One of Dean's uncles had been in the Great War nearly thirty years ago; he didn't have anything to show for it, except some depressed drinking stories and the wheelchair he was bound to, parts of his feet missing from a landmine.
John got the call first; they had him trained in Arizona and put on a ship to Hawaii hardly a month after Pearl Harbor. Dean was sent nine months later at twenty-four and he spent most of his training writing letters to home and his Dad's naval base, hoping, praying that Sam's enrollment in law school would keep him safe in America.
Dean went from a fort in Illinois to the Commonwealth strongholds in Egypt. He met Castiel Novak there, First Sergeant, command head of their battalion during their defense pushes along the borders of the Ally's fought over territory. He had a hard look to him, didn't talk much. Was the only guy in the camp Dean couldn't beat a hand of poker at, but respect ran deep amoung the company. After all, what First Sergeant was content to lay with Privates, hold friendly conversations, lend books to? More than once he'd gone off to get his mail from some agency, military or government – never from a sweetheart or a wife or his Mother, from what the other soldiers discerned – and he'd hand Dean his packets of letters on the way back.
It couldn't have been favoritism; in fact if it weren't for those moments of geniality from the officer Dean would have figured Castiel loathed him – his sergeant in training did, most ranking men did, too. Castiel Novak was hard on him, demanding, not above shoving him to the ground if he tried to get smart, either. He never bent to the officer's orders, not quite, but either way the other hadn't worked himself up to getting a court martial or a company change for Dean. In fact, by the winter of the next year he'd climbed all the way up to Corporal. During the ceremony, he and a line of six other Specialists stared stonily ahead. Castiel was in front of him, looking at the new patch adorning his uniform.
"Maybe I'll be a Sergeant before the war's out," he said to him, after the others had wandered away, into the shade of their tents and ramshackle bunkers. "Sir," he added quickly, clenching his jaw and feeling the grit of sand in his teeth.
His officer merely reached out, straightened one of the marksmanship badges hanging above his breast pocket. "Maybe," Castiel said. His hat was tipped upwards just enough that he could see his eyes; blue like Kansas skies, Dean thought, numbly saluting in farewell and walking away.
Castiel had once remarked, one of the evenings he was up late and Dean needed a cigarette to stop his hands from shaking, mind rattling from a nightmare based on the battlefront, that he had been through France and Germany – before the war started, you see – and England, as well, years ago, but he had never had the pleasure of Italy.
The streets were cracked and full of retreating Axis men. Dean fired a shot, saw three enemy soldiers go down at once and thought that this was the story he'd be telling his family about, when he came home.
He looked around; their company was fine, reloading quickly and dashing through the thin streams of buildings, rounding up civilians to take them to safer places.
He didn't see Castiel.
It shouldn't have bothered him to such a point but – he spotted a pair of Italian men being dragged away, hard won prisoners after so many had escaped – Castiel, he knew Castiel. The sergeant didn't rise in the ranks, he didn't have half his chest dripping in ribbons and metals for sitting on his ass. Dean felt his jaw clench – no sand here, just blood and the press of metal in his hands.
Too many Axis soldiers had escaped as they flooded into the country.
Castiel wouldn't rest until he brought an entire battalion back to them.
And Dean wasn't going anywhere without Castiel at his side; he picked a direction that led towards fields, once held for grape harvests, they'd been trampled by tanks and Italian fascists fleeing in the other direction. He ran, until the cobblestones went to dirt and mud, until sweat dripped into his eyes like streams of tears. He hopped over old wooden fences and the smell of rotting fruit stung his nostrils in an alien unpleasantness; bitter but not blood; foul but not death or shit and he hadn't been around something so typical for so long he didn't know what to make of it.
It must have been two miles down, before he stopped, before he couldn't sprint or jump, anymore.
Not with all the fucking bodies lying around.
A dozen – no, two – more in the distance, he surveyed, chest heaving. All but two were Axis men, shot in the head or the heart. He stepped through them, carefully, looking for movement, but the flies from the fruit had settled on most of them already, and their eyes didn't blink.
"Sergeant Novak!" he yelled, trying to see a figure in the horizon. "Novak!" Nothing but small trees and endless fields; everyone else was dead or gone and he feared, for a moment, that the others would assume him M.I.A. and leave him stranded. He realized just as quickly, a sort of child's fantasy, that he didn't care; he could stay with the reformed natives, find Castiel and take a vacation here, let the country rebuild – his sergeant always wanted to see this nation. They'd be together, swim in the ocean to stay fit, and once the Eastern armies pushed forward some more hundred miles they'd return like mythical heroes, see the end of the war with a hundred stories to tell.
Somewhere, close to the ground and to the left, he heard a wheeze.
Dean glanced down, gun pointed somewhere lethal before the face sank into him: A hardhat, hanging off his skull, skin white despite the years in Africa. Eyes like home. Dean swallowed, felt the gun slip out of reach.
Red on his uniform.
"Sir?" He was kneeling at his officer's side. "Novak, sir, come on – did you do all this?"
"Too many…" He cleared his throat but didn't speak.
"I knew it, I fuckin' knew you'd – shit, Novak, that's a – um," He pressed his hands down solid on Castiel's stomach, looked behind them, but no one had followed; no enemies, no help. "I'm going to get you out of here, alright, sir? You're going to be – fine, fine. Help!" He swung his head this way and that, screaming until his voice cracked. "Help! Anybody! Sergeant down! First Sergeant Castiel Novak! Anyone!"
