the
polluted sky and the electric lights, it always seemed the same to him, but he
shrugged in acceptance.
“You okay, buddy?” Dean asked quietly as they stomped across the ground.
Castiel’s eyes followed the pattern of breaks between the regular and repeating
blocks making up the ground. He nodded, not looking up. “You’ve barely said a
word since we entered the Complex,” Dean said, a worried tone once more in his
voice. Castiel finally looked up at him, taking in his concerned expression. He
thought about it for a moment, before speaking up. “I feel… worried? A bit
scared, my stomach is hot and tight and I feel a little sick...” He frowned,
having never felt this way— No, that wasn't true, he hadn't felt this way since
the first few times the menenth had taken him, forced him to his front on the
bed and—
“You're nervous?” He half shrugged, not knowing the word. He thought on it a
moment more. “Fear of the unknown, worry that I'll be found wanting some how…”
He trailed off again, until Dean squeezed his hand and then let go, immediately
wrapping his arm around Castiel's shoulders and squeezing him against his body.
“Sounds like nervousness.” Dean took a deep breath, releasing Castiel. He
stopped, ignoring Sam striding ahead of them, pulling Castiel to a stop next to
him. “We're doing something, Cas. And well— I Just— I believe in you, is all.
Okay?” Castiel nodded hesitantly, blinking in surprise when Dean's lips met his
suddenly, softly, his exhaled breath warming Castiel's rain-chilled face. “I
believe in you,” Dean whispered again, against his lips as his thumb brushed
the contour of his cheek bone. “I—” Dean said, but then stopped, shaking his
head, smiling warmly, but with something in his eyes Castiel could not name.
-
It had been disturbingly easy to get into building number forty-two, Dean
thought. The place was more of a shack with tin walls and a roof, the sound of
the rain a deafening drumbeat on the metal. Despite the two-bit look, forty-two
was one of the nerve centers of the Bridge. The corrugated roof and walls were
there simply as a wind and rain break, the true purpose of the room encased
within large clear plexiglass boxes. One of the few modern productions of
plastics, hideously expense, and only allowed for a handful of official
projects. One side of the building was open, mapping the same contours as the
Bridge, to which it was closely nestled. No rain made it in, and Dean, although
never having travelled through the Bridge himself, knew that no rain dropped
onto other worlds. He wondered how it worked.
As he looked across to Sam and Castiel, he realised that that was probably one
of the projects the Complex was running.
Dean picked the lock and slipped inside the plastic cube; he found the noise of
the rain almost totally dampened inside. He looked again at the sheet of paper
that Frank had given them, the only one they had decided to bring with them,
too complicated to memorize fully.
Sam stepped back from where he had been, next to Castiel, a hand on his
shoulder.
Dean had frowned at that, not liking the contact, but refusing to be jealous of
his brother. Or jealous at all, seeing as Castiel was the Worlds' most powerful
being, had just escaped from a lifetime of captivity, rape and emotional
torture, and wasn't his. Castiel didn't even comprehend what a boyfriend or a
relationship was. So— It was pointless being jealous.
He had already said his good lucks to the angel. In his heart they had been a
goodbye too, in case— Just in case.
Sam slipped inside the warm box, ducking his head to fit. They looked up
briefly at the angel, who stood bravely at the edge of the Bridge, the warm
pulsing gold-purple-nothing color of it throwing his form into shadow, the
baggy flannel flapping around his waist in the turbulence that the wall of
power before him emitted.
Dean and Sam had a job to do though, so while Castiel leaned his hand onthe
Bridge, Dean and Sam got to work, tapping keys, pressing buttons in a sequence
they soon lost count of, entering passwords and overriding systems quickly and
efficiently.
Dean looked up just as Castiel looked behind him, an expression of fear on his
beautiful, angular features— And then all the lights went out.
Sparks flew.
A blue glow rose, obliterating the soft colours of the Bridge.
Dean pressed the final button. The huge red one in the center of the terminal.
***** Chapter 13 *****
Castiel just thought hard.
After he had caught Dean's gaze—something hot that bolstered his confidence—all
he thought were the words, and he let the power rise up.
“Die, end, break, ruin, destroy, finish, die, close, desist, stop, die.” He
whispered the words under his breath, hoping for more, hoping his Grace would
hear him and play its part.
He felt the moment the lights went out, the sparks raining down on him, burning
his hand, his cheeks, his scalp. He felt the gushing, rushing warmth flow into
him and out again through his hand, gently resting against the strange texture
of the wall, like the skin on days old milk. He felt his Grace growing thin
again, knowing that he didn't have enough power, that he would fail.
He would fail Dean. And Dean would die.
He almost choked on a sob, but instead, forced his anger, frustration, fear,
and— regard? for Dean into the connection, into his smiting. He felt the
roiling mass of emotions flow through and feed his Grace, forcing out pulse
after pulse of energy, the blue light getting brighter and brighter. He could
no longer see the Bridge, either its soft glow, or its swirling colours.
Everything was white, hot, he threw his head back and screamed out a challenge,
daring his Grace to get stronger, brighter, more, and more, and more.
He felt something crack.
Then he felt the minds of every single person inside of the Bridge.
And there were hundreds, thousands, stepping through carefully, unaware as yet,
of Castiel on the other side.
And then the connection was gone and Castiel felt himself flying through the
air, barely aware. Wind simply rushing past his ears, away, the blue-white glow
gone, left with the jerky uncoordinated movements of the Bridge in front of
him.
He didn't expect the pain when it hit. When hehit the metal wall on the far
side of the building to the Bridge.
“CAS?!” was the last sound he heard as blackness descended.
-
Dean flew from the plexiglass cube, leaving Sam in the dust, as he ran to the
angel who had just been blown off his feet and across a thirty foot long tin
room, hitting the corrugated wall with a clang, and leaving a dent before he
hit the floor.
Dean skidded to a halt on his knees next to Castiel’s prone form. “Cas?” he
asked, his voice trembling.
The angel groaned and curled into a ball, pushing his hands, one palm bloody,
over his head. “Fu-huck!” the angel exclaimed breathily, utilising the human's
word with extreme emphasis.
Dean's lips curled into a smile. “I'd say. Shit, Cas, are you okay?”
Castiel groaned, but opened his eyes, looking around himself, a little
disorientated. “They're coming, Dean,” he breathed out, his voice heavy with
fear, full of it.
“But— But we did it,” Dean answered, looking toward the glowing brightness of
the Bridge.
“We did something,” Sam's voice came from across the room, from where he was
inspecting the Bridge. He must have gone to see their handy work once it was
clear Castiel wasn't dead. Dean had to admit that it wasn't the result he had
been hoping for. He had expected the Bridge to be a solid lump, stationary,
cold, dull, or maybe even gone. But this? It looked almost the same. The
colours within it still glowed, but there was something wrongabout them, the
gold and the purple clashing, the pulsing warmth—irregular, sickening to look
at. The surface no longer looked like the mass it had been. What had appeared
as steam rising from a cup of coffee in a huge spherical plume from afar, and
as a whirling golden mass up close, was now disjoined, stuttering, a jumble of
shapes crashing and coalescing. It looked congealed.
Dean bit his lip as he wondered how it looked from further away.
“What havewe done?” he asked, looking from Castiel to Sam.
Sam shrugged and moved toward the control terminal in the plexiglass room as
Dean helped pick up Castiel, who looked winded, his palm skinned, but nothing
worse, miraculously.
A shuffling noise from Sam's direction brought him back from checking his
friend over. “I think you need to check this out Dean, you're a helluva lot
better at the mechanical stuff than me.”
Dean shook his head. “This shit’s way beyond me,” but he moved forward anyway,
back into the booth, trying to comprehend the readouts on the small screens.
There was a set of lights set into a panel on the side of the box, a heavy set
of cables worming their way from the back of the unit and out through a hole in
the wall. He grabbed Frank's notes again, knowing he'd seen them in there,
knowing he’d had to press something on that panel to lower the power-something-
something.
They’d been trying to kill the Bridge using Cas’ power. Frank and the ellusive
Ash as told them that here was no built in way of disabling the Bridge's
control, no button, no sequence of codes—let alone a way of shutting off the
power of an Antimatter bomb that linked potentially endless planet… Yet, on the
panel there were two lights. In scratched and peeling letters, Bridge had a
steady green light, ancient and faded, but on nonetheless. Next to it was the
sign Controlwith a red stuttering light, all bright and shiny and never before
used. “Shit.”
He turned to Sam, his shoulders bent in the small space, and Castiel, slumped
against the exterior of the plexiglass, peering in through the open door.
“We've killed the control, it's wild again.”
“But— The tak and the menenth, and so, so many others are already inside the
Bridge, they had already stepped in!” Castiel's voice was rising, panic
growing.
Dean briefly zoned out in horror, his mind a seething rush of thoughts and
emotion. “The tak?” He bit himself off. Now was not the time. “Shit,” he swore
viciously.
Castiel continued swiftly, his tongue seemingly loosed by the fear growing
tangibly in the tin building. “The others yet to enter haven't been stopped
either. They can still cross, the iron chain only needs to the built and placed
around each Bridge. It may take a few years, but they'll continue, killing,
enslaving and recruiting their way across your Accord planets. But the ones in
the Bridge, Dean, are enough! There were thousands of them! They will converge
here and destroy everything!”
Deans stepped from the booth and  placed both hands on Castiel's shoulders; he
stared into his eyes, not knowing what to say, not knowing how, or even if he
could comfort the angel before him.
“I—I don't think they'll all make it through,” Sam began, Bobby's illegal
firearm already in his hand, as he stood prepared and ready. “You said the
Bridge was unsteady away from the human interference. If we truly have forced
the Bridge back to the way it behaved before we worked out how to control it,
maybe they'll be flung around, go insane like those leaders back when the
Bridge was new.”
Castiel stopped his fidgeting at Sam's words and finally looked at the Bridge,
eyes actually taking in what he was seeing properly for the first time. He
wiped his palm across his face, rubbing his eyes, and Dean was about to pull
his bloody palm away, until he realised that Cas had already healed. It was
humbling to be near something so powerful. Castiel looked briefly at Dean, his
aborted movement obviously confusing him, before returning his attention to the
Bridge. “You are correct Sam. I am sorry I missed it, I think, my, er, head—”
He cut himself off absorbed once again with the Bridge.
“They are still coming though. Some of them. Not all, but enough,” he said, his
voice sonorous in the empty space filled with the sound of the rain, distant
sirens, shouts and yells.
“Well—” Dean began, cocking an ear to try and hear the confusion outside as he
pulled another of Bobby's weapons from the holster slung at his hip. “You got
enough juice in ya or you want a gun too?” Dean asked quickly. Castiel simply
held out his hand, inspecting the third firearm before watching Dean undo the
safety catch, mimicking his movements.
They stood abreast in the room, thunderous rain drowning out the sounds of
panic from beyond, as hazy grey-green shadows started flitting through the web
of cracked lines, jolting colors and throbbing light that was now the Bridge.
A flailing shape—too many limbs—was the first to get close enough to make out,
the first to blast through the slightly viscous looking wall.
Dean's gun was the first to fire.
-
Castiel was aware of the strange pullthat the Earth had. Each time he had
entered the bridge in the past he had felt tug deep in his bones. He’d felt it
too when he flew between worlds, wanting to drag him towards its strange
neutral soil, where neither Grace nor Wroth had been created. Castiel knew
that, this close to, the tug wasn't a choice, to obey or not. It was a force,
like that which kept your feet on the earth and made you fall. Even if Sam was
correct and the bridge was no longer controlled, no longer steady and safe, the
army would still be able to make it though. Eventually. They may not be as
fearsome, they would certainly be battered and confused, but enough of them
would flow through. Enough of the many thousands he had sensed in the Bridge
when it snapped. They would have been sent off, throwing them from Wind-ward to
Fire-ward before they would fall through the gaps, or land back here on Earth,
some insane and some just incensed.
When the first figure came though, a menenth, Dean's gun cracked out, it's
report sharp in the confined building. The noise snapped Castiel into motion,
aiming his own weapon at the Bridge, wondering how many were already flowing
out into the flat, geometrically laid ground they were stood on, surrounding
the enormous rift between the worlds.
Castiel watched in awe as the menenth collapsed, a spurt of blood spraying from
her forehead, hitting the ceiling as her head was flung back. She landed half
in the Bridge, and Castiel watching in horror as her body was slowly sucked and
dragged backward into the shattered maelstrom, the shadow of her body being
whipped away too fast to track.
-
Dean raised an eyebrow at the sight of the body being snatched back by the
Bridge, making a mental note not to stray too close to its broken walls. From
the moment the hazy shadow was pulled from sight, it was as if a spell had
broken. Six off-worlders tumbled through, one immediately screeching in agony
as they stepped to Earth, directly into the corrugated tin wall, shearing their
body in half lengthwise, spattering the ground with blood, only to be sucked
back into the Bridge like the first.
Dean stood his ground, assessing his enemy. Three demons and two angels
remained of their group. They hadn't even given a second glance to the one that
had been killed by stepping out at the wrong point. Although he had never seen
the three species in front him before, he could see the malevolence in their
expressions. The anger, the drive, the desperation to obey and to kill.
They had already started forward, the armoured angel making her way toward
Castiel. The three demons, all with chests glowing red with Wroth through their
skin, advanced on Sam and Dean. The fifth, a different kind of angel, looked at
his companions, and seemed to decide that the armoured one was clearly a match
for the scrawny human-lookalike as it crept along behind the three demons.
Dean raised his arm to fire his gun again at the same moment Sam pulled his
trigger. The demons, unlike the menenth, were not susceptible to bullets. Sam's
shot went straight through the huge creature’s brain. The demon shook his head,
grunted, then moved on, his hands beginning to glow red in the gloom.
Another shot sounded, this time from Castiel. His unpracticed hands missed the
angel who crept after him, and hit her armor, the shot rebounding with a 'zing'
noise and puncturing the roof.
“Shit Sammy, we can't fight this. We don't have the weaponry,” Dean muttered,
getting a grunt from Sam in return. He noted Castiel backing away from the
angel, further from his and Sam's position, still firm in the center of the
floor.
Suddenly Dean's vision swam, his eyes meeting briefly with those of the
imposing angel standing behind the demons. He fell to his knees, vision
blacking out, thinking that this was it, he’d barely put up a fight, had done
the smallest amount possible to help Castiel and save every person, every
world— That was on him, and now he would die.
-
Castiel watched Dean and Sam go down, wondering if he was immune to the attack
the angel—the an-hark—was using, or if it just wasn't directed at him. He could
not spare a moment to help though, as his own angel took that moment to pounce,
a sword raised high, glowing dully with Grace.
He realized that the angel was weak, having tumbled through the Bridge; she was
likely a lowly rank in any case, not holding much in the way of power in the
first place. This species he knew of old. Cruel and dangerous, a willing ally
to the menenth. They were one of the few races that had developed not only
proper clothing, but metal armor. His proficiency with the gun wasn't anywhere
near good enough to take her on. He could not risk hitting his friends with
another rogue bullet.
Despite the roiling of his guts and the tiny fluttering of his Grace deep
inside of him, he collected himself. He watched the angel fall through the air
toward him as if it was made solid, her battle ready wings spread wide, slowing
her descent until it seemed that time stood still. Maybe it had. Sound had
disappeared for him, only the angel, her armour red and rusting, existed. He
side-stepped her sword, watching the pitted blade fly past him, missing by a
finger length. Without thinking further on the stupidity of simply reaching
out, Castiel pressed his hand to her forehead, letting the Grace bloom and flow
through his arm.
“Die,” he whispered, eyes closing for a moment.
His Grace flared, pouring from the angel's eye sockets, burning her thumping,
plated wings as if they were lit on fire.
He staggered back, the smiting having taken more from him than he had expected.
Sound assaulted him once again, overwhelming his stuttering senses. A whump of
silence cleared the air for a moment, and before he was even aware fully of his
surroundings, he was flying back through the air once more at the hand of one
of the demons.
This time, when he hit the metal wall of the flimsy building, he continued, the
propulsion of the attack sending him skittering across the gray ground in the
rain, the banging and crashing of the wall kicking up sparks from the ground
where it hit and pinwheeled, caught by the wind.
As he came to a stop, groaning with the pain, the new wounds complaining
loudly, he heard a matching groan come from the building, now thirty or so
lengths in front of him. He watched as the demon—a tak—who had attacked him,
chest nothing but pulsating Wroth between blackened ribs, strode from the dark
hole of the room, the building slowly collapsing in on itself behind it. He
breathed out in relief as he saw Sam and Dean stumble from the building just
before the roof fell in, and he thought dazedly, that the an-hark must have
been attacking only their minds and her distraction at his smiting the other
angel had lifted the attack.
The tak who had flung him so far, so fast, was approaching him, stalking
forward with a terrifying grace to his movement, towering horns rising from his
head crackling with Wroth in the rain. He stared up into the demon's eyes,
trying to summon his Grace again, knowing an attack would come, but from what
quarter, he did not know. It was likely that the demon knew what he was by now,
and would hold nothing back, he would attack Castiel with everything he had.
Castiel closed his eyes, trying to find that fluttering of Grace in his belly,
his chest, feeling the ground pressed coldly against the graze on his shoulder
and the rain beating his face. He was getting so tired of rain.
