It's not gradual. At least, he doesn't think it is. Just, one morning like any other, really. Then: BAM.
He wakes up before Sam that morning, like always. He crawls out from under the stiff, bleached, thin as a pin sheets. He shuffles into the bathroom, takes a piss, goes to brush his teeth and wash his face and--
"What the fuck?!"
Dean does a double-take, squints and turns his head, trying for a different angle. He blinks and then blinks again, even stretches back and snaps the light off and on several times. Nothing changes what he's seeing, though.
. . . what he's seeing through some. . . weird-ass eyes. What. The fuck.
"Sam!" Dean shouts, aiming his voice over his shoulder and keeping his eyes on. . . his eyes. "Sammy! Get your ass in here. Pronto."
"Dean?"
He glances up in the mirror, catches Sam's reflection over his shoulder. He's hovering in the doorway, the hair all fluffed up around his head making him look ridiculously young. Expression on his face isn't, though.
Yep, Dean wants to say, but doesn't. He sighs. Just another freaky thing in their freak lives.
"What's up?" Sam asks, carefully.
"Oh, nothing," he starts, slowly turning around, "just woke up to find The Tooth Fairy'd branched out a bit." He can tell the second Sam catches it. Kid hisses in a huge breath and his face contorts into a confused grimace.
"What the fuck?" Sammy whispers.
"Amen, Brother," Dean agrees. Sam's mouth twitches at the joke, but he shrugs it off. He steps closer, and then goes about doing some blinking and double-taking of his own. Even reaches up and tilts Dean's head from side to side with a firm paw on the chin.
"When-- when did this happen?" Sam murmurs. It sounds pretty much rhetorical, but Dean's in a talking mood.
"Well, they for sure as shit weren't like this last night. I think somebody in that bar, not to mention, you know, you or I, would've freakin' noticed, Sam."
Now the pursing of the lips-- yep. There it is. Bitch face! Sam finishes his careful examination and releases Dean's mug. He stays close, though, leaning up against the wall of the bathroom. And every few seconds, Sam'll look back at Dean with that frown of his firmly in place, drawn back to staring and puzzling like a junkie cat to catnip.
Dean can't blame him. After all, it's not every day you see a guy with what literally appear to be. . . stars in his eyes. Little, tiny, shiny, bright, white dots of light that apparently don't change no matter what the hell light source is shining on 'em.
Either both he and Sammy are tripping on some serious carbon monoxide and about two seconds away from another road trip down Hell Highway, or this is freaky angel shit rearing its ugly head. Again.
Cas has got some splainin' to do.
"Hey," Dean starts in a whisper, "you think if I connect 'em, they'll make a pretty horsey?"
First, Sam frowns hard, sighing. Then, sure enough, there's a twitch. It's starts off slight, barely noticeable, but Dean waits. The wait's a little longer these days. Used to be, a few seconds and the kid was a goner. Now, though, now it's more than 15. 16. 17--
"Fuck you," Sam suddenly grits out, still trying to be all stoic.
"Aw, come on," Dean retorts. He bats his eyelashes and brings his hands up to his chest. Leaning forward a little, he simpers, "I'm all star-struck over your big muscles, Sammy!" He darts a hand out, aiming for the chest, and Sam recoils. He slaps at Dean's hand at the same time as he starts laughing.
"You asshole! It's not a joke," he tries to scold, but no one would think that based on the way Sam's laughing.
Release of tension, Dean figures. Now they're at the point where if it's not immediately life-threatening, then it's not that big of a deal. So Dean's eyes are fucking weirder than shit now. Big whoop. He looks good in sunglasses.
Half an hour later, when Sam's lacing up his boots and Dean's zipping all the shit into the duffels, it occurs to him to wonder if this new cosmetic development might have something to do with the dreaded V-word.
They all avoid saying it like the plague. Even Bobby doesn't mention it unless he has to, and then it's a painful game of Watch Him Work Up The Nerve. Dean, Sam, Bobby, they're all trying by some unspoken agreement to kinda just. . . ignore it. If it's not immediately life-threatening. . .
Dean zips the weapons bag closed, and hears Sammy stand up from the bed behind him.
They just don't talk about it.
Which is probably why it's never occurred to him to ever really quiz Cas about Vessels. Dean remembers Jimmy, and he remembers the living corpse Raphael plays Dress-Up in. Dean remembers more than he thinks he really should about things he'd like nothing more than to forget. He doesn't know the hows or whys, but there's stuff in his head that probably shouldn't be there.
There are memories that don't belong to him, rolling around upstairs and mucking everything up. He somehow knows things, too, certain. . . things that he shouldn't, words that make no sense and that. . . taste alien, for lack of a better word.
"Time to go," Dean says, and doesn't even have to look to know, sense, Sammy nodding and grabbing up his share of their collective shit.
Dean picks up the weapons bag in his left hand, and turns to grab his own duffle with his right. He follows Sam to the door, like every single time for too many times to count. As he's pulling it closed behind himself, though, as he's doing a final visual sweep of the craptastic room. . . he recognizes another one of those painful truths. Cos you can lie to everyone and you can definitely lie to yourself.
You just can't lie to yourself very well, is all.
Dean closes the door to the room, then turns and goes over to the Impala's trunk. Sam's got it open and is, for once, just standing next to it calmly instead of. . . all little-brotherly. Lots of things are different these days. And Dean and Bobby, and everyone and everything else in existence, too, for that matter, can say what they will, but Sammy. . . Dean kinda thinks Sammy's more comfortable in his own skin now than he ever was before.
Maybe it's just knowing the truth, regardless of how utterly terrifying it is. Sam always did like having all the facts. 'S what makes him such a good hunter.