"Winchester, Dean Winchester," He felt a hand on his cheek; trembles in his fingers. He turned back to the bleeding man – his officer, the one who received him from training and didn't send him off, no matter how much he complained and cursed when he thought the other wasn't looking. Castiel looked frightening: All that humanity, bleeding into the vineyard dirt. "I went too far this time,"
"This time like every time," Dean said, pressing harder. He felt blood seep through Castiel's shirt and coat his fingers. "Now keep breathing, sir, we'll wait till you stop bleeding everywhere and I'll… I'll," He didn't know what he would do.
"The only way I'll stop bleeding is once I run out of blood. You know that."
"You're the miracle worker," he bit out, voice as unsteady as the fingers touching his face. "I'll carry you all the way back to America if I have to, you know I will."
Castiel smiled, closed his eyes as he did so and without a thought to it Dean had his hands cupping his sergeant's face, eyes boring to the crinkles of his eyes, the dark strands of hair, his dry mouth. "Sir? Novak? Novak! Castiel, goddamn it!"
Castiel opened his eyes lazily, he was still smiling, like this was a twisted, cruel joke. Maybe all their company was behind them, about to make fun of him for a picture-show performance. But he couldn't look away.
"You motherfucker," His face burned hot. "You're seeing some goddamn light at the end of the tunnel, aren't you?" His fingers dug into the man's face.
"No," Weak word. "No, Just you. Just see you, Winchester. Don't you have some company to go back to?"
"Not without their officer, sir."
Castiel breathed heavily; if Dean could think, he might have looked for a pulse, gradually weakening from some shot of a fleeing soldier. He'd slaughtered twenty – hell, he'd slaughtered five hundred in his time – before one finally hit him where it counted.
And Dean couldn't do a damn thing about it. He sniffed, catching the grapes in the air. He thought of wine, Rome. "Is the place as pretty as you thought it'd be, sir?"
Castiel chuckled again; his teeth were searchlights, so bright they made Dean's eyes gather water around the edges. "Prettier without all these soldiers, I think." Dean glanced at the bodies that bordered them; to the sweet horizon and sun beyond.
"Yeah," he breathed out, looking back to Castiel's face. "Yeah, sir, much prettier." Castiel's eyes had drifted closed; his labored breath hinted that the inevitable hadn't come. "You know sir, it's a shame," he muttered, like in a dream. "Could've lived here together. Taken a break from my tour. Would've been nice, I bet." He reached one hand up from his face and soothed it down Castiel's hair. He didn't know why he did it; seemed like a natural gesture, a comforting one. With his eyes closed Castiel could pretend it was some pretty girl or something. The strands were thick and longer than to be expected from an officer. Dean kept up with the movement, liking the feeling under his skin. "See a light yet, sir?" Nothing. "Novak?" His breathing was fainter. "Castiel?"
"No," he whispered. "Still hurts. Like a bitch."
"Is… Is there anything I can do, Castiel?" The sergeant's lips twitched slightly. "Any messages to pass on? Any note at all, I promise I can send it, just say the word."
Castiel's eyes were the smallest slits on his dirty face. Dean leaned in closer, trying to make the effort less. "Here," Dean considered that a 'come here' order, and didn't stop until his officer's lips just about brushed against his face.
"What is it, Castiel?" He responded to his first name best and perhaps that made sense; ages of only calling him by Sir or by rank made the pronunciation go tumbled and juvenile, which had to have been amusing for the officer, which was why he hadn't told him to knock it off.
He felt a solid press of Castiel's mouth to his cheek; not a mistake on either of their parts, it was a kiss. Dean's throat dried further, and he closed his own eyes, couldn't imagine why he did so.
"Sir?" Castiel had relaxed again. "Who was that for?"
Castiel didn't answer; Dean had his arms braced at the sides of his head and refused to move further away, lest he missed the man's dying words.
Sergeant Novak spoke, mouth tight along the shell of his ear. And he swore he said, words weak as they were, "You've earned it up to Captain, Winchester. Dean. Dean,"
He said nothing else. Dean was bent over for half an hour with bloody hands and tears he couldn't explain running into the dirt and Castiel said nothing else.
When his company saw him, then the First Sergeant's body, hanging limp in his arms like a fainted woman or a sleeping lamb, he couldn't even speak. When, not a month later he and other crew received additional ribbons, and Dean the rank of sergeant, he still couldn't stutter out the word sir to his new officers.
When his tour ended, and came home to his brother and Mother and even John, all safe and sound, he couldn't find a damn thing to say.
First Sergeant Castiel Novak had loved him for years, and he couldn't tell a soul he loved him back.
Nowadays, he found himself with his uncle, whose wife had passed on passed on some years ago. To put it simply, his uncle was lonely and Dean longed for the quiet; for the lack of a question with no honorable answer, because Bobby knew – no matter what rank he ended up or however many badges he earned, he had nothing to show for it.
xxxx
A/N: A friend of mine prompted me on tumblr for "World War II AU destiel". I don't care for war aus at all; I tend not to read them and I didn't think I'd ever write one, either, but here we are. This is set during the Allied Powers invasion of Italy in 1943.