He felt that warm touch, trying valiantly to re-build, to heal him and fight
for him, to protect him, but his Grace was weak and tired. So, so tired. Even
his old wounds, the bullet hole and the torn rim of his asshole, were throbbing
in pain once again.
He forced his eyes open, blinking rain from them, and pushed himself up onto
his backside, wincing with the pressure. The tak was grinning, stalking heavily
through the thunderous rain toward him. Castiel realized with hope that the
Wroth burning so clearly within it was probably low after repulsing him though
a metal wall. He pushed himself to his feet, wavering and staggering.
From the corner of his eye, most of his attention on summoning his Grace once
more, planning how to smite the huge and terrible demon, he saw Sam's tall
figure stagger backwards and heard the report of gunshots. In that moment his
ears finally registered the other noises surrounding them.
There was the heavy troop of footsteps splashing and thumping their way over
the hard ground, yelling and shouting. Orders he realised. He could just make
out, against the darkness of the sheets of rain and low cloud, masses of people
in dark clothing, lined up in blocks. Before he could distinguish more though,
his attention was dragged back to the fight happening only lengths from him,
backed against one of the small buildings like the one they had broken the
Bridge in. His attention, though, was mostly focused on monster approaching
him.
He remembered the gun in his left hand, and brought it up, swapping to his
right and shooting the thing. He hit it in the head and heard the bullet clang
off metal far away behind the demon. Another shot hit it in the shoulder making
it stagger and bring up a hand to clutch at its Wroth filled ribs. There must
be skin covering the demon’s bones, but even its weakened Wroth burned so
brightly that it looked like nothing more than a burning skeleton, horns
brushing the low, wet cloud over its head.
From the corner of his eye, once more, he was distracted by the movement and
gun shots of Sam and Dean. They were fighting the other tak hand-to-hand, and
Castiel had a moment of intense and destructive sadness fill him, knowing that
their likelihood of survival was so very poor. At that moment though, with his
attention elsewhere, the angel struck. The angel he had forgotten completely
about. The angel that crept from the ruined building and circled him. It
struck, not physically, but with it's mind.
He felt his head encased in something soft, like the pillows in Bobby's home,
and he almost believed he could feel the phantom touch of Dean's lips on the
back of his neck once again, until, it seemed to him the world pitched over, so
that the floor was the wall, yet the rain still hit him from the sky which
seemed to swim, falling down.
Castiel starting growling out a frustrated noise of anger. He was furious. How
dare this— this monster attack him. Him,who survived seasons of rape and abuse,
who escaped, who managed to find someone to care about, to care about him. How
dare this pathetic excuse for a person think to blacken his world once again
and take everything from him. How dare it think it had won.
With that, he thought repel.Rather than the almost stand-still of time when he
had geared up to smite the angel, time stuttered forward. He was on his knees
watching the smoke-like Grace encase and run down his arms, the sky rotating
around him, then he was upright, his hands flung out, squinting into the light
his hand emitted with a huge arc-like pulse. Then everything was white and
clarity returned, up was up once more. The demon and the angel were both on
their knees, the skeletal form and the white arcing wings broken,
twitching.They were slumped in twin heaps either side of him, their bodies
already cooling in the rain.
Castiel shook himself, knowing he had to rescue his friends from the two
remaining, enraged tak, and get them out of there. His Grace was far too
depleted now, and he could not fight again. He felt weak, he was trembling, his
vision swimming once again, this time with exhaustion.
He started forward nonetheless, desperate to save Sam and Dean, to get to them
before the tak took them, destroyed them. In his distorted vision he latched on
to the hazy red blur that indicated the tak’s Wroth, beating out from their
skeletal chests.
He stumbled, and fell to his knees, eyes beginning to fill with tears as he saw
a lump on the ground, unmoving—Sam. He forced his remaining Grace up, tiny and
cold, needing to get to them, to help. He staggered to his feet again, feeling
blood flow from the re-opened hole in his shoulder, from his ass, from the cuts
on his shoulder from his most recent fall, from his skinned palm. As he got
closer his vision coalesced again, he could make out Dean, his short hair
plastered to his head, blood smeared on his cheek. Fury rose at that, but he
didn't have time to even try and run forward— The demons let out a great roar
and one of them threw his arm up, his palm burning hot and red with Wroth, and
fired a bolt of molten rock-like-fire from his hand directly at Dean.
Castiel was frozen, white hot Grace mixing with his anguish and fury.
Except— The beam of liquid fire never hit.
Castiel felt doused in ice as he saw Dean Winchester's chest glow with Wroth
for half the time it took to blink, then the fire was dispersed, sent in a
thousand directions, landing like burning oil and evaporating harmlessly into
the soaked air in a halo around Dean and the man on the floor.
Castiel watched in total confusion, terror and betrayal as the not-human
screamed in rage—that sound, nothing but human in its misery and grief. Dean’s
face was contorted, no longer his as he flexed his shoulders, hands fisted at
his sides, and without so much as raising his gaze from the tak's glowing and
rapidly heaving chest, he pulsed. The air grew thick around Dean, almost solid,
then it attacked, blowing outward, shredding both the tak, slewing flesh from
bone, leaving the afterburn of Wroth hanging in the air until that too was
gone.
Castiel took one moment to stare at the being that was Dean before he cried out
in crippled shock and fear at the betrayal. He staggered back from the creature
that he had thought his friend, that he had trusted. The same creature that had
hidden his true self from Castiel, that had pretended to be good, benign, when
he was just as powerful as the evil creatures that had held him captive his
entire life.  
Grace or not, he pulled his wings forward just enough, and as Dean's eyes
snapped to his, his tears flowing freely, he flew.
-
Dean staggered back as he watched Castiel's wounded expression disappear along
with his entire being, leaving, for just a fraction of a second, a rain free
gap where he had been standing. Before he could really process that Castiel had
run—flown away once again, he felt a tendril of disappointment that his wings
had remained invisible.
Then the horror set in. Castiel had gone. And hehad used his Wroth. Castiel was
gone because he saw him use his fucking Wroth, the thing he had hidden since he
was a baby, somehow kept in check, with the help of his mother, to the point
that even his own father didn't know he had it, and now Castiel knew, and Sam
was dea—
A loud and pissed off groan sounded by his feet.
“Sam?!” he yelled over the staccato beat of gunshots behind him, far away and
irrelevant. “I thought they’d killed you! Fuck. Fuck!” He pressed his hand
gently to Sam's face, pressing around the edge of a slash across his forehead
that was still pumping out blood onto the soaked ground.
“Pretty hard to be dead when your brother's chest glows, dude,” he grumbled,
pushing himself upright, Dean fussed, helping him. “What the fuck was that?”
Sam's voice was irate, and slightly scared, but allowed Dean to help
nonetheless.
“Fuck, man. I’ll tell you later, if I fuckin' must, but right now we are
unarmed, surrounded by police and soldiers, angel-less, and in the middle of
the fuckin' Complex where an army of terrifyingly powerful angels and demons
keep dropping through. Perhaps we could keep the heart to heart for later?”
He hissed out his words, furious with the whole situation, as some of those
demons stepped through right next to them, heads of black writhing smoke. They
had fucking failed and Castiel had run. The army could only keep the newcomers
at bay for so long, and Dean could see more and more falling through as he
finally took in his surroundings again, looking with disgust at the remains of
the demons which had thrown fuckin' molten rock at him.
“We need to get out now Sammy. That is, if we want to live through the end of
the fucking world,” he spat out. Sam just gave him a look, grabbed his arm and
started running toward the nearest door back through the tall white walls of
the Complex proper. The part that, so far, wasn't smothered with the bodies of
troops pouring into the rain scoured plaza.
***** Chapter 14 *****
Mindlessly, Castiel flung himself into the void between worlds, blind and deaf
and dumb and mourning a trust, a friend, a being he had likedto be touched by.
When he broke through the air once again he fell to his knees with a sob, more
in anger at himself for his own weakness, than with any sense of sadness. He
had never been this weak before, not even as a youth with the alpha of the
menenth jamming his barbed prick into his virgin hole.
But, not only had they failed; the Earth was lost, and every other planet and
species along with it, but he had lost the first person, since his brother had
been ripped from him, that he had actually trusted. Now that trust was gone, in
a simple wall of force and pulse of Wroth.
That flickering orange-red static glow humming within Dean's chest for the
smallest fragment of time was the only true betrayal he had ever experienced,
and it hurt like it was the most catastrophic of events.
Basic self preservation kicked in, he made himself stand up, made himself wipe
the tears from his eyes to take in his surroundings. He had almost expected the
world he was on to be as dangerous as the one he had just left, but mere
lengths from the Bridge, the familiar disjoined writhing of dulled color too
close to him, all was silence. The tak's home world was dead.
That wasn't strictly true, but it was deserted. The mass encampment surrounding
the Bridge was so much wasted detritus rotting in the light breeze. He even saw
in the distance wild animals grazing amongst the ruin. He walked slowly,
letting his breath return, listening for the tell-tale flutter of his Grace in
his chest, trying to ignore the blood still soaking his torso from the reopened
shoulder wound.
He sat, giving his Grace a moment to recover before he focused the power and
used it once again. He scoffed at the idea of his kind being able to smite an
entire city. He could barely fly the length of the worlds without killing
himself after smiting two measly beings, how would he ever have enough power to
destroy a city? Why would he ever wish to do that? Apart from how useful it may
have been in ending the Bridge… But it's not like he wanted to destroy the
city-like building that surrounded it, filled with people of all different
shapes and sizes.
He stared at the Bridge, watching as occasionally tak were thrown out, landing
heavily on the ground.
The first few that had landed on the scant grass as he rested, had nearly had
him bolting, summoning his tired Grace. But when they hadn't moved, he calmed,
realising that the pull of the tak's home world must have dragged them back,
broken and dead, despite the iron chain surrounding the intangible looking
Bridge.
They had probably been rebounding inside the Bridge since he heard the first
crack, since he, Dean and Sam had ended the human's controlling power over the
Bridge's might.
After a time, with the fifth corpse landing heavily on the ground, he finally
thought to purposefully raise his Grace. Something about Dean had been familiar
when he had seen that touch of Wroth glow in his chest, lighting him up even
through his clothing, and Castiel neededto know what it was—if he was correct.
Dean's Wroth had felt the same as the tak's. But so, so much more.
He opened his senses, feeling the souls of the recently departed tak lying in
the cracked, compacted mud, the slow minds of the grazing beasts off to the
east, the sharp attention of the bird-like creatures sitting in the trees far
behind him, and the all consuming, humming, background noise that was the Wroth
that suffused the very being of this world.
It had taken him until he was around thirty or thirty-two seasons old to ask
his brother why each world “tasted” different, and why it got weaker each time
they left the world.
Gabriel had shrugged and told him it was the Grace of that planet. He didn't
know why, or why they could sense it. Castiel still didn't have the answers,
but since then he had noted that each world, and each species, had their own
specific rhythm of Grace or Wroth, with the Earth's nothingness humming almost
too loudly, enough for other species to feel it's pull, its quietness.
Now, he opened up his Grace and sensed the hum of the world at his feet, and
tried to match it to the feeling of Dean when he had repulsed and shredded the
tak. He was certain he wasn't getting the two energies mixed up. Dean's Wroth
was close, yes, but more, much more that the taste of the tak alone.
He startled, opening his eyes at the realisation that Dean was more powerful
than the tak, the tak who professed to be the most powerful of all beings Fire-
wards. And they were, he had never felt Wroth beat so strongly from any demon
other than a tak, until Dean.
Without another moment's thought, he summoned his Grace and left the empty
world and flickered across to the next, spreading his senses far and wide. He
felt nothing at all, no life; the world was dead. Then the next, plant life
only. The next, animals—no intelligence, the next empty again, then the next,
animals, and the next, the next, the next and on in a fear and panic until
nothingness.
He screamed as he opened his eyes to the lack of world. Blackness enveloped
him, deathly cold, sucking, ending, pounding nothingness.
The breath died in his throat as he flung himself backward, back to the real
void, the place betweenworlds, not the painful lack of one. He landed with a
thump to the dusty rock of the last uninhabited world, Wroth still sitting in
the stone, but no life to make it burn.
He tried to scream again at the fear still pulsing in his veins, his heart was
in his throat as he sucked in heaving breath after heaving breath, crying
uncontrollably in the shock of the- the Nothingness.
He opened his wings, about to throw himself back to Earth, as far from the
Nothingness as he could, until reality caught up with him. On Earth, a being
that shouldn't exist battled next to his brother's corpse against an army of
angels and demons who had abandoned their own worlds to cause chaos to Earth,
simply because an accident had opened a permanent rift between worlds. He could
not land in the midst of a battle, as weakened as he was, and expect to
survive.
He thought for a moment about what point there was in actually surviving, and
Gabriel’s face came to mind. And although he hated himself for it, Dean's face
was the next, the second reason to keep fighting.
Scowling hard, he roused his Grace for one last push, and purposefully
manifested his wings for the first time in his life, spreading them wide and
proud on the deserted planet. He caught the vibrating tendril of his wing in
his peripheral vision, a blue the colour of the sky at dusk, brooding and
violent, suddenly catching the sun, swirling impossibly turquoise, then stormy
cloud, then the colour of the aurora in the night sky, all the while contorting
like blood dropped in water.
He stopped short, staring at how beautiful they were. Almost gold when the low
sun slunk through the clouds and caught them.
He shook his head. He still needed to get away from the Nothingness, it was
bowel-wrenchingly terrifying, he needed to be safe and he needed to— He closed
his eyes in anger at himself. He needed to finish what he had started.
He tensed, straightening his wings, then giving them one huge beat downwards,
another, faster and faster until he rose, caught a gust of wind and was free.
-
Castiel landed outside of Bobby's house with a pained cry and a crash of
screeching metal as he landed on a rusting heap of an ancient car. He had
pulled his wings back out of the world before he made the final drop into
Earth's plain, but that was not what caused his poor landing.
His Grace was truely gone, used up.
He writhed, squirming on his back as pain shot through him, now too weak to
even hold back the tears being squeezed from his eyes.
“What the—” Bobby's voice sounded loud and scared through the yard, “Castiel?”
He groaned loudly, an agreement that it was him, even though he would really
rather not have been at that point.
“Dean—” he managed to gasp out, the fear rising in him once again, now he had
managed to fly across the barren planet to the right point before throwing
himself between the worlds to land on Earth. “Dean is a demon.” He rolled over
on his stomach and fixed Bobby with a glare.
Perhaps his Grace wasn't entirely gone— He saw Bobby's eyes widen in the half
hearted blue flash that lit him from the inside. “Did you know?” he demanded,
scorn dripping from his pained voice.
He watched as Bobby pulled the old and dirty hat from his head, ran his hand
through his thinning hair and replaced the cap, slamming his fists on his hips
and huffing out a breath.
“I had my suspicions, kid. You wanna tell me why you're here when the radio is
insane with reports of a huge battle ragin' at the Complex?”
Castiel growled low in his throat. “No,” he forced out, but rolled off the roof
of the car, a huge dent marring its rusty surface. He dropped to his feet which
promptly gave way underneath him, landing him in an ice-cold puddle, hands
squelching into the mud.
He nearly let out yet another forlorn sob, but refused. He was down, not
beaten, and Bobby had information for him whether he knew it or not. He felt
hands encircle his upper arm, pulling him upright. “What the hell you done
boy?” Bobby asked before Castiel could fix his gaze on him. “My boys still
alive?”
Castiel did manage to look at him then, the wording evoking something in him.
This man loved Sam and Dean as if they were his own. And he had deserted them.
But then the anger, the loss of trust flared again. Dean had lied, Dean was a
demon. Dean had protected himself and his brother's body by pushing out a force
so strong it ripped one of the strongest demons alive, flesh from bone from
Wroth. He shuddered at the memory. “Dean is. I—I don't know about Sam.”
He looked at the old human's face, care worn, good. He didn't trust him, but he
didn't mistrust him either. “I ran. Because I was in fear of Dean. I have never
seen anything so strong, Bobby,” he admitted, flat, uninflected, his accent
still subtly different to the humans’.
“Can you go back and help?” The man asked, eyeing the blood saturated front of
Castiel’s borrowed shirt, his voice withering. Castiel looked down to the muddy
floor and shook his head; he could not feel a spark of Grace within himself.
“Come on in then,” Bobby grumbled. “But if them boys don't come back to me, so
help me, boy.” Castiel shook his head at the man's idiom, but understood the
gist. He hoped that Dean's power was enough to help Sam, and get them out of
there.
“So, you left my boys,” Bobby stated as he got him settled into the warm, dry
kitchen of his home. Castiel stiffened; the tone had been idle, not really
directed at him, but it had been accusatory. Bobby wouldn't ever forgive him.
Ire rose, fury and anger. “I ran for my life, Bobby. I have spent my life
r—raped and battered and cut and molested and demeaned by angels and demons
less powerful than your precious Dean. He lied, he kept it hidden, he pretended
to be nothing more than a human, to what? To get to me? To kill me? To take on
this planet? To side with the menenth? The tak?! You think I left them? You'd
be fucking right Bobby. I left them because I was terrified.”
