Castiel needs a moment after Dean's revelation. He needs a moment, so he takes it, lifting his wings out the trenchcoats irritating restraints.
He goes to his favorite place. At least, recently. The pier, sunset, all oranges, yellows, and fiery reds. A crane is wading through the water. A fish jobs. Castiel closes his eyes, and draws a long, slow breath.
He misses the feel of the amulet around his neck. One finger moves to where it was, drops below. It never felt anything but cold against his skin. Cold, he knows, is supposed to be an unpleasant sensation. Nonetheless, now he misses it.
He feels hollowed out, wonders if, in fact, there is anything currently inhabiting this vessel. Every day it empties out, and he wonders if anybody, even Samuel Winchester, could possibly imagine that this vessel is half-full. Once it was nearly bursting, with his own angelic power, with Jimmy's questions and faith, with the hum of all his brothers and sisters.
Jimmy has been silent ever since Lucifer rose.
The angels have been silent for about that long, as well.
And as for him, as for Castiel. . .his eyes open, and drink in the sunset. What is there left of him?
He ignores the little tug at the left corner of his heart, the little corner reserved always, and eternally, for his Father. He can feel, even now, that presence that he has always associated with love. He does not scoff. Angels don't scoff. He thinks that he understands Jesus a little better now.
There is a buzzing in his pocket. Castiel sighs, and fishes the phone out of his pocket. He doesn't know if he will bother answering it. It hurts, has hurt for a while, watching Dean fight a losing battle. He does not know, now that he knows even God isn't fighting, whether he can watch the man continue to lose.
But it is not Dean's name popping up on the screen. Instead, the bold letters read Abomination.
"Hello, Sam," He says, as he flips open the phone. He is proud. He does it in just one flick of the wrist.
"Cas, hi." Sam's voice sounds weary and exhausted. His voice sounds the way that Castiel feels. The angel waits, an interminable moment, before Lucifer's vessel finally clears his throat and continues with his message.
"It's Dean," he says finally. "I think he's done something stupid."
"That would not be unusual for Dean," Castiel points out. He considers closing the phone and returnin to the peace of the lake, but he knows that Sam will just call again. He waits.
"I think. . ." Sam clears his throat. "I just got off the phone with Lisa. You know Lisa. . .Lisa Braedon."
Of course Castiel knows Lisa. He knows every secret in Dean's heart, including the yoga instructor and his son. He knows that Dean sees her as an ideal: the insant-made family he has always wanted. Castiel does not scoff. Angels do not scoff.
"That must have been nice," Castiel says, not certain what Sam wants him to say.
"She said that he. . .he's talking suicidal. . .I think he's going to say yes."
Sam's voice breaks a little. Castiel does not feel anything. He wonders if he is finally as broken as the Winchesters.
There is a tug on the left corner of his heart. The crane cries again. Castiel feels another little piece of himself break apart. A new sensation now: worry. Angels do not worry.
"Do you know where he is?"
"Yeah, I. . .I think so," Sam says, and tells Castiel the address. The angel thanks Lucifer's vessel, and hangs up the phone. He looks at it thoughtfully a moment.
Two roads diverged in a wood. He can just stay here. It's not a bad option. It's not heaven, and it is a little lonely, but it is also free of war, and betrayal, and whining Winchesters. He can stay, and pretend that he knows nothing of what is going on outside. Dean will say yes, and Sam will say yes, and there will be an apocalypse. But not here, not on this eternally sunset lake.
Oranges, reds, yellows and golds. Not a single hint of green. Not one.
Castiel sighs, and unfurls his wings again.
* * *
"You got nothing, and you know it."
Dean is standing in the middle of the room, a clear glass half-filled with brown liquid in one hand. Castiel, who would not have known the drink two months ago, knows it now, is intimately acquainted with it. Whiskey. His mouth thirsts.
"You know I have to stop you," Sam says. His eyes connect with Castiel's. The angel nods. He understands.
Bobby's Bobby's Bobby's Bobby's
The Antichrist is almost screaming the words at him. Castiel will have to explain to him, later, that this is not necessary. He hears. He hears everything from the Winchesters.
But not now. Not from Dean. From Dean, now, there is nothing. Nothing.
"Yeah, well, you can try," Dean snots, and Castiel does not like this tone in the hunter's mouth. It sounds twisted and bitter and wrong. "Just remember, you're not all hopped up on demond blood this time."
Unfair, Castiel realized, and files it away in that compartment of his mind that keeps track of the Winchester's wrongs to one another. Unfair.
Bobby's Bobby's Bobby's Bobby's
"Yeah, I know," Sam says. "But I brought help."
Dean's shoulder stiffen. Castiel cocks his head, examining the man. He remembers, vaguely, a time when his hair was a touch longer, his face a bit less lined, and his shoulders far less slumped. He thinks that he misses that time. Dean turns around, and green eyes meet blue for one moment.
And finally, there is something in Dean. There is recognition, and understanding, and
Shit, should have seen this coming
And his two fingers reach out, unerring (angels do not err) and a stray thought lunges toward Sam until they are all in Bobby's living room.
* * *
It takes hours for the Winchesters to recover, for Sam to stop running to the bathroom with a green-tinged face and for Dean to wake up (Castiel does not admit the satisfaction he takes in putting the older hunter out for the count). He visits his pier again, wondering if he will see Dean there, but does not. He does not visit Dean's dreams. That would be one invasion too many.
There is a humming going through Bobby's rom when he returns. He wonders if the hunters hear it.
Idgits. Don't they see what their damned tomfoolery is doing to me? Shit for brains. Damn wheelchair. Damn Winchesters. Damn you, John.