Dean pushes the bags in the trunk, and looks up. Sam nods and pushes off, heading for the passenger side. Push the trunk closed. Step around and take three big steps. Grab handle. Push and pull and swing door open. It's like a ritual. Rinse and repeat. As familiar as it gets. Like Sam's facial expressions, or the sound of the Impala, or cleaning the guns, or. . .
"Dean?"
"Yeah, yeah. Comin'," he answers, settling into the role again. Dean jerks open the car door and slides inside. Keys are in the ignition and he wakes the old gal up. Time to hit the road again, Babe, he thinks, easing her into reverse. Like home. Routine.
. . . and, the truth is, as completely familiar as Cas, with all his alien thoughts and memories.
Sam looks up from whatever it is online that's got his focus. "You headin' out?" he asks.
Dean nods, adjusts the fall of his jacket. "We're getting a little light in the cash department," he says, and Sammy quirks his lips.
"Pool?" he suggests.
Dean raises his hand, makes the shooting motion and clicks his tongue. "Got it in one," he congratulates.
Another nod, distracted this time as Sam's gone back to looking at the laptop screen. "Need me along?" he asks.
Dean grabs the keys, double checks his wallet and personal arsenal. "Nope," he replies. "You just get that beauty rest, Princess. Want you looking sharp tomorrow. Gotta move out on that potential harpy up North."
Another nod, brief twitch of the mouth in response. Sam mumbles something that's either "Be careful" or "Be fruitful." Dean's not sure which it is, just nods and leaves. He climbs into the Impala, starts her up, then heads on out to the street and farther up the highway towards this town's excuse for a 'business district.' He passes some more skeazy motels, and across from those are the crappy diners, restaurants and fast food chains. First bar he sees is right next to a 24-hour Laundromat. He snorts, keeps driving. Next place is just a liquor store, but again, it's snuggled right up against a Laundromat. Freakin' weird.
Although, to be honest, washing clothes in a Laundromat would be a much better experience if one were, say, hammered. At least buzzed, he thinks, passing another few food chains, a couple car dealerships and one weird looking collectibles store. He'll have to suggest to Sammy that they get liquored up before going about tackling their own dirty clothes problem. Last time Dean can remember folding clean laundry was back in Iowa, and that's going on two months ago. Yikes.
He passes quite a few bars on the drive, but doesn't stop at any. He heads towards the outskirts of the town, and then passes the outskirts and city limits completely. There's a State Park of some sort around here and, for some jacked up reason, Dean finds himself driving into it and parking. He's under a big ass tree in the middle of nowhere. The car's turned off, and the whole place is that special kind of quiet where squirrels chittering sound like lions.
It's the kind of quiet that grates on his nerves because with nothing distracting him. . .
Sometimes, Dean just feels really, really angry. And nine times outta ten, that anger's all for God, for this world The Big Bastard Created that just fucks people over. Is there happiness here? Really? Is there-- is there even really love, or is that just another trick? One more pretty lie for the 'hairless apes.'
"Fuck," he ends up whispering. "Fucking bullshit. Asshole." He moves his hand up to his eyes, rubs at 'em and then it hits him like a brick to the back of the head.
His goddamn eyes. He couldn't have gone into a bar and hustled pool if he'd wanted to. No sunglasses in his pocket cos he hadn't even thought to bring 'em. Hicks'd be all over that. Some guy with fucking freak eyes comes in and--
"God fucking damn it!"
"Dean."
He nearly clocks him right in the mouth. He's that close, and the only thing preventing Cas from being on the receiving end of Dean's fist is the embarrassment.
Being caught crying is worse than that time Dad walked in on him in the bathroom when he was 13. Dean can't even look at the guy. Angel. Winged bastard.
"Not a good time," Dean grits out.
"My apologies," Cas rolls out in that rumble of his. He's looking at Dean, burning a hole in the side of his face. It's creepy, unsettling.
It is. It's also familiar. Sitting here, in this strange place after this stranger than usual case, Dean knows nothing about this situation should feel comforting or safe. In a normal world, some guy pops up in the passenger seat of a car unexpected-like and he'd find himself in a shitload of trouble real fast. In a pre-Hell world even, some dude in a trench coat magically teleports into the Impala while Dean's silently freaking out. . . that dude's not teleporting back out without some kind of physical reminder as to why sneaking up on a Winchester is always a very bad idea.
How things change.
"You have a question for me," Cas states definitively.
"Yeah," Dean agrees, eyes closed. His cheeks feel stiff from where the tears have dried, but he gamely turns and opens his eyes to show Cas. "What the fuck is up with my eyes, Cas?"
And here Dean thought that angelic scrutiny couldn't get any more intense. Cas leans closer across the seat, his eyebrows moving down and together. He's frowning.
Dude's actually frowning. Castiel, Angel of The Lord: frowning in. . . concern? Confusion? Freakin' Interest?
"Well, don't spill it all at once there, Fred," Dean snaps when more than a minute passes and no explanation at all is forthcoming.
"This is. . . unexpected."
"Uh, what?" Dean asks. More staring. "You mind clarifying that a bit? 'Unexpected?' Is that good?" He's getting really uncomfortable with the close examination, but when he shifts in the seat and goes to look away--
"Wait," Cas tells him, hand just suddenly holding Dean by the chin.
"Cas. . . "
Instead of getting an answer, however, two things happen in quick succession. One, Cas leans even closer, so much so that now there's barely three inches between their faces.
And two, this close up, when Dean looks into Cas' eyes he can make out those familiar stars glinting back at him. It's not a reflection from his own eyes showing up as spots on Cas', though. Nope. Dean squints, focuses, and then all at once he can feel his eyes widen and the realization forms.
There are stars shining out from within Dean's eyes, and those same stars shine out from Castiel's eyes, as well.