He deflated, his hissed and spat words having rendered Bobby speechless, wide
eyed and shocked. He reined himself in, noting a dimming to the light in the
room, and he realised that his barely-there Grace had once more been pulsing
from his eyes.
He stared belligerently at Bobby, waiting for a reply, not truly expecting one
and planning his next poisonous words, trying to purge the feeling of having
been used, torn up and thrown away, all because Dean was not what he had
professed to be.
“T—tak?” Bobby finally asked, halting Castiel's thoughts in their tracks.
“Yes. They are the opposite to the menenth. Demons just as powerful, just as
hate filled. They have been working together, stepping from world to world on
their side of the divide. They are the most powerful—” He stopped remembering
that nothingness when he had gone in search of the nextmost powerful demon,
something as strong as Dean.
Bobby slumped to a chair, rubbing his hands over his face, before getting up in
agitation and grabbing two glass bottles from the fridge and handing one to
Castiel.
“You'd better sit, boy. You'll want to drink that.” Castiel watched, still
standing as Bobby took a long drink.
“Dean ain't Sam's full brother,” Bobby began with a heaved breath. Castiel
frowned wondering what he meant. “They share a mommy, but they got different
daddies. Very different I'd hazard a guess.”
Castiel slowly sank into a seat silently, eyeing the older man. “A little while
before Mary married John, somethin' happened. She came tearing in here, this is
when I was still workin' in the Complex with John. My wife had died not long
before, and they used to be friends. I'm not sure to this day if she was
lookin' for me or Karen. She was covered in blood, crying uncontrollably. I
helped clean her up, and she made me promise not to tell John. She was worried
that he'd refuse to marry her.” Bobby looked up and saw Castiel's frown.
“She was raped, son. Somethin' awful.” Castiel blanched, not wishing that on
anyone else. “Apart from the begging me to silence, and apologising over 'n
over, she was mostly mutterin' nonsense until she calmed down and slept. Well,
up until now I thought it was nonsense.”
He huffed out a breath and continued. “She kept sayin' his name was tak. I
thought it was a mighty strange name at the time, but I figured the poor girl
was just babbling in fear and agony.
“I don't know how much you know about this stuff, kid, but people can’t inter-
breed. We can try as much as we want, but tryin' to make a baby 'tween two
people 'o different species? Doesn't work. There ain't single child on this
planet or off it whose parents came from different worlds to one another.”
He nodded as if that was something more than mere fact. But—
“When Dean came along, somehow John got wind of the fact that he wasn't his.
Maybe he added up the dates and got the wrong answers, or maybe it was the mess
that I have no doubt Mary was still in down there on their weddin' night. But
that man didn’t never love Dean, not to his dying day. Mary knew that. Mary
knew her husband had this distaste for their first child. She kept him
protected. She and Dean spent a lotta time here.
“I watched Dean grow up and I saw some things which didn't make no sense. He
would get lost, and turn up on my doorstep, far too far for a three year old to
walk alone, or get bullied and they'd find the bullies a town over, or they
wouldn't find Dean for hours, he was so good at hiding. Mary would talk to him,
low and quiet like. I never heard the words, but it sounded like pleading when
he was tiny.
“As he got older Dean closed in on himself. But still, nothin' seemed to touch
him. Bullets never hit him at work, when he didn't wanna be found, there was no
one who could find 'im. When his mommy died—was murdered, their Daddy went a
little crazy, and Dean decided to try and follow in his footsteps, finally
wanting his daddy's approval. I think Dean knew he wasn't really his Daddy, but
you'd have to ask the boy that yourself.”
Castiel took a sip of the drink, pulling a face at the strong bitter taste
while Bobby fetched another from his fridge. “In fact,” Bobby mused as he sat
back down. “I ain't never seen him as open as he has been since you been here.”
Castiel looked down at the bottle in his hand, unsure what to say to that. “So,
my theory over the years is that Dean ain't fully human, but the only viable
child conceived, let alone born, of a demon and a human. And, your face is
tellin' me that you reckon that's the truth too. So, tell me.”
Bobby leaned back and fixed Castiel with a glare that matched his own. He
quailed a little and swallowed another mouthful of the strange liquid. “He
fought off demons, tak actually, with Wroth,” he stated blankly.
Bobby's eyes widened but he said nothing, letting Castiel continue. “What I
felt from him— What I saw. When I ran—” He paused, shame filling him. “I went
to the tak's planet, to see— Dean’s Wroth felt similar, but different, to their
power. It wasn’t until after I had left, after Dean had rendered the tak’s
flesh from bone, that I realised his Wroth even had a taste.
“When I sat on their ground, I knew it was different. So—” He huffed a breath
of his own. “So I went looking for a more powerful demon. There are none Bobby.
Every world after the tak is devoid of intelligent life.”
He waited for Bobby to get it, any of it. “You mean to tell me you just cycled
through infinite planets to see where my boy came from?”
Castiel fixed him with a stare. “Not quite. There were, I don't know, ten?
Twelve planets past the tak’s? And then nothingness.” He looked at Bobby again,
knowing he could not get across to the human just what that meant.
“Nothingness, terrifying Nothingness, Bobby.”
He dropped another deep breath. “It makes sense that Dean is a— Hybrid?” He
queried, not sure what to call him. “It seems unlikely, but also the only
explanation.”
Bobby simply grunted and Castiel watched him vacantly as he started pulling
books from the shelves. “Get readin' boy.”
***** Chapter 15 *****
Dean grunted as he was pushed back two paces against his car, finding himself
with a gruff Bobby in his arms, squeezing him tight before practically dropping
him to the floor to pull Sam into his arms too.
Bobby let go of Sam and visibly pulled himself together with a sniff. “Glad
you're all in one piece boys, glad you ain't dead, Sam,” he said, his voice
heartfelt and broken. With that, he turned and walked back into his house.
Sam and Dean looked at each other and followed him, Dean limping and Sam
holding the cut on his forehead and wincing with each step.
Sam flopped onto the couch the moment he was able, scowling at the wall, and
Dean just stood there, finally allowing the despair to hit him. He had held it
off throughout their two hour escape from the Complex, mostly against the
Police and Army fighting their way in, and the five hour drive back, but now?
They had failed. He had failed. And he had scared Castiel off. Again.
Wait— “How did you know Sam might have been dead?” He turned to Bobby, who was
standing at the fridge, pulling sandwich fixings out.
He scowled. “Where is he, Bobby—”
Bobby shook his head. “He don't wanna see you boy.”
Dean ignored him. “Fuck 'im. If he's here I'm gonna go shout at his stupid
face.”
He stormed toward the cellar, hoping that Castiel was down there and wouldn't
simply disappear into another world where Dean could not follow.
He threw open the door to the boiler room and pulled aside the hidden doorway
to the secret room beyond. Dean stopped short in the doorway at the sight
before him.
Castiel was curled on the floor in the far corner, naked to the waist, his back
to the door. A bottle of beer stood on the floor by his head, and there were
three empty ones on their sides a little further away. A blanket was hitched
over his hips and there was a pillow under his head.
His back was a mess of raw red welts, the skin torn around and down his
shoulder blades, with black bruising blooming and spreading as Dean watched. He
swallowed hard.
“What the fuck, Castiel?!” He yelled, the words and the anger bursting from
him. His outburst caused Castiel to flinch where he lay on the floor, but he
didn't move.
“I could ask you the same, Dean,” Castiel said, flat, even, calm.
“You left! Again. You left Sam dead— Or, at least I thought that at the time.”
At that Castiel lifted his head, hissing audibly in pain, but he still didn't
look over his shoulder.
“I am pleased he is not,” he said gently, and Dean realised he meant that, but—
“You still fucking left, Cas. Look, I know what you saw—” He didn't have
anywhere to go with that. Even Sammy didn't know. How could he explain
something that he was certain would make him a far more hated rarity than
Castiel could ever hope to be. His own safety lay in silence. He was usually so
careful, but he’d had to save his own life. It had been a reflex, not a choice.
“What I saw was a man who I had learned to trust, the first man I had ever
learned to trust, proving that everything he had ever said or done was a lie.
You hid your true nature from me.” Castiel’s voice was still flat.
“I hid?! You pretended to be a fucking human until we fucked and you lost
control and showed off your plumage!”
At that, Castiel rolled over, clearly wincing in pain, his gaze far less
intense than usual. “Me?” He laughed out a sick sound. “I think youwere the one
who lost control, Dean,” he hissed, before turning his back again, groaning
slightly, and groping his hand toward the last remaining beer bottle.
Dean stumbled back at that point, because Castiel’s words were true. He had
known it at the time, but he had chosen to ignore it, decided to blame it on
Castiel, and then he had got wrapped up in the fact that Castiel was an angel,
and forgotten all about his little demonic slip.
He could see things others couldn't. He could see things that weren't there,
like Benny's nub-like horns—growing from his forehead, made from pure
Wroth—that no other creatures could see, that the vamiir didn't even know that
they had. So, it was unsurprising that, during the best orgasm of his life, he
let down the walls slightly and managed to see what even Castiel hadn’t been
able to see.
“It doesn't matter anyway,” Castiel's voice cut through the heavy silence,
defeated and destroyed. “We failed. The world will end. Worlds. May as well
drink Bobby's… potent home brew and sleep,” he muttered.
Dean couldn't form words. He agreed, but hearing Castiel's broken voice; deep,
mournful, that beautiful accent thickened by the beer, all he wanted was to
shake the injured angel and get him to fight once again.
“Fuck you. Fuck you both,” came Sam's sharp and condescending voice, causing
Dean to jump and Castiel to flinch, rolling to look over his shoulder.
“This is bullshit! You. Castiel. You ran out on us again, you left me for dead!
Wanna explain that one to me? And Dean, how is it that I suddenly learn you’re
a fucking demon, care to talk me through that one?”
Dean and Castiel flashed the shortest of exasperated looks at each other before
spitting out, in acerbic unison, “No!”
Castiel rolled right back over, and Sam's breath caught and hitched as the
angel simply faded out, there one second, gone the next, taking his beer bottle
with him, but leaving the blanket to fall in a heap onto the concrete floor.
“Dean—”
Dean barged his way past his brother. “No, Sam,” he ground out, stamping his
way up the metal stairs to Bobby's lounge.
He found the old man hunched over his radio station, a set of walkie-talkies
lying on the table, hissing and emitting faint swear words from the other end
as he fiddled with the dial on an old busted up radio that Dean had fixed for
him years ago.
“What did you do to your angel?” Bobby asked, a note of warning in his voice.
“I didn't fucking do anything, Bobby. He's just fucking fucked off and left me,
again!”
Bobby stopped what he was doing and looked up at Dean with a confused caste to
his face. “Huh? Scrawny bastard stalked out of the kitchen two minutes ago with
a fresh beer. Went outside.”
“I— What?” Dean questioned, his surprise ringing clear in his own voice. He
stamped over to the window, and glared out into the dark yard, lit only with
the lights falling from the windows of Bobby's well lit home. “I'll be damned,”
he muttered, spotting the half naked angel hunched over on top of a stack of
three cars, morosely knocking back a bottle of beer, the rain drenching his
skin and sticking his hair flat to his head. The wounds on his back were
horribly obvious and still bleeding lightly. “You could have at least given him
a coat Bobby,” he said, a little louder.
“Firstly, when did I get a chance to give him shit? Storming around up here.
Secondly why'd I wanna give him shit when he'd just bleed all over it? Kid'll
heal quicker than I could clean his pus outta my stuff.”
Dean scowled but he had to concede the point.
“So, what's the news then?” he asked, turning back to the warmth of the room.
Bobby sighed and poked the dial on the radio again, snapping his fingers as the
static disappeared, to be replaced by an excitable sounding news reader.
“Rufus reckons that the Complex has fallen. The real news ain't sayin' shit
according to him—” He indicated the walkie-talkies still hissing with Rufus’s
swearing on the other end. “But his contacts have told him that the army is in
full effect, and the Government's Police are fighting at full tilt… Seemingly
the off-worlders are coming in in small groups, disorientated, but violent.
“Most of 'em, we ain't never seen before, but at the very least the Dist; the
20th degree Red has defected from the Accord—”
Dean grunted at that. “Yeah. Smokey headed fuckers. Never liked 'em. Some
dropped through the Bridge, before I—”
“Yeah,” Bobby continued. “Most of them ain't like our tame lot. A load of em
can fly, proper shit, like your Boy Friday out there, moping in the rain.”
Dean scowled. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, boy, that Castiel can fly proper-like, if he wants to, unlike most of
our Accord lot who can hover, or jump short distances. These can do it
properly, flying loop-the-loops and raining down fire on our lot, who've only
got fuckin' guns.
“The Government has tried to call in off-worlders who want to fight, but they
aint having much luck, Rufus reckons.”
“No fuckin' wonder.” Dean mused, as he walked to the kitchen, finally hearing
Sam's boots ringing on the metal stairs leading up from the cellar. He saw him
flop in the chair next to Bobby and pick up the walkie-talkie as Dean went to
the fridge and found the makings of sandwiches Bobby had discarded earlier. He
was fucking hungry, which wasn't a surprise, as, what with the driving and the
fighting, it had been fourteen hours since they had left Bobby's house in the
first place.
Dean finished his task, listening to more updates as Rufus chatted through the
crackling line. When he was done, he dropped two plates between the men at the
radio table, earning opposing looks of disgust and gratitude .
On his way out the door he grabbed an umbrella, hating the things usually, but
allowing that they were useful for keeping sandwiches dry. He approached
Castiel, and without even turning around the man asked, in a blank flat voice,
“What do you want, Dean?”
He didn't answer until he had rounded the bulk of the triple piled ancient car
wrecks, making him huff a little nostalgic laugh for them. Some were so old
they even still had gasoline engines.
“I brought you food,” he announced as he looked up at the bare chested angel,
perched up high and hunched over the brown glass bottle. He looked ethereal,
back-lit by the house, but even in the gloom, Dean could make out the blood
still slowly oozing down his chest from the re-opened gunshot wound.
Castiel huffed out a short sigh, and Dean was fairly certain he’d rolled his
eyes, but as he slipped off the cars, nine foot in the air and landed softly,
Dean caught the tiny smug smile that crossed his lips.
Dean stepped forward and chose to ignore Castiel's flinch, the stiffening of
his spine, and simply held the umbrella over his head as he stepped back under
it's cover, food completely dry. Castiel looked away, but picked up the
sandwich at the top of the pile. Dean simply waited, interested to see how long
it would take Castiel to notice that he couldn't eat as well as hold the plate
and the umbrella. The man sighed again a few moments later, silently taking the
umbrella from his hand and continuing to stuff his face.
“How come you ran again, Cas?” he finally asked, his tone far more wounded than
he had wanted. “I—I couldn't break that promise to you, you gotta know that. I
would never hurt you, man, no matter what I—” he broke off, unable to finish.
Castiel continued to stare out across the rain-swept junk yard toward the sheds
which held actual, working farm machinery. “I have been free for less than two
weeks, Dean,” he stated and Dean was worried he was going to leave it there,
thinking that was sufficient explanation.
“I spent a lifetime— When I saw your chest glow with Wroth, I realised you had
lied to me. The first person I had ever allowed myself to trust, the first
person I had let myself care for since Gabriel was taken, and he turns out to
have lied to me, and lied to me about his nature, no less. I spent—” He paused,
eyes raised in thought for a moment, “Fifteen years being raped, Dean. Cut,
tortured— I was penetrated once by three visiting tak at the same time. They
weren't powerful, but they were bearing messages from their alpha. And because
they asked, the menenth's alpha let them, and he watched. Another time, I was
forced to kneel on a table with slaves from many species. The generals were
having a party, and whenever one of them felt the need, they would choose a
hole. There were puddles of come by our knees by the time they were too drunk
to continue. Another time I was tied to the bed for four days, legs splayed.
The alpha slept on top of me, inside of me, soft and hard. When he was awake
and tending to business, he allowed his visitors to do what they wished with
me.”
Castiel finally turned his face to take in Dean's horrified expression. “Dean,
I trusted you, and you lied—and I felt like I had on all those occasions.
Flayed bare and available to anyone to use as they would. It terrified me. It
saddened me.”
He looked back into the night. “I had also just witnessed the reason for my
escape—practically the reason for my being—fall down around me in blood and
bullets. So yes, Dean. I ran.”
Dean wasn't sure what to say to most of that, who would? But he found one thing
he could tell Castiel, one thing to try and regain this man's hard won trust.
But it was hard. He had memories, from being so young—before he could even walk
or talk—of his mother whispering to him that he must hide in plain sight. Of
her begging him never to reveal himself, especially never to his father. So, he
had not, even his beloved brother knew nothing until this day.
“I— I'm. Cas, I'm a—a half d—.” He couldn't do it. His mind rebelled, making
his tongue fat.
“I know Dean,” Castiel sighed, sadness and resignation in his voice. Before
Dean could react, Castiel had the umbrella down, fiddling with the clasp until
it collapsed, and a hand on Dean's shoulder.
Dean blinked, a wrenching in his gut, and he found himself standing… elsewhere.
On a cool plain, dust beneath his feet, no rain. He looked up, and saw the
stars for the first time in his life. He gasped in awe and stared as Castiel
dragged him by the hand thirty feet or so across the even ground, Dean's eyes
fixed to the astonishingly beautiful vista above him. Before he could even make
a sound of amazement, he found himself in the cellar of Bobby's home, guts
coiling in irritation again, but warm, in the dry, with a plate in his hand and
Castiel next to him.
