Creeping slowly into his consciousness, separate from the growing awareness of pain, was the musty smell and gritty feel of the warehouse floor under his left cheek. Each time he breathed out dust swirled lazily away from him and a strand of his hair fluttered away before coming back to land on his face, and a piece of rubble dug into his ribs as he lay face down on the floor. With effort, he focused his vision beyond the floating dust to a pair of heavily scuffed dress shoes. Which didn't make sense, there was only Dean and Sam in the warehouse now Abbadon was destroyed, everyone else was still outside, fighting desperately against the last of Abbadon's demon army and the packs of hell-hounds. A brief flash of anger toward Crowley, who could have called them off now, flashed across his thoughts, before drifting away, as the pain began to make itself known loudly in every bone in his body. Sam groaned, but couldn't bring himself to move yet, a gnawing feeling of despair was filling him up. He couldn't remember why he was on the floor, and so badly hurt, but he had a feeling his brother had a hand in it.
He focussed again on the shoes he could now see belonged to someone who was standing just to his right. The shoes moved out of his eye line briefly, there followed a sudden dull thump sound and the shoes were replaced by a body, oomphing as the air rushed out on impact. Suddenly, full awareness and bolt of fear shot though Sam as he recognised Cas, flat now on his back, trench coat torn and bloody, groaning slightly as he tried to get to his feet. Sam found himself focussing on the angels right hand, covered in scratches and with broken nails scrape at the gritty warehouse floor as it formed a shaking furious fist for the beat of a heart before the hand relaxed and was lifted to wipe across the angels face in a futile attempt to stop the blood running into his eyes from the nasty gash on his hairline as he got up on to his feet.
Instinctively, Sam tried to get up to help his friend, but agonising pain shot though his skull and he could only manage to roll over before having to lie down again, breath coming in ragged pain filled bursts. He managed to turn his head to see Cas whose intense blue eyes flicked briefly to meet Sam's gaze, full of compassion and sympathy for Sam's pain, hardening with a steely resolve before looking steadfastly forward again. Lit sporadically by rays of hazy sunshine coming through the broken warehouse windows, the angel started to shuffle towards what, Sam couldn't see properly yet, but he knew it had to be dangerous. Sam knew he had some holes in his memory, probably due to his head injury, but he just couldn't understand why Cas looked so resigned as he moved forward. Then Cas spoke and Sam felt his stomach churn as the memories crashed back in.
"Dean" Cas' gravelly voice was pitched softly but with conviction "I will not allow you to hurt Sam any further, but I will not fight you either"
Sam flinched as the angel was thrown backwards again, this time from a punch to the abdomen. Grunting with the effort, Sam managed to pull himself up to lean back on the warehouse wall facing the scene, but the pain in his head became so intense he lost consciousness. The next time he became aware of his surroundings, Cas was in front of Dean, on his knees, and the angel looked wrecked. Towering above him stood Dean, the first blade clutched in a white knuckled fist. Sam looked at his brother and realised truly what a monster Dean had become. Dean dominated the space; Sam experienced almost tangible waves of rage and masculinity emanating from him. Dean curled his lip to expose his teeth and stepped forward a fraction, well into Cas's personal space. Dean's usually lively green eyes were focussed on the angel and were so dark as to resemble a demon. Despite clearly having been battling for hours Dean was breathing calmly and Sam wondered how on earth they were going to be able to stop him now.
"Come on angel, fight me, like a real man! You've done it before, so grow a pair and fight me like you used to, back when you were worth my efforts! Stealing some other angels mojo means you're now too good for a real fight eh?" Spat Dean "Don't want to lower yourself to the level of a mud-monkey again?" backhanding Cas and landing a kick to his ribs whilst the angel was down.
He let Cas pick himself up again, taking a step back to allow the angel to steady himself on his knees. Sam felt a shiver run down his spine at the intensity of the gaze the angel was under, and wondered at the strength of the angel, the sheer will it must have taken to not get up and run away from those terrifying eyes that promised a violent and bloody death.
"Sam may have fought you Dean, but I will not, as an angel or as a man. You need to put the blade down Dean, and destroy it before it leads you to destroy all that you love"
Cas paused, sighed and carried on sounding more like his usual snarky self, with a small half smile flickering briefly "But if it would help..." Cas stretched out his left arm, slightly unsteadily, towards the first blade.
Dean watched Cas' arm approach but never moved, held the blade steady in his fist, confident that the angel, even with his stolen but slowly fading mojo, could not take the knife from him now, but still slightly puzzled as to the angels intentions. Cas maintained eye contact with Dean as he rose up on his knees, his arm reaching the First Blade and he dragged his forearm down the entire length of the knife, without a flinch, all the while maintaining that eye contact, green to blue. Immediately, blood began to flow heavily from the slash, soon joined by drops of a beautiful iridescent substance too. Within heartbeats, just blood flowed and Cas settled back on his heels with a slight sway.
"Family, that's what you once called us. Well, your family needs you Dean, Sam needs you, I need you. You did what you came to do, Abbadon is dead. I need you to stop now..."
Before he finished the sentence, Dean backhanded him once again using the fist holding the First Blade, eyes flashing in fury and his lip curled up into a sneer of contempt.