I need you, Dean. I can't fight this alone, I just can't
Nothing
Castiel presses one finger to the bridge of his nose. It is getting a little louder.
Or maybe he is just reacting to the endless whining of the Winchesters plus Singer. Humans, he thinks, talk too much. That must be it. Too much talking. He sighs, and tries to focus on the conversation again.
"Every morning I look at it," Bobby is saying, and Castiel's heart screams out lie but he says nothing, because he knows where Mr. Singer is going with this, and he thinks that maybe it will get through to Dean. "I think, maybe today's the day I flip the lights out."
That sounds nice, Castiel thinks. Maybe his pier would be nicer at night. Maybe there would be hints of green over the water and he will be able to stay there forever, ignore the apocalypse, ignore the tugging on his heart, ignore the Winchesters and their doomed fight. Maybe
The humming is louder now. He closes his eyes, counts to three silently, wills the screaming and the pain away.
"But I don't do it," Bobby is saying. "I Never do it. You know why? Because I promised you that I wouldn't give up!"
Bobby's yell combined with the high-pitched humming is too much. Castiel bends over. There is a razor hot sharp arrow running through his brain, pointing THIS WAY THIS WAY THIS WAY. He can barely hear Sam's worry Bobby's indignation Dean's nothing.
"Cas, are you okay?" It is Sam asking the question, and it should be Dean, but Dean is nothing and the arrow is glinting gold now. The screaming is louder. He thinks the sound is coming from his chest, and thinks if only angels had but one head. It is a demand, a directive, an order. Follow it. Follow.
"No," Castiel grits out. Is he answering Sam? The arrow.
"What is it?" Sam asks again, and Castiel forces his eyes open, thinking maybe, if he sees the cluttered instead of Robert Singer's sorry excuse for a living room he won't see the arrow. He is wrong.
"Something is happening," he says. He sees Sam, confused. Over his shoulder, he sees Dean. Dean's features are pinched, his eyes wide. He has one hand half-outstreched.
Cas.
It's not nothing. The pulsing stops a little, pauses a little, and the arrow seems gentler. Okay, Castiel thinks. Okay. He unfurls his wings, flies to the graveyard.
Crushed autumn leaves cover the green of the grass. He walks through them. They tremble. The screaming stops. The arrow fades. He watches as the leaves pulse, a heartbeat beneath them.
He reaches down toward the pulse, but before he can touch it he senses them. He does not hear them. He still cannot hear them, brother or not, but he senses them, and stands before they can touch him.
Two more brothers dead, he thinks in sorrow as he whirls and fights. As Sam and Dean whine and whittle away at their bonds, he is murdering his brethren. And they don't care, he thinks with something like bitterness. They don't see. How can they expect to win a battle against heaven when they don't even see?
His brother's fall, both of them. He turns back to the pulsing ground. A hand is reaching out.
There are no flames in Hell. It is cold, bitterly cold, yet the human souls trapped below scream and writhe as though they are in fire. Castiel ignores them. He has a job to do, and even now he grips it tightly, the bright burning emerald of the soul held firmly in one hand.
He draws it upward toward the light, and as he does so the earth around him warms. He feels God's presence once again, and drinks it in greedily, anguished. The soul's light blinks, as though it understands him.
"You had better be worth this, Dean Winchester," the angel says, as he deposits the soul within a coffin. The body gasps, jerks, awakens. Castiel considers grabbing it by the shoulder, by the hand, pulling it out of the ground. He does not. He has done enough for this one human. It can find its way up alone.
He stays and watches, though. And so he is the only creature to see the two hands push up out of the earth, to watch the face breach the surface, eyes blink dirt and grit aside, throat open and gasp in air. He sees the broken fingernails. He sees the dusty eyelashes. He smiles.
Castiel reaches out and clutches the hand. It is not the hand of a zombie. It is the hand of resurrection. He pulls the body out. It is trembling, gasping, barely alive and too alive. Castiel considers killing it.
But it is a Winchester brother. He can kill his own, but he cannot kill this one.
For the fourth time in a day he opens his wings and flies.
* * *
As he flies, the body burns within his arms. There is something tugging, pulling at it. Castiel twists, midflight, drags it closer. The soul burns. Bluegreenblueggreen and deathdecay. Castiel breathes through his nose, tries to pretend that he doesn't smell the stench.
Angels, he thinks. He starts. When has he started calling them angels, instead of brothers? He tightens his arms around his burden. What is a brother. . .
The body twists in his arms. It does not belong to him. The soul tries to escape, the body pulls and Castiel
He wants to drop it. He does. Wants to continue pretending that his powers are as lacking as they were before the Winchesters confronted Joshua. Has to admit that they are not, that they are back, that they came back at some unknown point while his friends (friends? Brothers) wandered through heaven. He wants to pretend. He wants to go back to his autumn lake. Instead he clenches around the fire and burning and reappears in Bobby's room.
There are three faces staring at him, but only one matters. He does not want to hold this burden any longer.
"Help," he says.
"Boys!" Bobby says, as though he needs to remind them to act, as though they are not already moving, arms reaching out, eyes and hearts wide open. Castiel hesitates. He does not want to lay this burning in their arms – not in Dean's, who has already burned for forty years, or in Sam's, who will burn for all eternity. He lays the body down on a cot. He is stronger than the Winchesters.
"Who is it?" Bobby asks.
"Thats our brother," Sam says.
Castiel loses another bit of himself as the Winchesters stare at this fallen body, ignoring the near-fallen angel standing just beside them.
Castiel sighs, closes his eyes. He does not feel bitter, that they have all this concern for a human. None for him, he thinks. As is right, he reminds himself. He is an angel. He is strongest of them. He is the protector.
Still.
Still.