-
Castiel opened his eyes, and folded his wings down over his back, banishing
them back to that other place where he didn't even need to think of them. He
dropped the rain-cover and turned to the bemused Dean, standing next to him—his
shoulder still warm under his palm.
Dean had neither apologised, nor explained, but with Bobby's words still
ringing in his head, and a touch of guilt at leaving him and his brother in the
middle of a battle field, Castiel found that he wasn't all that interested in
hearing what Dean had to say for himself.
The man's remorse, and his reiterated promises, had filled Castiel's chest.
Dean was no different to how he had been every other occasion they had spent
time in each other's company. He was still trying to take care of Castiel
whether he wanted him to or not, he still looked relieved every time he found
Castiel when he left.
Whether there would be time to talk later, or whether the world would be taken
by the angels and demons bent on revenge, Castiel wanted to meet his future,
his freedom, however short it would be, with new memories, new experiences to
focus on. He wanted to place his trust in this man, and although his belief was
broken, it was not beyond repair. He believed the words that Dean had said,
that Dean would do anything to remove those memories for Castiel. Perhaps the
part-demon could replace them instead.
Castiel swiftly turned and planted his lips firmly against Dean's, his hand
still firmly gripping his shoulder, the other uselessly swinging by his side,
his body thrumming, tense.
Dean pulled away, eyes wide in surprise, his hands up in warding. “Uh, Cas?
Whatcha doin'?”
Castiel sighed. “I thought that was obvious Dean.”
“Yeah, no. I get what you're doing. But— Why? I mean, I thought we were kind of
mad at each other.  And the last time we did this—I mean, you weren't really on
board… were you?” Dean asked hesitantly.
Castiel sighed heavily. He really didn't want to explain, but he could see the
wounded expression on Dean's face, and he didn't want the man hurt.
“No. I wasn't. And, I am sorry Dean.” He looked down, not really knowing how
Dean would feel about it. Dean made shushing noises and stepped a little
closer, tangling one hand in his hair.
He looked up, catching Dean's soft gaze, so close to his own. “It's okay. I
just felt like I'd done something terrible that you didn't really want after
you—you know, left.”
Castiel huffed out a laugh. “It started a little like that, I was doing it as
thanks, but— You made it something else.”
He let his lips curl into a smile, warmth filling his chest again at Dean's
answering look. “I want you to make me feel good, Dean. And I want to make you
feel good in return,” he stated, remembering his brother's words, before he
banished all thoughts of him from his head. “I want to remember this,” he said
after a moment's thought, doing his best to avoid fatalistic thoughts about
this being a final wish.
“I got you,” Dean muttered before leaning in, and brushing his lips against
Castiel's, his hands landing on his waist. He leaned back once again, breaking
their contact, ducking his head until Castiel looked him in the eye. “And you
will always have me, Cas. I— we—” He huffed out a sigh, his fingers digging
into Castiel's waist. “You have to know how much I like you, man. You fucking
enchant me.” Castiel leant back this time, taking in the soft expression on
Dean's face, the want and desire to lean in again, held back by his respect—he
was waiting for Castiel.
He could feel it now, the thrum of Wroth under the man's skin. He hadn't
noticed it before. This close to Dean, it had flavour, something tangible in
the air. It had always been there, but it had always tasted of despair, desire,
concern. Now only the desire was there, the same, but tempered by lust,
respect, worry, fear, want, need. Love.
He stumbled back at the realisation. Dean let him go, dissapointment staining
his Wroth and his expression.
“No—” Castiel murmured, so completely disorientated. “Really?” he questioned, a
smile tinging his lips again.
Dean jutted his head in confusion, “Really what?”
“You love me.” He stated it, flat, covering the hysteria that was starting to
dance in his chest.
This time Dean stumbled back, eyes wide. “Huh? What? No! I— I'm not—”
Castiel laughed happily, still able to perceive the raging emotions projected
by the power within Dean. Embarrassment, surprise, incredulity, bravado,
confusion, acceptance, agreement. He grinned, wide and untainted, and pressed
his palm against Dean's chest, where the orange-red glow had pulsed, invisible
now, but under his palm shivered the roiling emotions, foremost of which was
desire once again. He almost blanched at how strong it was, how much Dean
wanted him, but the softness in his eyes took away the fear.
Dean wouldn't hurt him; he believed him now.
He took that step and wrapped his hands around the back of Dean's head, lips
meeting lips as his fingers gripped between the strands of his hair. His wild
groan filled the air, and Dean suddenly lost control, leaning into Castiel,
moving his lips hard, pushing insistently against his tongue, wrapping his arms
hard around Castiel, holding him tight and close. The need Castiel could feel
should have scared him, but it did not, he could appreciate the sentiment
behind the roughness, the want.
“Dean,” he whispered as they pulled away from each other for a moment. His eyes
were wild and black filled, but they held nothing but possessive need and lust,
a soft warm regard. Love.
Another strangled groan came from Dean as he seemingly lost control again,
needing to touch Castiel, but instead of the embrace he was expecting, Dean
heaved him up, and, in surprise, he automatically wrapped his legs around the
man, lips locked together, smiles now on both their faces.
Dean staggered backward, turning as he went, and inelegantly dumped Castiel on
to the bed, on his back. He froze up immediately, but Dean started kissing his
neck, distracting him so completely that he forgot everything apart from the
hot lips and tickling breath mouthing their way across his heavily stubbled
neck and jaw, drawing a keening noise from him and full body shiver.
Dean mounted the bed, kneeling between his legs as he continued to kiss and
lick at Castiel’s throat and collar bones, staying clear of the bullet wound.
Castel ran his hands through the man's hair, arching his back into the warm
ministrations to his skin.
“If you—” began Dean, in between kisses to his nipples, causing him to groan
quietly into the silent air of the basement, “manifest your wings, will I be
able to feel them?” Dean asked, licking a line straight down to his navel.
Castiel panted, discovering how short of breath Dean's mouth was making him. He
could feel his erection pushing up against the trousers he was wearing, Dean's
belly arching enough over him not to touch. Oh how he wanted him to touch.
“I don't—don't know” he breathed, not really thinking about it properly with
Dean's mouth licking at the line of hair trailing from his navel to the band of
his trousers. Dean just hummed and worked his mouth back up, kissing and
licking randomly until his tongue was mouthing at the mound of his shoulder.
Castiel jerked away, disgust and concern stabbing through him.
Dean simply chuckled. “Being horny clearly suits you, Cas,” he smiled, nodding
at the wound. “Or, at least it suits your Grace.” Dean smiled and leant up
enough to allow him to look at the wound, now just a puckered scar once more,
washed clean of blood in the rain, and glistening with Dean's saliva.
He shuddered at that, and pulled Dean back to him, fixing their mouths
together. He licked into Dean’s mouth, deeply tasting him. He tasted of
Castiel, sweat and rain. It was exhilarating.
“Oh, Fuck, Cas. Can I— Can I try something? You trust me? You want me? I really
want to make you feel good, you— You beautiful fucking bastard you.” Dean
panted out the words, his lips close and wet against Castiel's lips. He simply
nodded, believing that Dean wouldn't do anything to hurt him.
Dean pulled back, licking at his nipples again before sitting back on his heels
on the bed. He looked down at them both, Castiel, naked to the waist, rain and
sweat damp, dirtied and bloody, trousers tented at his crotch, Bobby's heavy
boots still on his feet. Dean; fully clothed, sweat beading on his brow, lips
puffy and red.
“You're beautiful Cas,” he whispered, before trailing his fingers gently down
his torso, too firm to tickle, just enough to make Castiel squirm. He pouted as
Dean grinned and placed his fingers on the fastenings of his pants, avoiding
his straining cock.
“You really think that?” he asked, never having thought about his looks much
before, knowing he was repulsive to his captors.
Dean rolled his eyes and threw back his head with a groan. “After a few square
meals, Cas, you'll be lucky if I'll be able to tear my eyes off you.” He
shuffled back, pulling Castiel's clothes with him, gently lifting them over his
erection, careful not to touch him. Castiel groaned this time, in want. “Your
smile man, your eyes. That hair—” he huffed a laugh as he pulled off Castiel's
boots and dragged off the pants. “You just have something about you. I want
you, want to be close to you—” he shuffled back more, bending Castiel's legs up
and wide.
He stiffened a little at the position. It wasn't one he had ever had sex in,
but being so exposed again, so vulnerable, had his heartbeat escalating. Until
Dean's lips touched his crooked knee. “I want to hold you—” Dean licked down
the inside of his thigh, “I want to talk with you and laugh with you.” He bit
gently at the scarred flesh at the back of his thigh.
Dean looked up, warmth in his eyes. “I want to be the one to make you smile,
Cas,” he whispered as he pushed gently back on his knees, exposing his hole
completely. Castiel whined in his throat, a confusing mix of want and fear.
Dean let go of one leg and started kissing his way down the inside of his thigh
again, sliding his other arm under his lower back, raising him, kissing,
licking, biting—
Castiel wailed aloud when Dean's tongue swiped hot and wet across his hole. He
pressed kisses around it, nose brushing his balls, before licking firmly again,
the heat almost unbearable.
The sensation made him forget everything but the fact that it was Dean doing
it. He could feel his muscles, torn and ruined by years of abuse, clamping on
nothing in want of Dean's tongue pressing deeper.
He felt Dean's mouth leave his hole, but his breath still touched him, warming
him as he spoke. “Was that— Was that okay?” Dean asked, pressing a small kiss
to his thigh again.
Castiel growled, deep and guttural. “If you don't continue I'll smite you,” he
ground out, his voice reverberating low in his chest. Dean let out a delighted
chuckle and ducked his head again to lave long swipes of his hot tongue over
Castiel's hole, never pushing in, making him want.“D—Dean!”
“Yeah?” he answered, popping back up between Castiel's knees, a self satisfied,
smug smile on his lips.
“Will— I want— Can—” Dean's face soured a little, and Castiel frowned,
wondering what he had done wrong.
“I thought you'd want to—y'know—”
Castiel took a moment to comprehend, but then he growled again. “New memories,
Dean. Now, please—”
Dean shushed him again, kissing against his hole before sitting up, letting him
lower his legs to a more comfortable and modest position. Dean slipped from the
bed and pulled off his top, showing bruises to his torso that Castiel had not
known were there. He keened in his throat at the sight, sad that he hadn't even
thought to ask if the man was hurt. “It's okay Cas, nothin' hurts,” Dean
correctly interpreted. He dropped his trousers and kicked off his own boots,
stopping a moment, naked, hard, utterly beautiful, to look at Castiel as he lay
there simply wanting.
“If we're doin' this, we're doing it right,” he said in a low voice, greedily
letting his eyes rove across Castiel's body. He wriggled in discomfort slightly
at being so watched, and Dean smiled, softening his predatory expression. He
stepped closer, his cock bobbing, and leaned and kissed him on the forehead
before turning to the door and stepping through, oblivious to his nakedness.
Castiel whined and pushed himself up, wondering what Dean was doing. He eyed
his erection, wondering if he should follow Dean, staring at the dripping
purple head standing hard and proud between his thighs. Before he could even
lever himself upright enough to slide from the bed, Dean returned, a small pot
in his hand, which, although different, he recognised as lube. “Oh,” he said
without meaning to.
“I am not about to leave this, Cas—you—don't worry,” Dean smiled. “Now, shift
over. I'm gonna make you feel awesome.” Castiel did as bid, and hissed when his
naked skin touched the cold wall alongside the bed.
Dean jumped to the end of the bed, Castiel's hungry eyes following the man's
beautiful, soft, smooth and perfectly sized erection greedily, remembering the
barbed spiny cocks of the menenth. Theirs were the worst, but the tak's hadn't
been much better. Some of the others’ had seemed ludicrously small by
comparison, and he barely noticed when they slipped inside. He would notice
Dean, and he couldn't hold back the shiver of worry and anticipation at the
thought. Dean had clearly enjoyed it when they had been together before, he
hoped, oh how he hoped that it would be enjoyable for him too.
He was surprised when Dean pulled the covers up over him, protecting his side
from the cold wall, and slipped into the bed beside him, wrapping one arm
around his shoulders, the other sliding down, brushing a thumb over his nipples
once again, sweeping down his belly and tangling with the hair at the base of
his cock. “Please—” he choked off, not knowing what he was asking for anymore,
but revelling in the heat of the man's body next to him, in the feel of his
hand simply on him.
He groaned with disappointment as the hand left, leaving the bed and letting in
a draft of cold air. Before he could open his eyes he found Dean's mouth on
his, a happy humming emanating from Dean's chest and another rush of cold air,
before fingers trailed down again, then up his thigh before dipping between his
legs.
He jerked as instead of the warm touch of Dean’s fingers he felt cool liquid
touch his hole. “Sorry,” Dean murmured against his lips, before he dove back in
for another kiss.
Castiel groaned as he discovered that the cold liquid quickly warmed, and
slickly slid over his hole, like Dean's tongue had, around, and over, around,
over, around, in.
He stiffened as Dean's finger slid in, and Dean murmured something
unintelligible into his mouth, leaving his hand still inside of him, his thumb
just softly caressing his balls. He stayed there, the fingers wrapping around
his shoulder gripping him tight and kissing him deeply until Castiel relaxed
again, by increments. It did not hurt. It was Dean.
It wasn't until he moaned into Dean's mouth almost having forgotten the
intrusion in his ass that Dean started moving his hand again, having waited
until his kissing made Cas forget.
He slid his finger further in, moving it easily through the ring of muscle,
probing into Castiel. His thumb rubbed circles against his balls, his other
fingers touching the skin surrounding, massaging and touching everything in
reach.
Castiel groaned the moment he realised he wanted more. How was this so good?
How was it so different to everything he had ever had before. With his cock
only being stimulated by the heavy blankets weighing it down, the heat he had
felt the first time with Dean was not able to peak, he could feel it, low in
his gut, but there was never enough, always the constant movement against his
rim distracting him from looking for more.
He whined into Dean's mouth as the man slid another finger inside of him, and
Dean hungrily kissed the noise away.
Castiel lost himself as Dean continued to stroke and rub at him, feeling out
the shape of his inner walls and stretching him on two, then three, then four
fingers, his thumb all the while rubbing small circles against any piece of
flesh it touched.
Castiel was a limp sweaty mess in Dean's arm, almost unable to kiss back when
he found Dean's fingers slipping from him. “D—Dean?” he huffed out, more breath
than words.
“Hey,” Dean whispered into his mouth, sliding down the bed a little more and
onto his back. “You're ready, if you're, y'know, ready.” Castiel still lay next
to him, eyes glazed, uncomprehending. "I wanna do this right, Cas. You need to
be in charge.” Castiel found Dean’s fingers at his waist, gently pushing him to
rotate, to roll over, to move on top of Dean, to straddle him.
He felt his eyes widen at the position, but it suddenly seemed so natural, to
have the choice, to be in control to that degree, whilst still allowing Dean to
fill him.
He groaned, as the cold air hit his back, but the feeling was only good against
his fevered skin. He knelt on hands and knees, dipping down to press kisses
against the skin of Dean's neck and jaw, finding the smell of rain and sweat
addictive. He leaned back until he felt the blunt tip of Dean's cock nudge
against his opening.
Dean groaned, opened mouthed, the noise filling the air with his want, his
need.
Castiel wanted to seeit.
He leaned back, supported only by his knees and let his open body slide
painlessly onto Dean's shaft, slick, wet noises accompanying Dean's bitten lip
and scrunched up eyes. He would worry that Dean was in pain, except for the
burning Wroth, so obvious now he knew it was there, screaming pleasure and want
and need and desire and love at him. He wondered if Dean could feel his Grace
screaming similar things.
All thought left him then, as his body finally processed what was happening.
Dean was frozen, barely breathing, tiny panting little breathy noises escaping
him. Castiel was sliding down on his dick, his rim stretched and accommodating;
there was no pain, no barbs, no spines, no bony protrusions. Just Dean, his
erection; hard and solid, filling him, smoothly, slickly, pushing in just far
enough as he sank down fully, his ass cheeks meeting Dean's dark brown pubic
hair, the swell of his thigh under the back of Castiel's own scarred ones.
It was— He let out the breath he had been holding, he’d been waiting
for—anticipating—the pain, not believing it would not be agony, still expecting
Dean to somehow hurt him despite all his words. But it was good.
“Cas— You're so hot and—” Dean broke off with a hissed laugh, his hips
twitching under Castiel's still unmoving body. “How in the hell are you so
tight? If that's your Grace… Shit.” His words broke off as Castiel clenched his
internal muscles, a smile ticking at his lips at Dean's reaction.
He wasn't sure what Dean meant, but he could feel the fact that he was no
longer torn and ruined down there. He doubted he was as whole as he should be,
but, somehow his Grace was healing him once again, all over. Even his oldest
injuries.
He felt Dean's hands slide up his thighs, and the touch reminded him of where
he was, what he was doing. Of how good it felt.
He shook his head trying to bring himself back, he didn't want to be anywhere
but there. Dean's hot, hard, silky, smooth heat inside of him.
