Title: What Dreams Are Made Of
Summary: The only downside to having a freaky angel stalker that can dreamwalk? You run the risk of having him interrupt your sexual fantasies… about your freaky dreamwalking angel stalker. Dean/Castiel.
Rating: R
A/N: Yes, the title is also a Hilary Duff song. Stop laughing at me! Also, this was one of the more difficult stories I've ever written. Guess I can add possession-dream-sex fics to my list of impossibles. Who knew?
Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural or its characters. *Is sad*
What Dreams Are Made Of
Dean's eyelids fluttered shut as the angel pulled himself back up the length of his prone body, nose hitting his jaw and dragging up his cheek, warm breath puffing onto his face. "I love you."
It was enough to melt the hunter. He turned his head to capture the other man's lips. He was going back to Hell. So going back to Hell. Never going to see the light of day again. Somehow, though, that was all right.
A tongue slid into his mouth, wet and human and holding all the answers, able to give him the things he'd never thought he could have. Constant things. Stable things. Wonderful, exotic things. Things he'd seen, but had never quite been able to grasp.
He pulled back, looking into dark blue eyes. He didn't say anything. The feeling was there, mutual, returned. To speak it aloud, though, would make it real, and he wasn't ready for that. Real things had a way of breaking, shattering, running away and never returning. Real things had sharp edges and drew blood straight from the heart. This was real enough to make him happy, not real enough to hurt when it would inevitably end.
The angel smiled. "It's ok. I know."
Dean smiled back. It was perfect. Everything he'd never known he wanted, curled naked with him in dirty motel sheets. And he didn't even have to say a word. He wished-
"I love you."
A shiver ran up his spine every time he heard those three words. Something sparked in the angel's eyes at that. Three simple words, and truer ones had never been spoken. Every time was like the first time and he still couldn't believe it. Something like that and someone like him? Impossible. Improbable. Happening as the angel leaned forward again, kissing him, pulling breath from his lungs as his heart hammered in his chest as the door opened.
"Dean?"
Warm lips faded from his own even as he willed them to stay. Slowly, Dean sat up and turned to the door, where a fully-clothed version of the angel he'd just finished fucking was standing and staring at him with wide eyes. "I can explain everything."
He blinked and found himself lying back in bed, his clothes wrapped snug around his body. Too snug. Castiel, sitting next to him on top of the tangled covers, glanced at him and frowned. "You can take care of that later. Right now, you have work to do."
"Yeah," Dean sputtered, pushing himself up. "But, um, see… I can-"
"Later. A Seal is about to be broken. A demon is being summoned. Set was worshipped by the ancient Egyptians as their god of the desert and chaos. He killed his brother Osiris and attempted to murder his nephew as well. If he is released-"
"Bad things will happen?"
Castiel fixed him with a cold, disapproving gaze. "The sands will rise, chaos and destruction will reign, and brother will turn against brother." He leaned close. "Tell me, Dean, do you want to kill Sam?"
Dean glanced over at the other bed, at his soundly sleeping brother, and shook his head. "No. but-"
"Then stop them."
"Just let me explain."
"Time is of the essence. Go now or the demon will be released." With that, the angel disappeared.
Dean pushed the constraining covers away from his body and scooted to the edge of the bed. He ran a hand over his face and closed his eyes, sighing. He was so going back to Hell.
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
Castiel watched from the shadows as Dean roused his brother from sleep. They packed their bags and left, Sam chatting about getting to go head-to-head with an actual Egyptian deity.
As soon as the men were gone, he slunk from the dark corner of the room and sat on the edge of the bed Dean had claimed. The brothers would need all the help they could get when going up against Set, and he should have headed out with them, lent a hand in battle. He just couldn't drag his mind from the dream he'd walked in on.
It wasn't the first time Castiel had ever interrupted a dream. He'd walked in on Dean killing monsters, spending Christmas with his family, even having a picnic with a dark-haired woman. This one was new. This one troubled him.
Dean had never, to his knowledge, willingly dreamt about him before. He believed the term willingly fit because most dreams that involved his presence were created for the specific purpose of passing on orders. That, and Dean had seemed to be enjoying himself. Quite a bit, if his state when woken was any indication.