Sam's heart stuttered as he realised there was no getting through to Dean now, nothing would work if Sam or Cas couldn't get through to him. Eyes darting around the room, Sam calculated that he might be able to approach Dean from behind whilst he was distracted by Cas, maybe be able to use Ruby's knife on his brother. It was a long shot Sam realised but was the only option he could now see, and refusing to think of how he would live with himself should he suceed. Picking a suitable route, Sam started to gather his strength to stand up and make his way along the wall. As he did he heard Dean's deep resonating voice, laced with heavy contempt ring out across the empty space.
"Do you think such a stupid gesture would really work? You think I'm going to just throw the blade away, and we walk off into the sunset? Forget hunting, open a little store 'Dean n Cas hardware' and live happily ever after?" a broken sounding scoff came from Dean and his face momentarily broke, before reforming into a sneer
"I am done with being powerless Cas, done with having to give everything I am, again and again. So screw family, and screw you, FIGHT ME!"
Cas' head slowly dropped, and a sad little laugh emerged, before he raised his head to once more look at Dean in the eye, a small smile playing across his face before his whole body was wracked by a cough. Bringing his hand upto his face, Cas looked momentarily shocked to see he had coughed blood into it. Eyes flicked back upto Dean, and Sam had to strain to hear his gravelly voice, softer than Deans, with a surprisingly conversational tone begin
"I always liked the idea of a book shop actually. We could have been happy, I would have done anything if it meant seeing the Winchesters happy, but it just isn't going to be possible anymore, and for that I am sorry Dean"
With that Cas slowly folded to the side, exposing what he had managed to keep hidden throughout the fight, a massive, surely deadly set of hell-hound gouges to his back. A frown played across Deans face, and Sam couldn't decide if Dean was annoyed that he truly didn't get the fight he so sorely wanted, or if the former angel had finally gotten through to him.
Sam managed to pull himself up the wall to stand, dropping all thoughts of dealing with the problem of his brother with Ruby's knife, if Dean was going to kill Cas and Sam, so be it. Instead he staggered forward, head thumping in agony, before falling down at Cas's side, glaring at Dean before beginning to try and staunch the bleeding from the wound on Cas's back and the slash on his forearm. As he desperately tried to search for a pulse, he heard a clatter somewhere in front of him. Sam looked up to see the First Blade had dropped from Deans suddenly nerveless fingers and was now on the floor, rocking back and forth, looking crude and just a little ridiculous. Dean hit the floor with his knees before joining Sam in trying to stop the bleeding, ripping strips from his shirt and thrusting them at Sam.
"Dean, you saw him lose his grace, he can't heal himself now. He was protecting me Dean, and trying to get you to come back to us, and it worked. Right now, I can try to stop this bleeding, but I ... I can't find a pulse". Sam carried on binding the former angels wounds, but as Dean watched he could clearly see Sam slowing down, before stopping and hanging his head with a shuddering breath.
"What are you doing, he'll die if you stop!" shouted Dean desperately. Sam looked up, momentarily stopping Dean cold with the look of total grief in his little brothers eyes.
"no, NO, Sam, you have to help him, he can't die, he's family, he's my angel..." Sam hung his head once again and slumped back onto the floor, head pounding and surrendering to grief. Shuffling further away to lean on the back wall of the warehouse, slowly Sam realised silence had descended and wondered at the battle outside, who had triumphed? He huffed as he realised he was too tired to care anymore.
Dean had gone quiet too, Sam realised after a while, and looked up to see Dean holding the former angels right hand. Sam was about to look away, not wanting to interrupt such a private moment, but then a red glow appeared around their joined hands. Dean had a look of intense concentration on his face, the red glow growing brighter before fading away completely. Dean pushed up Cas's right hand shirt sleeve and examined his forearm closely before slumping back, shifting until the former angels head was resting in his lap and grabbing his other forearm, tightly bound with strips of Sams t-shirt, and he began to unwrap the bindings. Sam felt a sudden white hot rage at his brother, realising what he had done again to his family
Sam heard himself shout, in a broken voice he didn't recognise anymore "Dean, no! Cas wouldn't want that". Deans shoulders hunched over, the only indication he had heard Sam.
Sam gathered up enough strength to stand and move over to stand behind his brother. "you need to let him go" he quietly breathed to Deans back. No response from Dean.
closing his eyes briefly, to shut out the sight of Cas, his friend, his brother dammit, lying there "Dean, please, you know he wouldn't want you to do this" Sam's breath hitched as he realised Dean was not going to listen.
Sam stared at his big brothers back for a moment longer before he could gather the strength to walk slowly and unsteadily to the warehouse entrance. He couldn't help looking back at what remained of his family, Dean sat cross legged in the middle of the debris strewed floor, lit by a shaft of dusty sunlight beaming through the high windows, Cas's head laid on his lap, both of them surrounded by a pool of blood. Dean rocked slowly as he cradled the former angels slashed arm, now stopped bleeding entirely, muttering "come on, come on, son of a bitch, fight, heal" over and over.
Sam had no idea if the Mark of Cain could do anything at this point, and realised he was too weary to care. He loved Dean but he couldn't go through this again and he knew it wasn't what Cas would have wanted, dammit the angel had deserved to finally be at peace in his own little heaven, he had sacrificed enough for the Winchesters, enough for humanity.
As Sam left the building, he was assaulted by the sounds and smells of the horrifying aftermath of battle, the moans of the dying all around him. Sam slowly made his way over to the nearest wounded hunter, and sunk to his knees to give what help he could, and as he began, Sam heard a whoop come from inside the warehouse. Sam closed his eyes, but not before feeling tears he could not control begin to roll down his cheeks.