He pressed his hands against Dean's chest, wanting to see that glow of Wroth
again— that loving Wroth. But he settled for touching, feeling that thrumming
inside of him.
With the press of his hands came the tilt of his pelvis, leaning forward just
the smallest amount. Dean, grunted breathily at the sensation, throwing his
eyes open finally. “More, Cas, please, move, more,” he hissed, clearly trying
to restrain himself from pumping into Castiel.
Cas grinned, finally comprehending that Dean was feeling too much and not
enough all at once.
He lifted up, letting out a small mewl, finally registering his ownpleasure.
It felt good having Dean inside of him— But having Dean moveinside of him?
“Fuck,” he hissed out, not enough breath left for actual words. He slid back
down, Dean's hands gripping tight to his thighs, his thumbs rubbing small
circles on the hair that grew there. He rose again, his knees already
complaining of taking all his weight, and this time as he slid back down, Dean
couldn't stop himself from thrusting up to meet him, jarring their bodies
together. Castiel grunted and started panting out his breaths.
More thrusts, faster, but never too hard, and Castiel collapsed forward,
missing Dean's mouth too much to hold back any longer. He winced and let out a
whining groan as something inside of him was pressed, Dean's cock thrusting
against it, sending shock waves of hot pleasure searing into him. He heard
Dean's huffed laugh before his mouth captured his again, tongue delving into
his mouth, his hands gripping him by the shoulder blades, fingers tracing the
closed wounds.
They moved in sync like that, Castiel’s penis, erect and throbbing, sitting
heavy between their bellies, his balls heavy on Dean's abdomen. Occasionally
that amazing searing jolt of white hot pleasure would flow through him, making
him throw his head back and bite his own lip, eyes screwed shut.
“C—Cas.” Dean panted, his hips thrusting up at pace into Castiel's rolling
body. “Wings. I wanna see. Lemme.”
Castiel opened his eyes and was astounded to see that orange-red glow, deep and
fire-like, flickering in Dean's chest, like a banked blaze. The gold flecks in
his green eyes glowed.
He slowed his movement, leaning up a little, one palm pressed flat to Dean's
sternum. He could see the red glow through his own hand, feel Dean's need and
lust. He brought his wings forward to the point he would use them to fly
between worlds; still invisible to any other eye, but Dean gasped, and Castiel
opened his eyes to see the beatific expression on Dean's face.
Dean reached out, still thrusting up into Castiel's now all but stilled body.
He was part raised up, his hips twitching back and forwards, entranced with
Dean's reaction.
Castiel brought his wing forward, stretching it out to meet Dean's shaking
hand, but the wing passed right through. Dean's whine of disappointment was
enough for Castiel to concentrate further and bring the wing completely into
this world.
Dean gasped in awe, and Castiel wailed in pleasure as Dean's fingers wrapped
around a tendril of his nebulous wings. It felt— It felt.
It was indescribable to Castiel. Firing off nerve ending he didn't know he had.
He opened his eyes to discover the swirling shifting mass entwined with Dean's
fingers. He was pulling the wing forward, and Castiel noted that despite it's
appearance, it behaved like the wing of a bird, jointed and limited, yet Dean's
fingers were being held by the wing as much as he held on himself. It felt like
pins and needles and sent a shiver directly to his throbbing cock. He mewled
again in pleasure, feeling Dean’s ecstasy reciprocated through the burning
Wroth in his chest where his hands still pressed.
Dean's other hand suddenly wrapped around his erection and Castiel had to bite
back a scream, as the triple layered pleasure became too much. Dean's hips were
snapping up into him, his fingers pulling gently on a writhing wing and his
fingers hard around his cock. Castiel clenched down in response, opening his
eyes he finally saw what he didn't know he had needed from Dean.
Arcing from his head in twin, branching bolts, grounding themselves on the
metal bed frame behind his head, were the sparking, glowing, vibrantly red-
orange horns that the half-demon had hidden from him. From everyone.
He raised a palm, his hips snapping as he kept the other on Dean's glowing
chest, fingers digging in as he felt the glory of Dean's erection deep inside
of him, and the hot tunnel his hand made for his own dripping cock. He grazed
his fingers over the shifting bolts, causing them to ground on his hand, like
lightening, hissing as it landed and tasting of ozone. Dean gave out a
strangled cry, his mouth agape, breath hitched, his body locked, and he came.
He came deep and hard and hot inside of Castiel whose body could take no more,
the buzzing heat travelling down his arm from Dean's Wroth, the prickling
pleasure from his wings, the slick heat inside himself and the flinching
pressure on his cock. He pitched forward, covering Dean's mouth with his own as
he stopped breathing, and silently convulsed his pleasure, covering Dean's
chest and stomach with load after load of hot come, hips pumping, pushing into
Dean's hand until he collapsed. He heaved breath after breath against Dean's
neck, enjoying the heat sliding from his ass and sandwiched between their two
bodies.
“Oh fuck, oh god, Jeez, what the hell?” Dean muttered around panted breaths,
sounding completely undone.
Castiel shifted back, not wanting Dean's softening cock to leave him, and Dean
wailed, sending another tiny spurt of come against Castiel's wide and wanting
hole.
“What was that?” Dean asked, his tone almost scared, but negated by his wide,
black and gold flecked eyes and broad grin.
Castiel slid from him, liking the sticky mess between them. “Sex, I believe,”
he stated flatly, side eyeing Dean as he settled next to him on the narrow bed.
Dean chuckled. “I have never, Cas, never, been made to feel that way. What did
you do to me when you waved your hand over my head? It felt like an electric
shock straight to my cock.” He paused— “But in a good way.”
Castiel huffed a laugh. “Your horns do resemble lightning,” he said with a
shrug.
“I'm Sorry? Horns?!” Dean spluttered.
[doppler bridge sex scene cenedra riva]
-
“I have never seenso much come, by the way Cas. Thanks for that,” Dean grumbled
as they walked through the doors from the cellar into Bobby's lounge, showered,
dried and fully dressed in more of Bobby's pilfered clothes, side by side and
hand in hand.
Castiel just shrugged and shot him a small grin, before facing back to the
room. Dean followed his gaze into the room he had expected to be empty; Bobby
and Sam should have been long in bed.
Instead he was greeted by two flat and grim expressions. “What's up fellas?” he
asked, hoping that their less than quiet, earth shattering sex, wasn't the
cause of their displeasure.
It wasn't.
“We've found something,” Sam stated.
“And you ain't gonna like it,” Bobby chipped in.
***** Chapter 16 *****
Dean's heart sank as he saw the expressions on Bobby and Sam's faces.
“How powerful areyou, boy?” Bobby asked, making Dean raise his eyebrows in
surprise before he could tame his face into an expression of innocence.
“I don't know what you—”
“Don't play dumb with me, kid,” Bobby gritted out, and Dean tightened his hold
on Castiel's hand, sealing his lips shut. He’d been anticipating going out in a
blaze of sex drowned glory, and now here Bobby was accusing him of—
He sighed. Castiel and Sam had seen him. What was the point in hiding any
longer? He looked up at Bobby briefly before shrugging.
“You don't know?” Sam asked in his prissy tone. Castiel's hand tightened on his
this time and Dean shook his head, looking at the floor.
“He only just discovered he had horns,” Castiel chimed in in a helpful tone.
Dean groaned and felt heat rise up the back of his neck.
“What? You did.” Cas said, innocence ringing true in his voice. Sam sniggered.
“Can it boys,” Bobby grumbled. “Let’s get these two idjits acquainted with the
facts from the beginning, huh?”
“Okay.” Sam began, getting up and retrieving a book from Bobby's desk, open,
and with a forest of bookmarks shoved between the pages. “Bobby and I spent the
evening researching while you two were, er, talking and um, resting.” Sam
looked up, with an amused smirk plastered on his face. Dean glowered.
“Bobby came across a reference from the atmableda,” Dean frowned and he could
sense Castiel's confusion where he stood next to him. Sam let out a noise of
frustration. “For a cop you are woefully unknowledgeable about the species that
inhabit this, and the Accord worlds,” Sam groused. “The atmableda are
prophetic, Dean. They see in snatches and odd lumps of time, from any number of
possible futures. It’s mostly pointless, in all honesty. Bobby and I helped one
of them out of some trouble, and they left a book as thanks.”
Dean looked over at Bobby with a raised eyebrow. “Do you never think to ask for
something cool, old man?”
Bobby grunted. “Useful, though, ain’t it?” he grumbled.
“Anyway—” Sam said over them, voice raised. “The book is old, very old. Some
demon by name of Metatron was a powerful mage. He actually saw whole futures,
but no one knew which future they belonged in, so the stories became, mostly
just that. Stories.”
Sam looked pleased with himself for some reason.
“And… I assume you have found something in these stories that may aid us in
ridding every single planet of the tak, and the menenth, and every other angel
and demon who has taken a liking to the power offered?” Castiel asked in a sour
tone, clearly thinking little of these prophetic stories.
“Well,” Bobby began, “the text is a little flowery, even for my tastes, but it
essentially says that the release of huge and terrible power will open a path
between Wind and Fire, Water and Air—” Dean felt Castiel tense at the terms.
“Cas?” he felt the blue eyes—now clear and devoid of the pulsing Grace that had
lit them both up so fully in the safe room below—settle on him. “They are the
terms we use for the directions within the Bridge. The angels are of the Wind,
the demons of the Fire.”
Bobby nodded, bringing their attention back to him. “Yeah, and seemingly he
reckons that only an equal amount of power can close it. Oh, and that it
doesneed to be closed, or 'the end will come,' or some shit. Fucker liked the
sound of his own voice.”
Dean snorted. “He goes on to tell us,” Sam picked up the tale. “That only the
union of demon and 'the Graceless,' met with 'the filled vessel of the
angelically divine' would have the power to close it.”
Silence met Sam’s words. Castiel was frozen next to him, Dean wasn't even sure
he was breathing. He looked from Castiel's clenched jaw, to Bobby's intense
glare, to Sam's expectant eyes.
“And what's that mean?” he asked, watching the two men in front of him deflate,
rolling  their eyes in unison.
Sam rubbed a hand over his face, shaking his head with dismay. “It means, jerk,
that the offspring of a human and a demon can create enough power to close the
bridge when paired with the most powerful angel.”
“So,” Bobby grunted out. “I ask again, kid. Just how powerful are ya?”
-
“Is this really necessary?” Dean huffed, looking around in the rain.
All four of them were standing in the middle of Bobby's junk yard, Castiel
looking grumpy and damp and fascinated, Sam looking fascinated and damp and
excited, and Bobby looking non-plussed and sceptical.
“Dean, if this… prophecy is accurate, we may have a chance. I am the last hath,
you are the onlyspawn of a cross-species union.”
Dean scoffed, “Lovely way to put it, Cas, thanks.”
“It is worth a try, we have proven that my power alone is not enough to halt
the Bridge. If we can close it, stop travel through, then we have a chance to
defeat those that are already here.”
Castiel looked so earnest, his face no longer aglow with their 'union' in the
small hours of the morning. In the flat light of dawn, his skin looked as
pallid as it had before they had slept together. He mused briefly on the
healing powers of love making on Castiel's wounds, before Sam cleared his
throat snapping him back to the task at hand.
“You shredded two tak, Dean, pulling their flesh from their bones, leaving
little more than black sludge and ash...how can you worry about doing
something—anything to some junked out old wrecks?”
“And he don't mean us,” Bobby groused.
“Yeah, but, I've never meant to do anything with the power Bobby! Mom always
forbade me using it. To save my life Bobby! And when I did use it, it was
always by accident! Keeping hidden from kids at school, protecting myself on
the streets at work. I never mean to do it. I don't know how to make my powers
work!”
“Oh, quit your whining, boy, and concentrate!” Bobby yelled, losing his
patience finally and throwing his cold mug of coffee at the muddy ground at
Dean's feet.
He flinched and stepped backward. “What'd you do that for, you crazy old
bastard?!”
Sam hummed from where he stood next to Bobby, then reached behind him to the
bonnet of the car they were backed against, chucking a random lump of twisted
metal at him. It clipped his arm and he glared at Sam, “What the fu-!”
He heard Castiel shift behind him, but he kept his eyes on his sly, dishonest
brother and the old shit throwing crap at him.
Suddenly a hail of pieces of scrap started flying at him, all from the
direction of his family.
-
Castiel felt guilt rise at his manipulation. He had limited powers, it seemed,
in respect to telekinesis, but he seemed to be able to draw things toward him.
He managed to make them avoid Sam and Bobby who were flinching, but looking
slack jawed at the display, and for all Dean's clear annoyance and irritation,
he was managing to stop the metal and glass from hitting his lover.
“Guys!” Dean shouted, frustration evident, “Stop! For fuck's sake!” Castiel
half smiled at Dean’s mounting irritation at the attack. He could taste his
Wroth in the air.
He outright grinned when Dean lost control, the Wroth suddenly a burning
static. Dean bowed his head, flexed his shoulders and deflected.
Not only were the pieces of broken and ruined machinery that had been jerkily
flying through the air towards Castiel flung in an arc surrounding his body,
but the rotting hulks of whole cars were flung in a circle, outward lengths and
lengths.
The rain of shrapnel ceased as the rusted cars hit the mud, and Dean stood
stock still in shock.
“Do it again,” Cas all but whispered, commanding, demanding.
Dean's eyes were closed and he was frowning hard. Castiel saw that pulsing hint
of orange-red Wroth just glowing in his chest. His own Grace was singing out to
join it. Dean grunted and pushedagain, sending the cars rolling, toppling from
their careful piles into the mud in great splashes and the scream of metal on
metal.
“Huh,” Bobby said, unharmed next to Sam, mud spattered all over them. “I'll be
damned.”
Dean dropped to his knees, breathing hard.
Castiel leapt forward and ran to him, dropping to his knees and skidding in the
mud for a half-length,wrapping his arms tight around Dean, murmuring proud
platitudes into his ear. He touched his fingers to the man's brow and listened
for anything broken or damaged within his lover. There was nothing wrong,
simply surprise and disbelief raging tiredly within him.
“I—” Dean began.
“It's okay,” Castiel whispered, holding him tight, kissing his warm forehead in
the rain.
-
Dean was asleep in the cellar room, having refused to go to sleep back in his
own bedroom alone. Castiel had waited until the man was breathing evenly before
he slipped back upstairs to the other two men.
“He resting?” Bobby growled. Castiel just nodded, not wasting his breath on
stating the obvious.
“You think he can do it?” Sam asked, worry furrowing his brow. Castiel
shrugged, copying Dean's mannerisms unconsciously.
“He is immensely powerful,” he stated, his voice low and level. “I am willing
to try again. If you truly believe this book, this Metatron's prophesy, then I
am willing to try again, to try and shut off the Bridge to anyone else flowing
through. By now there must be a thousand, more maybe, on this planet. There are
many more in the Bridge, even discounting the ones thrown back to their home
worlds, or destroyed by the instability of the Bridge.”
Castiel huffed out a heavy sigh, “I am just unsure if Dean's ability to control
his power, or direct it in a useful way, is strong enough. I can smite, that
has already been proven to work to a degree on the Bridge. Dean's powers are
different. He deflects, hides? I don’t know what else. Is this useful? Does he
have other powers? Or does it not matter? Will it be enough simply if he and I
working together?”
Bobby huffed out an enormous breath, removing his hat and rubbing a hand
through his thin hair, before replacing it on his head. “Boy. You taken a look
at yourself recently?” he asked, his voice gentle for the first time since
Castiel had returned to the Earth, broken and weak and bloody on one of the
wrecked cars. He shrugged one shoulder and shook his head, not sure what the
man was talking about.
“Since you and Dean had…some alone time, you got yourself healed up all nice
and pretty there.” Castiel nodded, aware that he had healed in the intervening
hours. Bobby sighed. “Kid, you were broken, bleeding and bruised. Show me your
back,” he demanded, no allowance for argument in his tone. Castiel frowned but
did as bid, lifting the too loose shirt to reveal his spine. Bobby grunted and
Sam gasped. “When you got back here, I'm certain you knew what state your back
was in. Bleeding, boy, suppurating wounds, black bruises flowing like wings
across either side o' your spine, kid.
“There ain’t nothin' there now.”
Castiel frowned, he had known that, but Bobby's meaning was slowly making sense
to him. He turned, still perplexed to face the men. Before, when he had been
wounded, it took time to heal. Quicker than humans, yes, but it still took
time, leaving red marks and scars. Sleeping with Dean, less than two days after
being raped by one of the menenth's barbed cocks, even with his Grace no longer
suppressed, should have been agony.
Was it Dean's doing, his closeness with him, physically, or mentally, that was
buoying up his Grace, making it stronger, rise faster?
Bobby hummed in satisfaction, noting Castiel's comprehending expression.
“That's what I thought. So no, kid, I aint sure it matters what either of you
do, so long as you work together and direct it at the Bridge...” He tailed off,
Sam looking at him questioningly.
“That is, if this Metatron's prophesy is correct,” he shrugged and Sam's
expression tightened, fear replacing his zealous enthusiasm.
“How much do we know about him?” Castiel asked, wondering if it mattered. The
Bridge was already feeding their enemies into this world. If the angels and
demons managed to take the Complex fully, from there they would be able to step
back outward, just like the humans had, and instead of forming an Accord,
however controlling that agreement seemed to him, they would take whatever they
wanted, kill who ever stood in their way, enslave anyone they wanted, rape and
kill for the fun of it… It truly would be the end of times, for all worlds.