So he was puzzled. Dean had spent most of his time since his resurrection running- both physically and at the mouth- and trying to escape Heaven. He was stubborn. He didn't believe in God. He didn't believe in good. He was so easily distracted by the simple pleasures of food and flesh that it was ridiculous, and yet he'd never given the angel a second glance. Not like that.
He was missing something. Something big. And he wasn't going to let it go, wasn't going to wait for Dean to come back and mumble out some half-assed explanation.
The angel glanced at the door. Set was weak. No one believed in him anymore, and the lack of belief meant a lack of strength. He was still dangerous, but if John Winchester and a bona fide angel of the Lord couldn't get Dean to question his brother, Castiel doubted a demon could.
He closed his eyes and let himself sink back- back in time, back into Dean's mind, back into the invisible oblivion that came with being a watcher of mankind. He would see. He would know. There would be no explanation required.
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
Castiel opened his eyes and glanced around the room. It was different than the room the brothers had been staying in that night, different than the room he'd seen in the dream. It resembled the hotel the Winchesters had stayed in two weeks back and three states over. He had overshot the time, maybe overshot the dream.
He sighed and leaned against a wall, blending in, staying out of sight. It wasn't long before the door to the room opened and Dean trudged in, muttering something about Sam and Ruby under his breath.
The hunter dropped his duffle bag onto a chair and flopped down onto his bed, crossing his arms behind his head and staring up at the ceiling with a frown on his face. "Who needs them?" he muttered. "Just wish I wasn't alone."
As if on cue (and it was probably was, with them being in a dream), there was a flutter of wings and the fly-on-the-wall wasn't the only angel in the room anymore.
It was odd. He'd looked at his vessel, watched the man as he'd prayed to be used, had seen his own reflection in the mirror, but this was different. This was him-but-not-him. A dream. A fantasy. Something cooked up by the subconscious of a human that didn't believe in anything but what he saw. It looked exactly like him.
"Dean." Sounded like him, too.
The hunter shifted on the bed, rolling onto his side and groaning as he saw the angel that had, oddly enough, appeared right beside his real-world counterpart. "What do you want?"
"You don't want to be alone," the angel said, stepping out of the shadows and sitting on the bed beside Dean.
"You came to keep me company?"
"I came to talk."
"Knew it. There's always a motive."
"Not about the End Times."
"You want to convert me?"
Castiel grinned as he watched. It was such a typical thing for Dean to say, exactly what he would have expected. But something was different about the human's eyes. Something was off, had dulled.
He moved closer, stepping away from the wall and toward the bed, leaning over his own shoulder to get a better look at the man's eyes. He bent a little too far forward and stumbled, reaching out toward Dean, his hand flat, fingers splayed.
He was falling. Losing his balance and tipping into a dark hole and suddenly he was sitting on the bed next to himself. "I simply wish to talk," the man sitting across from him- the man that was him- said.
The law was simple among the humans. No one could be in two places at once. It was unnatural. So there he sat, riding out the dream as Dean saw it, from the fractured man's point of view. Trapped, and yet able to leave at any time. Free, but forced to rely only on Dean's explanations. Curiosity killed the cat. Another human law.
He slid back, the body moving of its own accord until he was resting against the headboard, half-sitting and half-laying. "What about?"
"Love."
Suddenly, he knew what that look in Dean's eyes- his eyes for the moment- had been. Uncertainty. "Let me guess? Jesus loves me." He inwardly cringed as he said it, hating the script he was being forced to follow.
"And so do I."
He blinked, just as shocked as Dean was. "What?"
"I love you." The angel- that was what Castiel had decided to call the thing that looked like him but wasn't, seeing as the title was technically correct- reached toward him and he jerked back.
"You're kidding."
"I don't joke."
"You can't-"
"Why not?" The angel asked.
"Because I'm me." Hopelessness. Loss. Abandonment. It flooded his system and would have taken him down had he been in control of the body. So strong. So certain. Nobody wanted him. Everyone left.
"You don't understand."
"Really? Well, please explain."
The angel shook his head. "It is in my nature. We were made out of love, Dean. Pure and unconditional. I know it may be hard for you to see that now, in these conditions and in this time, but it's true."
"Why me?"
"You're special. You shine. It's another thing that you can't see, but it's true. You wouldn't have been chosen if it wasn't."
It was true. He'd seen the light that radiated from Dean. How strong it was. How beautiful it was. "So you like me because God told you to?"