So, whether this was a sure thing, or the slimmest of possible chances, he knew
that he would take it, he would throw his life away to save millions and
billions of others, and he was certain that Dean would agree, whether he wanted
to or not. He would choose saving people, all the people, over saving their own
lives.
“Well, he was prolific, that's for sure.” Bobby flicked through the book, a
deep blue leather bound volume, picked out in faded gold and thicker than two
of Bobby's fists. “This is a compilation of about a third of his works,
according to the preface.”
Bobby scowled. “If ya squint, you can see events that have come to pass in some
of his blatherings. But, with this kind of work, the way it's written, it’s
hard to tell. It may have been, may come to pass, or may apply to a whole
different future. One in which the worm didn't turn, or whatever.”
“More to the point,” Sam butted in, clearly having noticed Castiel's confusion
at their ridiculous language, “if we decide to do it, we need to work out
howto. I doubt we'll be able to walk in like we did before, and on top of that,
what's the science of it all looking like? Do we know how your smiting,
Castiel, affected the Bridge?” he asked the question of Bobby, who just nodded
along as he listened to Sam's words. “Do we know why it only broke the
stabilising controlls, rather than closing it completely. Was it simply lack of
power? Or the wrong kind? Should you be trying to take power out, or putting it
in to overload it?”
Sam's words started to wash over Castiel, the meaning elusive. It was so much
easier talking with Dean.
It was Bobby this time who noticed his glazed expression. “Why don't you go
keep your boy down there company, huh? If we’re doin' this, then you two are
gonna need all the rest you can get.”
“Or all the sex,” Sam muttered under his breath, the comment clearly only meant
for Bobby's ears, as the man choked on a laugh. He didn't think it was a bad
idea, so he nodded, turned and returned to Dean's sleep warm body.
***** Chapter 17 *****
Castiel awoke to blazing warmth and suction around his pulsing cock. He whined
at the sensation, a spurious thought that Dean was far too good at making him
feel good flitting through his mind before he let loose a louder groan as
Dean's tongue flicked over the head of his dick. The man's mouth was sinking
and rising over his spit-slick erection as he sucked. Dean’s palms lay flat on
his hips as, even in his sleep, he had been trying to thrust up into the
wonderful sensation.
He needed to see, to look at the man's green eyes. He could feel the fire
burning within them both, but it was nothing like the night before. They were
sleepy, satisfied and calm, loving and soft. But, Dean's eyes were always worth
looking into, he was finding. He flipped back the covers, revealing Dean's
sweat covered brow and smiling eyes. Castiel gasped at the sight of his hard,
reddened flesh disappearing into the man's mouth. He could feel every time the
head ran over the roof of his mouth, touched the back of his twitching throat.
He moaned in pleasure, pumping his hips in a tiny aborted circles that had Dean
moaning on to his cock.
Castiel was close, he could feel it, no idea how long Dean had been working him
before he woke up in a blaze of heat and glory. He wailed as Dean's fingers
stopped gripping his hips, letting the small movements grow with each swallow
of his throat, each meeting of their eyes.
He yelled Dean's name aloud as the man's finger slipped into his hole, he
couldn't even begin to think about when he had coated his fingers in lube, but
the feeling was too much. He lost what control he had and thrust hard into
Dean's mouth, making his eyes widen, black pupils filling with lust and want.
The man’s throat slackened and he held his head still, humming to give Castiel
permission.
He growled and started rhythmically pushing up into Dean’s welcoming mouth.
Four, five, six thrusts later, and Dean flexed the finger inside him and every
nerve ending sang, his hips snapped up and he yelled in pleasure as he came,
long and hot into Dean's mouth. Castiel looked down to find Dean's eyes closed,
a small frown between his eyes.
With a gasp he slumped into the bed, spent, tired and feeling boneless,
astounding. Dean swallowed once again, then slipped his finger from Castiel's
hole, and allowed his dick to fall from his mouth. Come was dribbling from the
corner of his lips, the sight sending one last weak spurt to jump from his
softening dick.
Dean rolled his eyes and sinuously rolled his body up Castiel's, joining his
lips with his, the taste of his own come tangy in his mouth. His cock twitched
again. Dean rested his body against Castiel's and he moaned in disappointment
that Dean wasn't hard. What had he done wrong?
Dean pulled away snickering, “Don’t worry Cas,” he whispered. “You already made
me come.” He smiled down at Castiel's confused face and leaned his pelvis more
firmly against Castiel's, kicking his leg across the bed with his foot until
his calf landed in something cold and wet.
He made a noise of disgust and squirmed out of the way to Dean's laugh. “That's
revolting,” he grumbled sleepily.
“You didn't mind it in my mouth, or between us yesterday. And, you make such an
awful lot of it,” Dean whined.
“It's nice to share between us, Dean, when it's hot. Not disgusting and
congealed on the sheets,” he groused, pouting at Dean's beautiful face. He
leaned up and licked a stray tendril of the white stuff from his chin,
grimacing at the congealed stuff. “See? Revolting.”
Dean slumped forward laughing. “You're ridiculous, Cas, I love you,” he gasped
out around a smile.
Dean seemed to freeze when he reailsed the words he had spoken, but Castiel
ignored that, leaning in to kiss him again, licking deeply into his mouth and
rocking his spent body against Dean's warm skin. He knew what Dean felt, he
could feel his Wroth burning with it, a banked fire in his lover’s chest. It
was the same thing Castiel felt too. His Grace sang with his love for the
infuriating human, for his smile and his persistence, for his belief in Castiel
and his strength, his soft heart and his loyalty.
-
They saw the smear of smoke on the horizon long before even the broken heathaze
of the Bridge came into view. When they rounded the bend in the trees, as
before, the pine needles dripping from the constant rain. The Complex was no
longer the pristine arc of white it had once been.
Scorched, broken down, cracked and blasted. Beings swarmed in the air and on
the ground. Fire balls flew, beams of Grace sang through the air. Sound was
impossible at that distance, but Castiel could see the dark ranks of soldiers
and police swarming the ground, see the flashes of fire from the muzzles of
their guns.
“How’re we meant to get in there, boy?” Bobby asked Sam, who sat in the front
seat next to Dean.
“Uh, I was going with, run,” Sam answered. “Really, really quickly.”
Castiel rolled his eyes. “Are we going to the place we were previously?” Dean
looked up and caught his eye in the mirror, a surprisingly relaxed expression
on his face.
He and Dean had spoken at length that morning, after they had showered and
dressed, Dean resting against Castiel's chest, between his legs and wrapped in
Castiel's arms as he pressed his lips to his hair.
They had decided to take the risk—to use their power combined to try and close
the Bridge. It was die long and slow watching the worlds burn, or die quick and
fast in a blaze of glory. They had even entertained the idea of winning, of
succeeding for a few moments, but decided they would deal with that if and when
the time came. They had held onto each other, breathing in sync, in silence,
until Sam and Bobby had appeared, telling them it was time to go.
“Pretty much. We need to get to the plaza, somewhere safe enough, for long
enough to do our thing.” Sam and Bobby had planned on working the machines
again, to try and feed more power into the Bridge. They had gone with Castiel's
earlier words that the Bridge's power could not be utilized, and worked with
the idea that they had tried before; Castiel had fed energy in, smiting it by
overloading it, and they would attempt it again. Feeding in what they could,
along with Dean's and Castiel's powers.
“Well, stop as close as you can and I'll fly us,” he said matter-of-factly,
earning twin expressions of dawning understanding from Bobby and Sam and a
smirking grin from Dean.
-
They stood in the correct spot on the same desert world Castiel had taken Dean
to before, when he had moved them from Bobby’s yard to the cellar. Sam and
Bobby both looked confused that Castiel just knewwhere the corresponding spot
was on Earth, but Dean had stopped in the right spot three steps ahead of
Castiel, and turned to him with a questioning expression, Castiel had only
raised an eyebrow and stopped too.
Dean might not be consciously using his powers, but they were innate to him.
He could only carry one of the men with him at a time, and he wondered who he
should take first into the 'hot zone', as Dean had called it. They did not know
what to expect beyond on Earth.
He started pacing, to Sam's grumbling and fidgeting, while Dean stood and
watched quietly, occasionally glancing up at the slightly overcast sky, and
watery sun above them. “Dean,” he looked up and Dean walked to him, trust and
belief strong in his expression. “Do you feel that? I am correct aren't I?” he
asked, hoping Dean could feel what he could feel. They stood close to the
Bridge, is cracked facade only lengths from them, about fifty lengths from
where Sam stood shifting and Bobby stood still.
Dean just nodded his head. “Here!” he yelled to his family, waving an arm over.
“What?”
Dean frowned at Sam's petulant question and sighed. “This spot is safe, or,
well, it is inside a set of...” he looked at Cas for confirmation. “Walls?
Barriers?”
Castiel nodded. “I believe it is a room much like the one we were in before,
still intact. Although I cannot get an idea of a roof over the space.” He
looked up at Dean's brother, tall, fit and strong. He would be able to defend
the space while Castiel brought Dean and Bobby through. “You first.”
-
The room was not intact. One wall was little more than fire, another molten and
ruined. The roof hung wildly over part of the room. But it was sufficient and
defensible, at least for the moment. The room was missing the one major element
that they needed; it had no cables, the power source Sam and Bobby insisted
were necessary to help he and Dean overload the Bridge.
Dean was staring at the cracked skin of the Bridge while Bobby and Sam poked
around the room. It looked like a long disused holding area with benches
running along the remaining intact wall, filled with the heat and smoke from
the burning walls.
“This aint good enough,” Bobby grumbled, wiping sweat from his brow, “we need
power or this is just a wild stab in the dark. We can't do this half assed. N’
‘specially not with the building fallin’ on our heads.”
“What do you want us to do Bobby? Run out there through the cross-fire and find
another building, one with a power supply? One we can feed my brother into
properly?” Sam’s tone was pained, near hysterical. His calm facade was clearly
just that, Castiel thought, as he watched it crack.
“Yes, boy! God damn it, yes, that’s exactly what we need to do,” Bobby
answered, his voice cracking in turn. Castiel turned to Dean, but he still only
stared at the Bridge, its ugly congealed colors sickening to look at.
A great shrieking filled the room and from the molten gap where the wall used
to be stepped a demon, wings aflame with Wroth as he stepped over the lumps of
burning metal. The heat was ferocious. Bobby levelled his shotgun before the
rest of them even had a moment to think and shot the creature through the head.
It dropped, thankfully, with the perfectly aimed shot, its head vanishing in a
plume of blood and gore.
“Shit,” Dean swore, scowling, silhouetted by the Bridge. He walked quickly
toward Castiel and took his hand. “Bobby is right, Sam. We need to end this
now. This is just the first wave remember? Cas has told us just how many are
waiting to come through— And if they’re already on an Accord planet, it isn’t
going to take them long to find enough iron to surround the bridge and
stabilise it long enough for them to step through. How long do you think it
will take? A few months? Less? Hell! The buildings on the planets probably have
enough iron in them to to do the job for them! And in the meantime we have
another thousand or so insane angels and demons pouring through. It will be
enough to destroy this world— Look at this place Sammy! The one place on Earth
that was working properly, and it’s just a pile of rubble! How long do you
think it’s gonna take for them to spread out? To take out every other city
still standing?
“Sammy,” Dean’s voice softened, “in the long run, our lives—” and he held up
their joined hands for Sam to see, “mean nothing. Not if we can save everyone
else. Across so many worlds.” He squeezed Castiel's hand and Castiel wondered
when they had become so convinced that they were going to die in this process.
All of them; Bobby looked resigned and beyond sad and Sam looked ready to argue
and fight, refusing to give up.
He looked across and met Dean's eyes. They were full of love, and the sadness
that they had only had a few days together. He nodded.
“So. We need power?”
-
“There,” Castiel said, pointing at a building even further to the South than
their current position. It was butted up against the Bridge, solid looking,
with heavy gray walls stained green with algae from the rain and disuse.
“It's too far,” said Sam doubtfully.
“But, it's the only building in sight with power cables intact,” Bobby stated.
“If we run for it...” Dean left the sentence hanging.
“Bobby has weaponry,” Castiel offered, having watched the older man load up
holster after holster with guns and a huge number of things he didn't
recognize.
Bobby grunted in acknowledgement.
Castiel found himself with a hand wrapped around the handle of a gun and his
eyes on the far-off building. “I could fly us again—” he began, looking at the
three men, and the enormous stretch of gray flat ground between their position
and their goal. They didn't even know if it would be of use, if the power was
working, if the controls were there— Flying them would be much safer, but—
The three other men exchanged looks between them, clearly such long studies of
each other that they didn’t need to make the exchange audible. “No time,” Bobby
broke, “we can run it quicker. No one'll be looking out for us, we're small
enough targets, clearly human, so the soldiers and police won’t be looking out
for us.”
“And you need to save your Grace,” Sam added, looking sickened and grim.
“So. We just need to avoid the dive bombing angels and the charging demons,
huh?” Dean asked, an edge to his voice, acceptance there, even if he clearly
prefered Castiel's plan.
“Come on.” Sam stated, a determined edge in his voice now, taking a look around
the room at his friends, his family, before peering across the space between
the buildings.
Castiel had hardly blinked before he saw Sam's long legged form take off,
followed by the stumpy run of Bobby, much slower. Dean followed, his bow legs
making Castiel smile briefly, sadly, before Castiel made himself run too.
He was winded too fast, unaccustomed to any such movement, his muscles wasted
and tiring to easily, his lungs and heart only used to working with pain and
fear. These were things his Grace could not bolster, and yet he threw himself
after the Winchesters and Bobby Singer, ignoring the pain in his chest and
knees and the hitching of his breath.
They ran, keeping one eye on the hordes of uniformed men firing weapons at the
angels and demons yammering and throwing their weight around. He was pleased
that Bobby had handed them all ear plugs, which blocked the wails of the off-
worlders, rendering their songs useless. They appeared to be in luck too, that
none of the mind altering creatures were using their skills.
They would have lost too soon otherwise.
He ran.
His first step was like a signal, breaking the comparative calm.
First came an errant fire ball skittering across the ground, leaving in its
wake puddles of red hot molten stone. It ran through the space between him and
Dean causing him to take a flying leap over the puddle, his landing jarring his
bones.
He had a moment to suck in a breath before a set of halo spines from a
zafi’irara spattered across the space, one hitting Bobby in the leg. The old
man simply pulled it from himself while still on the move.
A huge bat-like winged demon fell from the sky, screeching, with its claws held
high, blood falling free with it. It landed, clipping Sam, throwing him to the
ground. Dean increased his pace even further lengthening the gap between him
and Castiel. Dean fired his gun as he ran, loosing bullet after bullet into the
creature’s head until it stopped screaming and stilled in a splatter of shining
blood. Castiel caught up to them, heaving breath, and managed to pulse enough
healinto Sam for him to get back on his feet, to get running again.
He tried his best to keep up, but Dean and Sam outstripped him again, Dean
throwing a pleading look over his shoulder, a fearful glance at the sky above
Castiel’s head, sending him forward even faster. He tried to run, but his
muscles just weren’t toned, even with the shot of Grace thrumming through him,
he lagged behind, even with Dean slowing up to stay closer. He had spent too
long in captivity. One by one they disappeared into the black maw of the
building they were aiming for, first Bobby, guns firing, then Dean, and Sam.
Castiel became aware of the screaming of the angel above his head, and he felt
a surge of Grace to his weak and shaking leg muscles—
He didn't stop, fearing the angel at his back. He could feel the power of it,
it’s sour Grace dragging at him, making him want to stop and allow himself to
be made a meal of.
He felt the temptation well up, finally too strong, all of its attention on him
and his ragged run. His resolve failed the moment before Bobby's gun blazed
just feet from his head— The compulsion stopped the moment he heard the wet
thump of the angel hitting the ground.
Castiel hurtled into the building, almost tumbling through the Bridge, Dean
only just catching him by his shirt where he himself had come to a skidding
halt.
Dean turned to watch as Bobby squared his shoulders where he stood, in position
by the door, weaponry dragging him down. Castiel saw Sam as he ran straight for
the terminal, slamming his ID through the slot and accessing the power system.
He let out a shout of success and Castiel heard the hum of power start up
through the secondary cables feeding a control room to the south.
It was time.
Dean took Castiel's hand. There were tears in his eyes, the gloss reflecting
the Bridge’s light, gold and purple burning away the green.
Castiel nodded. They didn’t need words.
They placed their free palms against the cold wall, feeling the power burning
in each crack that he had created merely one day before. He already missed the
feeling of Dean's arms around him, that hum of warm Wroth in his chest.
He felt that hum, that Wroth, as Dean opened up and started pushing undefined,
panicked energy into the Bridge. Castiel started smiting, thinking the words
die, kill, slay, end, break, go, be gone, die, die, die.
He felt the pull in their clasped hands as Dean's Wroth picked up the song,
meeting his Grace and pulling it along, racing it. The heat bloomed between
them, pouring forth into the Bridge.
He was no longer aware of anything else, just the attempt to bring to an end
the war, Dean's hand held so fast in his, that their Wroth, their Grace, mixed
and became indistinguishable.
He looked to his left at the flawed and perfect man that he had given his heart
to. He had been the first to show him love since his family had been taken from
him.
Dean's green gaze fell on him and he smiled, his eyes lighting up gold as the
Wroth filled him, matching the Grace that poured forth from his own eyes.
-
“Dean!” Sam screamed above the noise of fighting, of gunshots, of wailing
angels and bellowing demons and the reports of Bobby's guns and tasers and
falling bodies, his voice just making it into Dean’s consciousness. “It's not
enough!”
Castiel turned to look behind them, where he still stood gripping Dean’s hand,
his palm forcing energy into the Bridge, glowing blue all over. Dean followed
his gaze. Sam looked frantic, smashing buttons on the terminal, sweating. But
it was Bobby's form that got their attention, their hands still pressed against
the Bridge, the power flowing through them, from who knew where.
Bobby was stationary, standing with his back to them, a gun held loosely in his
fist by his side.
What they saw beyond Bobby’s lax form, they didn't need to speak for
understanding to flow between them, not with the mix of the Grace and Wroth
burning through their veins. The alphas, of both the menenth, and the tak.
Advancing. Adorned with gold, burning bright, stalking shoulder to shoulder in
front of an army—
Dean looked at Sam, at Bobby, but then his gaze landed on Castiel’s glowing
blue, beautiful eyes once more.
Understanding, like the moment that his gaze had first lit upon the stars, fell
through them.
As one they stepped into the Bridge.
-
Dean had never been within the Bridge, and through the connection between their
tightly clasped hands he could feel Castiel's distress at being within it once
again.
He cast wonder-filled eyes around him—
Immediately around them was the same swirling mass of golden light, just like
the Bridge appeared close up from the outside—just as cracked now as it had
been since Castiel’s interference, just as sickening to look at. To Castiel's
back was a slowly swirling mass of red and orange, too hard to look at,
ceaseless, endless. He twisted to look behind himself and found the Blue-wards
direction; wildly fluctuating, shimmering, spinning and nauseating.
Lumps and shards, spots and pulses shifted within the mass, sometimes a figure
flew past. He knew, until they chose a direction they were held in stasis, even
in the untamed Bridge.
“Cas,” he whispered aloud, and despite the howling, screaming noise; stuttering
static, he could hear the sound. Castiel's eyes met his sadly, lovingly. And he
knew this was it.
They leaned in to each other, shutting out the light show, and kissed.
Castiel's tongue swiped over his, delving deep, every movement screaming love.
They were close, physically, mentally; their Wroth, their Grace intwined. They
were one. He could hear Castiel’s thoughts through their kiss, his thoughts
that screamed dieas the blue-Grace light of his eyes flared, illuminating his
own closed, Wroth-filled ones.
He synced his thoughts with Castiel's again, finding it easier and easier to
pulse out that pounding heat. It felt like fire, an electrical storm, and he
threw it out from himself wordlessly, allowing the flames and the bolts of
power to mingle and ensnare Castiel's Grace, this smooth flowing, gaseous-
liquid thing that shifted and held onto him, his power, his heart.
They continued kissing, the need for breath gone, for sight, smell, sound. Only
taste and touch remained, the heat where their mouths met, and the firm hold
they had on each other's hands.
A thought drifted into his mind as he felt the first pull. I love you Dean
Winchester. Thank you for saving me.
Another tug came, but they refused to be torn apart, their tears melding where
their faces met. I love you Cas. You saved me too.
A jolt forced their lips from one another but their eyes met and held. Their
hands tangled together just as tightly as before, their mingled power still
pouring from them. Castiel was mouthing the words he had said into Dean's mind,
over and over again. Dean found he was doing the same, tears flowing freely
down his face. Anther pull came as they both found their power waning. “More!”
he yelled to the screaming air, sound rushing back with a fury.
Their hands clenched, hurting, as they threw out the last dregs of their power,
burning their veins on the way through, the glow surrounding them pulsing out
with fury, hurt, love, peace, terror, worry, adoration, resignation.
Castiel whimpered, pulling Dean back against the tugging, the constant pulling
dragging them in opposite directions. He fixed his mouth to Dean's one last
time—
Then he was torn away, almost ripped from Dean, their hands only just linked,
as they still pushed out the last of their power.
As the very last trickle ebbed from them, the last DIE!,screamed into the void,
the tug jerked one last time.
They were ripped apart.
The last thing Dean saw was Castiel's blue pulsing eyes, glistening with tears,
flying from him down the tunnel of goading, laughing red as he was dragged
blindly into the blue.
-
Dean didn't want to open his eyes. All he wanted to was to remember Castiel's,
those twin pinpoints of glowing blue, fading, tears being pulled from his face,
hanging in the air as he was pulled from him into the vortex.
He wanted to be dead.
Why wasn't he dead?
He felt hot tears leak from his closed eyes as Sam's voice cut through the
memory.
“Dean!”
***** Chapter 18 *****
Blue pinpoints disappearing into the red maelstrom. Blue pinpoints disappearing
into the red maelstrom.
It was all that was revolving through his mind.
Until a stabbing pain in his back made itself known. It was niggling, and
lasted too long and Sam’s hands were poking him and prodding him, and his voice
was still yelling his name over and over.
“I've lost him Sammy. I've lost him,” he sobbed out, suddenly realising that he
was on Earth.
He was wrenched up into a hug, pulled from the ground, with the strong arms of
his brother wrapped around his limp body, the stone, or whatever it was,
dislodged from his back.
“You did it, Dean, you did it. It's over, there’s no war,” Sam's voice sounded
gently in his ear, repeating the words over and over.
“It's over?” he finally comprehended his brother’s words and struggled to sit
up, expecting to find his body broken, but there was no pain, except from the
bruise on his back.
“It's over Dean. The Bridge is closed. For good.” Something in Sam’s tone made
him finally open his eyes.
Instead of the cracked veneer of the Bridge, gold and purple, he saw a mire of
spoiled mud through the missing end wall of the building they sat in. A
worrying flatness to the scene, the mud slick, already, with the never ending
rain.
“The Bridge… Is gone?”
He looked around, to Bobby, sitting hunched in the other missing wall, this one
facing the Complex's inner wall. Beyond Bobby's panting form lay a multitude of
corpses, human, angel and demon.
Something was missing.
“Where is the fighting?”
He sat up properly and pushed Sam’s fussing hands away from him, pushing
himself to his feet. He staggered forward, towards Bobby, resting a palm on his
shoulder where he sat propped against a fallen beam. “Wh- Where the hell is
everyone?” he asked, bewildered as he viewed the scene.
He couldn’t have been out long. There were huge numbers of soldiers, and the
Complex's police, all standing vacant, stationary, bewildered.
There was not a single living angel or demon in sight.
-
Dean was listless. It had been three days since he had lost Castiel.
It may have been three days since he had won an almost-war, prevented it from
ever happening, but that was incidental. He had lost his angel.
And Bobby? Bobby had lost the use of his legs—
And Dean could hardly make himself get out of the bed he and Castiel had last
shared. The world was saved. But Bobby could not walk. And Castiel was gone.
It did not feel like winning.
The news had come in thick and fast after the blast. Some of it, first hand,
from Bobby and Sammy, but some from Rufus and the official news on the radio.
When Dean and Castiel had succeeded, and the Bridge had collapsed in on itself
sending out a huge shockwave, Sam and Bobby had only been saved, being soclose
to the Bridge, by Dean.
Dean was completely unaware how, but according them them, he had come flying
out, thrown back onto the hard ground and put up some sort of unconscious force
field, deflecting the evaporating power of the Bridge from hurting his family.
Anyone else standing within about fifteen feet of the Bridge had died. Everyone
within the Complex's plaza, was just knocked down or blown a few feet. There
were no other fatalities, despite the damage to the building of the Complex
itself, which was comprehensive.
It had taken a day or two for the next lot of reports to come in, Sam asking
questions of whoever he could while Bobby was assessed in the hospital.
Not only had every angel and demon that had come to invade disappeared, but
every single non-human had seemingly been erased from the planet.
That had caused great celebration amongst the religious community, but
everywhere else? They were looking at crashing economies and a huge employment
deficit again.
On top of that, every human that had moved off world had been sent back,
popping back into place from their corresponding position on their previous
world.
Some died at sea, others from exposure on mountains that weren't there on their
preferred worlds. Colonists were throwing fits, because all of their hard work
making a new world was being undone and there was no way to get back, they were
stuck on the shithole that was Earth.
That news had finally injected an ounce of warmth into Dean's otherwise cold
chest. Maybe Castiel wasn't dead, but simply on Hath.
And then a memory of their conversation in the hospital had come to him. Of
plague and death. And Dean had sunk further, knowing that if the man who had
finally given him something worth getting out of bed for had indeed survived
their tumble through the Bridge, then he had been sent to his death on a sick
world.
Sam tried to cheer him up with news that the Government, those who had
survived, were finally beginning to look inward once again. Without the Bridge,
they were finally made aware of the problems in their country, on their world,
and a meeting had already been called. The first bills to be discussed;
environment, education, and agriculture & farming.
Dean could not find it in him to care.
On their return to Bobby's he had slunk down to the cellar, to Castiel's room.
He had closed and locked the door, and collapsed onto the bed, still stained
with their mixed come, the scent of the man still suffusing the pillows.
He had left Sam to look after the now wheelchair-bound Bobby.
He had cried and mourned his loss.
-
On day four Dean surfaced again but did not go back to the room he had shared
with Castiel. The man he had loved, ever so briefly, would not want him to
wallow, and certainly not in come-covered sheets.
With a lump in his throat he had thrown the sheets, and all of his clothes in
to wash, already missing Castiel's scent, knowing it had faded two days before,
but not willing to let go.
“When you heading out?” Bobby asked gruffly, making Dean jump. Sam had left
that morning, telling them that he had to return to the Complex and help
rebuild. He wanted to be a part of the rebuilding of their world.
Dean had not been able to watch him go, and it had really been for Bobby that
he had risen. “I don't know, Bobby. I'm not sure I want to go back,” he sighed.
“Can I?” he gestured to Bobby, who scowled, then, “What is there for me there
anyway?”
He thought of the shit-covered streets, they very ones on which he had found
Cas. “I helped a handful of people, Bobby. I get that, but...” He just stopped
staring at the wooden floor of the living room.
“But you feel like you found somethin' worthwhile, that you'da followed to the
ends of the Earth, and you did, and now it's gone, and now you don't know what
to do with yourself,” Bobby completed for him.
Dean nodded morosely.
Bobby hummed. “Okay, well, while you work through that shit, why don't you git
outside and start picking up that shit you threw across my land, huh? And I’m
gonna need help pulling damn potatoes soon, seeing as I gave my damn legs to
the cause.”
Dean looked up at him in surprise. “Wha?”
Bobby scowled. “You don't remember throwin' every piece of scrap metal I own in
a fifty foot radius across my yard?” he folded his arms, all mock sternness.
“Well I do. And, if I'm gonna get this place turned around while I’m stuck in
this god-forsaken chair, I'm gonna need to melt that shit down, gotta get those
old junkers turned into something useful, and it looks like my mobility ain’t
want it used to be.”
Dean stood slack jawed with the order, but the concept felt right somehow.
Good. Honest. Real work, cleaning and tidying, helping Bobby, the man he had
wished more than once was his father. He owed Bobby that much. He had already
cleaned the world of everything that didn't technically belong here once,
unwittingly, by filling the rent between the worlds; why not start cleaning up
his messes on the actual planet too?
“Yeah. Okay Bobby. I can do that.”
“Good. Then you can help me with the beer. Needs rackin' into bottles. Then you
can build a damn ramp for me.”
“Yes sir,” he answered with the ghost of a smile on his lips.
-
In the three months since Dean and Castiel closed the Bridge, Dean had only
returned to the city once.
After dropping by Benny's flat to collect his possessions, like many humans
were doing with their now absent off-worlder friends, Dean had dropped into the
Precinct and told them he was leaving. He didn't even bother to give them a
reasonable notice period; they hadn't cared when he worked there, and they were
grateful to see the back of him.
Dean had grinned, though, when a Sergeant from the Complex's internal police
force had walked in the door and yelled at Gordon for everyone to hear. Dean
had snuck out before shit had hit the fan. Walt had already been brought into
the argument before he’d had a chance to get fully away.
He was pleased that the Government were trying to get America back on track,
but he was more pleased he wouldn't be a part of it in that way.
He had emptied his apartment, and driven back to Bobby's, chucking his stuff
into the cold cellar, now no longer needed as a refuge; there were no off-
worlders to need Bobby's help any longer.
He couldn't face sleeping down there though, not without Castiel.
He spent every day either working the land for Bobby, getting his farm from
glorified garden, to something actually productive on a much larger scale, and
working in the newly erected garage, where he cannibalized the old trucks and
cars and broken farm machinery and built new vehicles, capable of cutting
drainage channels and turning the heavy soil.
With his time freed up and his mobility curtailed to the paved tracks Dean had
built, Bobby started talking about setting up a school to make use of his
library of books.
Singer’sbecame the place everyone went for working farm machinery. Dean was
busy.
But he wasn't happy, or even particularly fulfilled. He knew he was doing good,
helping people to finally start to rebuild on a sustainable level, feeding
those who still toiled in the cities, providing a service that was desperately
needed.
But, he missed Castiel. It was like a raw ache in his chest. And he hated
himself for it. He had barely known the man, and yet he could not see himself
happy without him.
He was out in the garage, stripping back the rust from a practically
prehistoric seed drill when he caught himself thinking of Castiel again.
He kicked himself, because those warm thoughts only ever led to one conclusion.
The man who had given him something to live for, a direction and a purpose, was
dead. Either torn to shreds in the closing Bridge, or thrown out on his
homeworld, and left to die from a plague that had ended his race.
And, with each passing day, that tiny glow of hope that Castiel had survived
and the virus, or whatever it was that had killed an entire planet of the most
powerful angels, was dormant, faded. Castiel was either stuck there, alone, a
slow, painful, lonely death awaiting him, or his Grace was gone, and the result
was the same.
It would be better if he had died in the Bridge. Any hope that he could still
escape under the power of his own wings had long since died.
At first, Dean had entertained the hope that Castiel was just resting before he
flew back and found him, loved him again, but it had been three months. Castiel
had been healed and strong enough after a lifetime of rape and imprisonment to
destroy a rift between worlds after merely ten days.
Three months?
Dean knew Castiel was dead.
It was unfair that he wasn't too, that he had to go on, had to stay alive for
Bobby and Sam.
Once again he was living because someone else had told him he ought to.
He shook his head and started attacking the rusted chassis with wire wool even
harder, shredding his knuckles even through the heavy gloves he was wearing. He
needed to get this done, as the farmer owned a whole lot of land and a whole
lot of farm machinery. Bobby wanted to set up a contract, so Dean had to do the
work well, and quickly.
He sighed, hating that he still had to dance to another's tune, even though he
wasn't good for anything else.
He idly wondered about using his Wroth to deflect the rust away, but having not
touched that element of himself since he had woken up with Cas lost to him, he
figured he would probably just deflect the entire machine away through the tin
wall and out into the rain.
He stopped at that, noticing that, for the first time in months, it wasn't
raining. The lack of the constant noise was almost deafening.
He dropped the ball of wire wool to the floor and ran out into the yard looking
up at the sky and squinting at the unaccustomed brightness. The sky was pale
gray as far as he could see, until he looked toward where the Bridge used to
be, where the heavier clouds were stark on the horizon, a smear of rain sitting
underneath them.
“Well, I'll be—” Bobby's voice interrupted.
Dean hummed in agreement. They had both experienced their fair share of
rainless days over the past few years, but the painful glow in the sky? Behind
layers of shifting cloud? That was new. It may have a long way to go yet, but
seeing the sun, however weak, was something to celebrate.
“Beer?” Bobby asked, as if reading his mind. He nodded and Bobby wheeled
himself along the hard track and up the ramp into his house. Their house.
Inside, Bobby handed him a bottle and he opened the cap, swallowing down the
golden liquid within. They sat on the porch, Dean sitting next to Bobby on the
top step, ignoring their commitments and duties for the rest of the day, just
sitting outside, and staring at the puddles beginning to dry.
It was Dean's favourite day since the day he lost Castiel.
-
Dean made an inarticulate grunt of pure irritation and anger down the phone.
“And, good morning to you too, dear brother.” Sam replied with far too happy a
tone for six thirty in the morning.
“Fuck off, unless you have magically re-discovered the recipe for pie, I don't
want to know.”
Dean could hearSam frown. “We never lost the recipe for pie, Dean. You made
Bobby apple pie last week. You told me, you were all proud. It was kind of cute
actually.”
Dean grunted again.
“Look, I was thinking about coming over today. I found something interesting
that I want Bobby to look at. Is that cool? Doesn't ruin any dates you've going
on or anything?”
Dean actually laughed at that. It wasn't a happy sound. Sam had taken to jibing
him about staying single. Three months, two weeks and four days wasn't long
enough to get over Castiel.
Dean was pretty certain that a life time wasn't going to be long enough.
“Yeah, no, you're good. Bring pie!” and he hung up, rolling back under the
covers until Bobby hit the floor of his room from beneath with the wooden broom
handle, letting him know he had to get up, or get no breakfast.