Something flitted across the angel's face at that, but Dean was choosing to ignore it, looking instead for confirmation. He waited, watching, wanting some sign that he'd been right, that no one could love him.
"I saved you because God commanded it. I stayed with you because God willed it. I loved you because I felt it."
He felt himself blink. "What, you been following Stephenie Meyer around, too?"
The angel cocked his head. "You are my only charge, Dean."
"Dude, no, that was cheesy." But he didn't believe it. Castiel could tell. Castiel could feel. So many different emotions all fighting for control, rising within the hunter's chest as he saw the truth behind the angel's eyes. He didn't believe that it was cheesy (whatever that meant). He believed it was impossible. Impossible and improbable and that still didn't stop him from wanting it to be true.
The angel leaned closer, his brow furrowing. "It is true. I don't understand why you don't believe me."
"Because you can't. You just can't."
"I won't leave."
Something inside Dean broke at that. Castiel felt it disengage with a snap, felt cautious warmth fill the body he'd fallen into. There were thoughts in Dean's head, swirling and confused, rushing by too fast for him to possibly make any sense of them. He could gather the gist, though. He could feel the want.
He hadn't watched Dean's life, hadn't followed the hunter through his journey as Dean had imaged he would. But he had learned. He had gone back and watched, had seen the revolving door of people in his charge's life, had looked on as Mary and John and Sam and countless others disappeared. Some returned for a brief time, only to leave again.
The storm of the man's thoughts quieted, but Castiel could still feel him fighting. He wanted to believe. He wanted it to be true, simply to have something good and solid and constant in his life.
"You don't mean that." Because nothing could ever be that easy. Nothing ever had been. He'd lost his mother, his father, fought his way out of a semblance of a perfect life only to lose his brother, and had finally lost himself as well. He wasn't going to let himself care and lose again.
"Dean." The angel sounded tired, leaning even closer, making Dean nervous and twitchy. Uncomfortable. "You need to trust me. I love you."
Dean's mouth opened to speak, but nothing came out. The sound was swallowed by the angel's lips on his own, declaring love in the only way Dean Winchester could identify.
Castiel was shocked, feeling his own tongue sweeping through Dean's mouth as the hunter softened under the touch and leaned into the kiss. A moan slipped from his throat and into the angel's mouth.
Dean pulled back, scared and confused and desperate. "You mean it? You swear it? Because if you're lying-"
"I can't lie, Dean."
Castiel knew that wasn't true. Angels could lie, had been granted a small degree of free will. Telling the truth was preferable, but sometimes lying was simply easier. But this was Dean's dream, and whatever Dean believed was reality. As long as he was talking to the angel, he wouldn't be lied to.
He felt a smile creep across Dean's face. "Yeah, I guess not." He leaned forward, the body he was trapped in moving against his own will and better judgement to capture the angel's lips again.
Dean closed his eyes, lost in thought, in the knowledge that he would never be alone again, that he was loved, that someone would come back for him time and time again. Clothing rustled, he moved, and somehow he was lying down on the bed with a body on top of him.
His eyes opened to see startling blue. They were half clothed now, shirts and jackets and tie abandoned on the floor. The angel reached down and caressed his face. "Dean."
There was such a rush of excitement at that, at the tone of the voice that Castiel had finally gotten used to thinking of as his own, that he was actually caught up in it. He found himself smiling along with Dean. "Cas?"
The angel leaned back, hands straying to Dean's belt, undoing the buckle as Castiel was forced to watch. "Won't you get in trouble?" he heard himself ask.
Done with the belt, onto the pants. Button and zipper, agonizingly slow, Dean relishing the touch almost as much as Castiel hated it. "It doesn't matter." Bright eyes looked up from the work of a warrior's hands and met with Dean's. "I would Fall for you."
Castiel's own heart sank at that statement while Dean's rose. It was the ultimate sacrifice, one that would be made willingly for him, and it was quickly undoing the human. No lies. Simply everything the hunter had ever wanted to hear, the small things that no one had ever bothered to tell him before.
The body he was in leaned up off the bed, allowing his jeans to be removed. The angel tossed them aside, smiled down at him, and leaned in once more. Dean replied greedily to the kiss, arching up into it and sweeping his tongue over lips and teeth, begging for more.
His hands strayed down toward the angel's hips, fingers ghosting over the leather belt, the shiny buckle. Dean possessed skill and dexterity, a comfort in the human form that Castiel knew he could never hope for. The kiss was broken, another pair of pants pooling on the floor. Two pairs of boxers joined it, and for the first time since the beginning of the dream, Dean was truly scared.
There was a sense of urgency, the feeling that they were standing at a threshold. There was no turning back. Suddenly, Dean wasn't so sure of his angel's honesty.
"I love you." Warm breath puffed onto the side of his face, and Castiel was surprised to hear the conviction behind the words. It was, apparently, strong enough for Dean to believe it.
"Prove it." He felt a smirk on his face, saw the angel smile, and braced himself.
Their lips met again, and something sparked to life in Dean, something small and warm and helpless. Something that he knew could grow stronger, shine brighter, if only it was nurtured properly.
His mouth was freed as lips trailed down his neck, to his collarbone, over ribs. He felt Dean react, realized rather belatedly that Dean had been reacting the whole time, since love had been proclaimed and clothing had fallen to the floor. The angel rocked into him and Dean moaned.
He felt something brush against him and Dean stilled. "Wait." He turned and began fumbling for the bedside table. "You need-"
A strong hand clamped around his wrist as warm breath puffed against his face once more. "No, I don't. I would never hurt you."
Dean's heart sped up a bit at that, at the words being said and the meaning behind them. Because there were two types of hurt in the world, and he'd suffered both multiple times. Yet here was someone willing to protect him, to save his body and his mind from any more pain, and it was wonderful and enticing and just the sort of promise that no one had ever made before.
"Do you trust me?"
His hand dropped from the table and fisted in dark hair, pulling the angel close for another taste. "That answer your question?"
He laid back on the bed and gazed into bright eyes, gasping as the angel began moving back down the length of his body and Castiel cringed in disgust.
It was horrible, an abomination, and the Bible stated that the copulation would lead to blood. There was more than one reason for that, more than just the wrath of God. There would be blood and there would be pain without the proper preparation, apparently something that Dean was willing to forego and endure for forbidden pleasure.
He felt Dean relax, felt his legs spread, felt something slide smoothly into him as Dean moaned again. There was no pain, no blood, just the sweet bliss of the dreaming.
And Dean smiled, let his eyes slide shut, let himself believe for once that everything was going to be all right. He was convinced that the words were true, that everything he'd wanted was within his grasp, that things could only get easier.
That was when Castiel realized. When Dean's thoughts began to quiet and his emotions took over, baser instincts riding out waves of pleasure that should have brought pain.
It wasn't about what they were doing. It was about what they were saying, about consummating words with action, forming a bond, becoming one, warmth spilling into him and over him at the same instant, so perfectly in sync that nothing could ever tear them apart.
The hunter's eyes opened as the angel left him and splayed out beside him, arm around his waist, eyes boring into him. "You believe me now?"
"Yeah." The response was breathy, only half there, lost in a haze of sleepy pleasure as the angel rolled back onto him, lips ghosting over hips and ribs.
Dean's eyelids fluttered shut as the angel pulled himself back up the length of his prone body, nose hitting his jaw and dragging up his cheek, warm breath puffing onto his face. "I love you."
It was enough to make him melt with warmth and familiarity, trust and love. He turned his head and caught the being's lips. He knew it was wrong, Castiel could sense that much from him, even through the torrent of emotion, the hurricane of lazy thoughts. Dean believed himself damned once more, but now he didn't care. He had someone that would Fall with him, find him, make it all bearable.
A tongue slid into his mouth, wet and more human than it had any right to be. A promise of the things to come. Constant things. Stable and exotic things.
Dean pulled back, and Castiel found himself looking into the dark blue eyes that he saw every time he looked in a mirror.
The hunter didn't say anything. The feeling was there, mutual, returned. He could feel it flowing through Dean, and straight to his core. To speak it aloud, though, would make it real, and Dean wasn't ready for that. Real things had a way of breaking, shattering, running away and never returning. Real things had sharp edges and drew blood straight from the heart. This was real enough to make him happy, not real enough to hurt when it would inevitably end.
And it had to end, had to stop before dreams began to bleed into reality and Dean lost his way. Castiel knew humans, knew that despite their beauty, they could be the ugliest creatures dreamt up by his Father. Petty and pushy and selfish. The things that Dean had never been, but may now become if he dared to believe, to blur the lines between wakefulness and sleep. To openly admit his wants.