He liked breakfast. Bobby made a killer omelette.
So, he got up.
-
“So, do you think it's accurate?” Sam asked Bobby, his eyes fixed earnestly on
the old man.
“I think it’s about an accurate as any of them prophesies,” he shrugged and
Dean switched his gaze back to his brother who was practically vibrating with
eagerness.
“But what if—?” Bobby waved him off and dragged the book out of Sam's lap to
look over it more thoroughly.
“What if it isaccurate huh? What if you take it to the new guy—?”
Sam snorted. “Governor, they're calling him a governor now. His name is Carver
Edlund.”
Bobby grunted, “No wonder I can't remember his damn name. So, then what? You go
to Edlund and tell him that you think you can reopen the Bridge based on a
prophesy by a five hundred year old angel who ain't always been too reliable—
Although, I have to admit, dead on in some cases.” At that he shot a look at
Dean.
“Ah! Ah—” Sam cut in with a finger held high and a smug grin on his face. “Re-
open it safely and about a quarter of the size if my calculations are correct.”
“And without a nuke I hope?” Dean finally chipped in, staring incredulously at
his potentially insane brother.
Sam just nodded rapidly as Bobby continued. “And then what, kid? The government
will just do what it did before. The Complex will only look to the other
worlds, and Earth will be left to struggle along again. We're finally starting
to make headway, boy. They're even cleaning up the fuckin' city, Rufus told me
yesterday, so you want to compromise all that? Potentially let another war
begin? For what?”
Sam looked a little chastised. “But— People have lost family.” Sam shot a look
at Dean this time. “Children were ripped from their human parents because the
Bridge didn't discriminate when it threw people back home. There are people on
Earth whose partners were off-worlders on new colonies, and that’s all gone.
Not to mention the scientific possibilities—”
“Not to mention you're out a job.” Bobby raised an eyebrow.
“Am not,” Sam groused, secure in the knowledge that the Complex was in need of
every ounce of legal help it could get.
“So, you're saying I should sit on it?” Sam finally asked, looking between Dean
and Bobby, clearly thinking that Dean would be on his side.
“I think you need better reasons than science to rip a hole between worlds,
Sam,” Dean said, flat and low. “And, I'm not sure orphans and broken families
are a good enough reason either. You don’t even know if the angels and demons
made it back. Just because the humans did...”
He hadto get up and go then, the pain in his chest palpable at the words he had
just uttered. He left the house, quietly and calmly, and jogged through the
light rain to the garage.
He just sat and stared at the wall, knowing he had said the right thing, while
his guts screamed at him that he deserved to be alone and miserable, because if
he couldn't get the man he loved back, then he didn’t care if anyone else could
either.
He silenced that thought. That wasn't the reasoning. The rift was closed and
Bobby was right, Earth was rebuilding finally, or at least America was. Due to
the Government looking to other worlds, communication over seas had faltered.
Most other countries had already picked themselves up, cities empty yes, under
fed and poorly educated, but at least they had sorted out regular refuse
collections and mended the sewers.
They could not afford to drop back into the way things had been before.
If they re-opened the Bridge, it had to be for the right reasons. Dean couldn't
think of anything that constituted a reason right enough for that to be valid.
-
Dean was sharpening blades for the farm machines, the ringing of the metal on
the stone regular and therapeutic, when he heard a thump and a crash out among
the wrecks in the yard.
He put aside the blade, then leapt up to help, wondering what the hell Bobby
was doing in the wrecks in the first place when he heard it— “Fucking rain!” a
deep voice growled out as another clang sounded, accent thick, like honey and
illegal diesel.
Dean stopped. His heart in his throat and his guts in his feet.
He stepped slowly out into the yard, the rain, indeed, storming down on his
head.
He nearly fell to his knees when, outside he saw nothing, no one.
Great, now he was going fucking insane, he thought.
A cleared throat had him jerking up straight, tears stopping before they had a
chance to develop. “I am really fucking unimpressed with your terrible
description of vaccinations, Dean,” Castiel's voice growled out from behind
him.
He turned slowly, terrified the illusion would be gone when he faced it.
Dark hair, flattening in the rain, natural cloth t-shirt, held together with
toggles at the shoulders, sides and sleeves, the same jeans he had been wearing
when he was torn from him, and bare feet.
It was the jeans more than anything that had Dean moving.
He was practically glowing; broad, muscled, his skin golden and his smile so
wide, his eyes twinkling. A raw scar peeked through the draped sleeves of the
top, but Dean didn't take in any more as he bowled into Cas, wrapping him up in
his arms, tears flowing freely down his cheeks as he breathed in deep at the
man’s neck, sobbing with relief and joy.
“I missed you too,” Castiel whispered into his hair, and the angel finally
sought out Dean's lips.
The sensation filled Dean's senses, the softness, the warmth, the hot slick
slide of his tongue over Castiel's. Cas pulled away, holding Dean at arms
length, he didn't even notice the whining sound he made.
“You look like shit. Let’s get you inside, huh?” Castiel said around a smile.
Dean just nodded and allowed Castiel to lead him back inside the garage where
he had come from.
-
Castiel tried to explain to Dean why he had been gone nearly two seasons, but
he didn’t get a chance. With a groaning, whining sob, the sorely diminished man
in front of him latched on to his mouth and was pushing his hands up under his
shirt.
He had missed this so badly, not the sex, as such, although the times with Dean
had been perfect, but the heat, the touch, the kisses. Being wanted and loved.
The feel of Dean’s Wroth against his Grace.
The kiss was bruising, teeth clacking, and Dean's tongue rough and demanding
against his own, but it was filled with disbelief and passion and an aching
need. “I thought you were dead,” Dean whispered against his mouth and Castiel
froze briefly.
His Grace screamed to him, singing with the urge to hold the man before him.
The man who had tears sliding down his face. His Grace wanted him to allow it
to intertwine once more with Dean’s Wroth, to make it better again. To make
everything better. He knew his absence had hurt Dean, that much was obvious, if
his gaunt frame and sallow skin were anything to go by, but he had not once
thought that he would believe him dead.
He had been filled with the knowledge that the man who had his heart was alive
on Earth, he had assumed that Dean had feltit too. As Dean's mouth closed on
his again with a needy groan, he remembered that Dean was not like him; he was
not like anyone.
He pulled back from the kiss and smiled at Dean's whine of protest. He shushed
him gently and pulled him deeper into the building filled with half built and
naked cars, deciding to address Dean's location and choice of occupation at a
later point.
For now he needed to show Dean that he had missed him and that he loved him
too.
In a warm corner in the back, next to a table and a small electrical fire, he
pulled Dean to the hard packed ground, snagging some blankets from the top of
another car-type-thing on the way.
Dean's eyes were wide, but there was a hint of a smile as Castiel spread the
material onto the ground, and pushed Dean down, following immediately
afterwards, taking Dean into his arms and kissing his neck.
“I have thought about you every day, Dean,” he whispered into his hair where he
kissed his forehead and cheeks, jaw and neck.
He laid Dean down, fumbling with the fastening on his jeans before undoing his
own and freeing both of their erections, relishing the gasp Dean made as the
cool air hit his fevered skin.
Castiel leaned down, and without any warning, drew Dean's cock into his mouth
for the first time, groaning in pleasure as Dean's rock hard, silky soft length
filled his mouth, sat heavy on his tongue and rocked to the back of his throat.
He swiped his tongue down the length, sucking lightly, remembering how Dean had
done it for him, humming as Dean bucked up slightly and smiling as the part-
human twined the fingers of both hands in his rain-damp hair.
Dean tasted musky, slightly unwashed, and more perfect than he could have
imagined.
He sucked down, taking him as far in as he could manage, knowing, now, that it
didn't need to hurt, and he swallowed, eliciting a loud moan from the man who
he loved.
“Cas!” Dean gasped, and the sound had never been more welcome. “I—I'm not gonna
last—” he panted out, his hips moving in tiny aborted thrusts. Castiel grinned
as much as he could and sucked harder, wrapping his fingers in the man's public
hair and squeezing lightly at his heavy balls.
He felt them draw up almost instantly, and one swipe of his tongue over the
smooth head later, Dean was pumping his mouth full of come.
He swallowed every drop, relishing the tart, tangy taste.
He removed his mouth, but licked stripes up Dean's cock until it softened and
Dean pushed him away with amused “Stop!”
When he looked up, Dean's face was flushed in the low lighting, pink and
beautiful with a predatory look in his eye. “Your turn,” he whispered, his
voice raspy.
Before Castiel had a chance to react, he found himself flung to his belly on
the floor, his aching cock trapped under him, perfect and unpleasant all at
once. He looked over his shoulder when he felt Dean's fingers at the waist of
his jeans, pulling them down. He heard a soft groan when his naked ass was
bared. “Commando, Cas, really?” he stayed silent, not understanding. He had
kind of missed Dean's constant, strange chatter that never meant what it ought
to.
He yelped, banishing all other thoughts, as Dean dragged him up by the hips,
leaving his hole exposed. He clenched, and almost tried to escape, but Dean's
soft fingers were there, caressing his skin, stroking his scarred cheeks and
nuzzling against his upper thigh.
“You're so beautiful Cas,” he felt whispered into his skin, just a moment
before he felt Dean's burningly hot tongue lave over his hole. He made an
undignified high-pitched noise at the sensation, but didn't mind, as it made
Dean chuckle, little puffs of hot air gliding over him, before he brushed his
fingertips over his hole and licked another long stripe over him, finishing in
a kiss against his rim.
He repeated the action again and again, always pressing a kiss to him before
beginning to poke his tongue into the dip, opening him slightly then licking
another long hot stripe . Dean kept his hands away from Castiel’s throbbing
cock, bobbing between his legs, untouched, as he licked again, delving his
tongue in just a little further.
“Dean,” he breathed out, feeling his Grace stretch to encompass Dean, and
finding the man's Wroth stretching to meet him in return.
Another hot lick, another kiss, his tongue pushed into him, wriggling against
his rim. The utter joy in his Wroth, and Castiel came, his neglected cock
pulsing spurt after spurt of come against the blanket under him, Dean's tongue
still licking inside of him as he clenched down and gasped out in pleasure.
It felt like they stayed there frozen while he came for an age, muscles
clamped, nothing else mattering while Dean's tongue was in his ass.
With a groan though, he was finally spent, and Dean pressed a final kiss
against him before rolling him over, away from the puddle of come, and leaning
on him, his naked groin nestled up against Castiel's naked hip, arms wrapped
tight, and a smile evident on his face where it was pressed to his chest.
He listened as Dean's breathing slowed again, and he ran his fingers through
his hair, holding on to what was his.
-
“Dean?”
Dean murmured something unintelligible against his neck in the dark. He could
hear the rain easing off outside the shed. It was getting cold, even under the
rough blanket he had finally pulled up over their forms.
“I want to apologise. For taking so long to come back, for letting you think I
was dead,” he began, and felt Dean stiffen next to him.
“I was sick for a long time,” at that Dean's head poked up, hair all over the
place, a wild look of fear in his eyes. “I— No, I'd better start from the
beginning.” He let his head drop back onto the hard ground, and stroked Dean's
head until he rested it against his chest again.
“When we were torn apart I was flung through the Bridge the wrong way, toward
the Fire.” He pulled a face, not knowing how to really explain the next part.
“Do you remember about the Nothingness?” He felt Dean nod hesitantly. “I was
thrown there again, I can't even tell you how terrifying that was. But, it
didn't take long and I was flung out the other side, and I hurtled to Hath. I
guess it was the quickest route or something. I did not know the worlds formed
a full circle before then.”
Dean’s fingers were gripping his waist hard, but Castiel did not shake him off,
revelling in the sweetness of his touch, no matter how fear filled it was. “The
planet was lush and full and green,” he smiled, then huffed out a laugh, “and
not empty.”
Dean looked up again astonishment on his face. “It appeared some survived the
plague. Not many. A few hundred maybe? As we can fly, the inhabitants were
pretty sure that there were no others. They had gathered near the Bridge, to
keep an eye on it, not trusting it. But, beside them were about ten or fifteen
others, including myself, who had been prisoners.”
He looked up at Dean's open mouthed face, too gaunt in the harsh light, and
grinned wide and happy. “Gabe survived.” Dean let out a tiny whoop and squeezed
Castiel in a tight hug, murmuring how happy he was for him.
“He's an ass,” he laughed again. “But, he was the one who had the balls to
suggest we try the vaccination. I told him about it when the first of us, who
had never been on the planet, started getting sick. You never said that we
would all get sick with the damn thing before we got better, you bastard.”
Dean looked up at him and winced. “It's not done that way now, Cas, not sharing
blood… And, I didn't know!” He looked a strange mix of relieved and worried.
He hummed in response. “We only lost two. An elder, he was very old and weak,
and passed even before Gabe and I tried it on ourselves. And a young woman who
had had a similar life to mine— She may not have survived even if the Bridge
had not collapsed, throwing her from her prison to Hath and its sickness. We
mourned their loss, but the rest of us survived. After more than a season of
sweating and coughing.” He said the last with a fond anger in his voice. He
would have pretended it to be Dean's fault more, except the man looked haunted
and full of sorrow.
“Thanks to you Dean— You saved our lives.” He leaned up and kissed him, before
dropping his head back.
“Once Gabe and I were up and about again, he got my tale from me, and told me
his in return. I...won't tell it now, but he wanted me to take him to the
Nothingness.”
He huffed out a breath, but continued. “I— What we found was amazing, Dean.
But, I don't want you to think I simply came back because I want your help or
want company… If you don't want to— I will stay here with you for the rest of
my life if you say so, if you ask me—”
Dean's eyes were confused, hopeful, warm, overflowing with love and intrigue.
“But…?”
He sat up, helping Dean to do the same, mourning the loss of the man's soft
belly, now flat and hard, almost concave. He hoped Dean would allow him to heal
him, as much as Dean had healed him in those first few days.
“We found another Bridge.” He had his palms wrapped around Dean's upper arms,
feeling the sinewy muscle tense under his gaze.
“I— What?”
“When I was thrown through, there was nothing, when Gabe and I returned, now
that we knew it linked our Wind-ward with the Demon's Fire-ward…” He laughed at
the memory. “Its no longer a nothingness…. It's everything. Just like the
Bridge.”
“When you step in it's the same, two directions except the colours, the
directions, are more feelings, hiding on the edge of vision.”
He locked his gaze with Dean's. “We found Earth and Water, Dean.”
Dean simply stared at him, mouth a little parted.
“Will you come with us?”
Dean shrugged, seeming to consider, and Cas’ heart leapt into his mouth. “Well,
I know how much you like the rain, Cas,” Dean paused, eyes glinting, “but all
things considered I think we should probably take a look…”
Castiel’s heart leapt in joy as Dean’s deadpan expression broke into a dumb
grin, a smile of amazed wonderment. It made his eyes glow with excitement,
finally,as well as all the love he had seen there from the first moment he had
returned. Dean grinned wider, before he tackled him back to the ground, holding
him tight with a laugh and a kiss.
***** Epilogue *****
“I distinctly remember you saying that wings are only showed to family, to
lovers,” Dean muttered, brushing shoulders with Castiel as he squinted up into
the wide blue sky, the burning sun at his back.
“They are,” Cas shrugged, “I told you he’s an ass. But, well, we need them out
to fly longitudinally— According to him, the self-proclaimed ‘Grand Keeper of
all things hath’,” he said snarkily, raising his fingers in air quotes which
made Dean snigger. “We also needed to fly in battle in times long past. I think
he’s making it up but…”
Castiel glanced up too, watching his brother fly loop-the-loops, whooping at
the top of his lungs. His wings were like Cas’ only in form. They were not so
large, but otherwise, they looked like billowing gas, just like his lover’s
did. Only, Gabriel’s were gold, yellow, orange, amber, white— They sparkled in
the sun’s glare. If Dean wasn’t totally enraptured by Castiel’s wings, he might
have had to admit aloud that Gabriel’s wings were almost beautiful.
“You ready then?” the slighter angel yelled from above them, and Castiel
sighed, dropping his gaze back to Dean.
They wore a mix of Castiel’s native clothing and Dean’s; sturdy, practical, and
they both had bags slung over their backs.
Dean nodded. He was ready. They all were.
Castiel reached and grabbed Dean’s hand, lacing their fingers together. After
two weeks together, whole, healthy and happy, Dean was beginning to get used to
the surge of Wroth in his veins each time they touched.
Castiel took a breath and Dean felt it when Cas stretched his wings out into
that invisible place that meant he could step from one world to another. The
new Bridge was everywhere in the Nothingness, they had to step through from the
planet they were on; the last Wind-ward planet of them all.
Castiel nodded firmly and they flew, Gabriel somewhere above their heads,
screaming a “Yee-haww” he had somehow picked up from his two days on Earth.
Dean blinked hard as they floated in the Bridge—
It was as unlike the Bridge on Earth as it was possible to imagine; no gravity,
no sound, the colour beyond the capability of his eyes, and yet he knew which
direction was which.
“So, Cas, Water or Earth?” he asked, looking in either direction.
“You pick,” Castiel grinned up at him.
“I choose…

END
Please drop_by_the_archive_and_comment to let the author know if you enjoyed
their work!