The angel smiled. "It's ok. I know."
He felt Dean smile back. He could feel the human's wants weighing heavily on his heart, making their shared skin tingle. It was perfect. Something that could read him, could know him, without a word being spoken. And he felt Dean wish, felt him hope, felt him want.
"I love you."
A shiver ran up Dean's spine every time he heard those words. Three simple words, and truer ones had never been spoken, as far as the dream was concerned. And he couldn't believe it. Something like that and someone like him? It was really no wonder he didn't believe he deserved to be saved.
The angel leaned forward and kissed him again. Castiel recognized the action, the position, the scene that he'd walked in on and interrupted.
The other body rolled off of Dean's to rest beside him, smiling and curling an arm back around him, fingers tracing the lines of Dean's tattoo. "I love you." A simple peck on the cheek got Dean to smile and relax, drifting closer to sleep. "So much."
He was drifting, peaceful, trapped. Dean was happy, fully convinced that he would wake in the arms of his new lover and never have to be alone again. The body beside him shifted, rolling off of the bed and standing as the atmosphere of the room changed.
Dean dared to crack an eye open and see what had happened, in turn letting Castiel get a better view of things.
The angel was standing by the bathroom door, fully dressed and looking up at his brother with hard eyes. "It's done."
Uriel grinned. "He believed you?"
"Every word."
"Good."
The angel shook his head. "I still don't see how this helps."
"It's simple," Uriel explained. "You earn his trust, and he'll obey your every word. Promise him what he wants, and he'll do the Lord's bidding. It's the way he was made. Soft, weak, pliable. Pathetic, really, to think that the one meant to save us is so easily manipulated."
Castiel felt Dean's heart sink, felt a rush of inadequacy, disappointment. He'd been used. He would keep being used until they had no need for him, and then he'd be thrown out like common garbage, abandoned and alone, unwanted and unloved.
His eyes closed as the rustling of wings sounded and the charge left the air. Uriel was gone.
The mattress dipped again and Dean blinked, pretending to wake, and looked up at the angel. "Cas?"
The angel smiled, twining fingers through Dean's short hair. "I have to go now, but I'll be back."
Dean nodded, a coldness settling in his chest at the thought. Everything he'd wanted, and it had been turned against him, made meaningless in mere seconds. "Ok."
"I love you." And it was gone.
-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-
Castiel blinked and looked around the room. He was back where he'd started, sitting on a bed in the Winchester's latest motel of choice.
He was still puzzled. The dream, while apparently pleasing when he'd first entered it, had turned sour in the end. Had turned him into, if he remembered correctly, a heartless son of a bitch.
So why was Dean still having it? How could it still have that effect? Was he really so lost that even a nightmare could bring comfort?
Something whispered through the back of Castiel's mind and he strained to hear it. New orders. The sort of orders that made him wonder, made him question, made him doubt. God watched all His children continuously, and had been paying particularly close attention to Dean Winchester in the past months. Attention that might not have been such a good thing.
The doorknob began to jiggle and Castiel turned toward it. He could already sense Dean on the other side, and Sam asleep in the car, exhausted from battle.
The door opened and Dean stepped into the room. "Stopped it. Thanks for the heads up on all the security, by the way. Ten demons all gunning for us wasn't a nasty surprise or anything."
Castiel simply stared.
"What?" Dean tossed his bag into a corner and frowned. "Oh. Look, I can explain everything."
"There's no need," the angel said, gaining his feet and approaching the hunter. "I saw." He swallowed hard, unable to believe that he was about to do this, unable to disobey his orders. He placed his hands on Dean's hips and pulled the hunter close, surging up to meet his lips in a kiss.
Dean stiffened and sucked in a breath before pushing him back. "What the hell?"
"I love you."
The hunter's eyes widened comically before his expression softened. "You mean it?"
He tilted his head to one side. "Don't you trust me?"
Dean smiled and leaned down, relaxing into the kiss, refusing to surface for air. A dying man clutching a lifeline, unaware that the rope was frayed and could very well send him to his death.
Uriel had been right. Soft, weak, pliable.
Pathetic.
The End. Yay!
As always, comments and reviews are welcomed! Thanks for reading.