This being posted in promise to a poster on the Supernatural story finders page on Live Journal. I'm not sure if this is what they wanted, but I promised to post it as soon as I could, and I have honored that.
This story does not follow the current canon. Instead, consider it an Au following the first episode this season. This is how I wish things would have gone. And the end of this short little story is how I hope things may still go.
This is meant to be a one-shot. I do not plan to write anymore stories around this idea. If anyone else takes inspiration from it, well then, have at it. Just to warn you, though, this is meant to Gen. I don't write slash. I can't control what anyone else writes, but hey, what a change it would be for a story to written from a family and friendship point a view!
As for a disclaimer...I don't own it. Never did. If I had, I wouldn't be wasting my time writing fanfiction, would I?
Chance of a Lifetime
He had become used to second chances.
Unlike many of his brethren, Castiel had even been afforded a third chance. He convinced himself it was continuously offered to him because he was in the right. That his choices, whether or not they seemed the correct ones to others who viewed them, where right because they where for the greater good, and that his Father would continue to reward him with His protection.
How coincided he had become.
How dangerously close to following in his brother Lucifer's footsteps.
He should have known, should have guessed that he had used his allotted amount of chances up.
Becoming a god had killed the angel in him. He could no longer count on an army of heavenly hosts to back him up. Many of his former brothers and sisters had turned their backs on him, unforgiving for all the things he had done, the numbers of them he had killed.
He may have been a god, but he was one without a home to go too.
Dean would have joked that heaven didn't want him, and hell was afraid he'd take over. The only problem was it wasn't funny at all, because it was the truth.
He was cut off from heaven, and was number one on Crowley the King of Hell's hit list.
Basically he was screwed.
One would have thought the thousands of souls residing in him would have given him protection. With so much power coursing through him, he should have ruled the world. Funny thing was, almost as soon as they entered him, they started fighting to get out. He could feel them fighting against each other. Screaming and clawing at his form, both the heavenly one, and his vessel. They where killing each other inside of him. He could feel it each time one soul was destroyed, and he would cry out for the loss.
Jimmy had been the first to go. He was already weakened by all that had been done to him, and he didn't put up a fight at all, just let the newcomers now sharing his body tear him apart.
Something that Castiel supposed he could call grief had hit him the moment Jimmy was gone. He hoped his Father and what was left of the angelic host would look kindly on Jimmy, and allow him entrance into heaven. It certainly wasn't his fault that Castiel had fucked things up so spectacularly .
Dean's words, not his.
In the end, he knew what he had to do.
He couldn't just release the souls. Many of them where far too crazy, far too violent to release to the world. Castiel had taken them to stop the restart of the apocalypse, but to let them go unfettered on the Earth would simply be another way of beginning the whole unblessed thing again. He had worked too hard, sacrificed too much to let that happen.
He knew he couldn't turn to Dean and Sam for help. They had made their thoughts and feelings on the matter perfectly clear, although Castiel had not wanted to listen to them at the time.
Deep down, he knew working with Crowley was wrong, continuously lying to his friends, his family, was wrong. But he could see no way out at the time. No other way to achieve his goal, to stop Raphael and save the world.
He still couldn't.
Even though the ends may not have justified the means, he could honestly say he didn't regret what he had done.
His only regret was in seeing Dean's disappointed face. In hearing he anger in his closest friends voice directed toward him. He regretted the possibility that the bond they once shared may not ever heal from the break in it he had caused.
And so he was alone on the night he decided to destroy the remaining souls inside of him. He simply could not contain them anymore. They where surely destroying him inside out, even as they where fighting to destroy each other. The victor would take control of the body that he now felt was his. The body that had once been Jimmy Novak was all Castiel had left to call his own. He wouldn't let anyone or anything take it from him.
On the desolate mountain top where his Father had once appeared to a man the world would come to know as Moses, Castiel purged himself of the souls of Purgatory. The good ones, the repentant ones, he sent on, knowing heaven would not deny them access now.
The others where more difficult for him to fight off. One in particular was especially hard. The soul pulsated with pure evil. The kind that enjoyed causing hurt and pain. Reveled in destruction and death. Castiel know in destroying it, he may have to destroy himself.
Surprisingly, he was alright with that.
If ridding the world of great evil meant he had to sacrifice himself, he was ready to do it.
Hot, searing pain shot through him as he used the full force of his power to deal a killing blow to the evil soul. He pushed all of his grace at it, burning it with the light so strong no human, alive or not, could bear to look into it without being consumed by it.
He screamed as he felt him wings unfurl. They seemed to tear out of his body, breaking bones, destroying skin and muscle.
He bled.
From his back where the wings had escaped. From his nose, his mouth, his eyes.
He knew then that this was it. No god, no angel, could survive what he had done.
He fell to the hard, dusty ground. His breaths coming weaker and weaker, until they stopped, and Castiel's world turned black.
How strange it was that then, after all he had been through, all he had done, the good and the bad of it, that then he would discover that his chances where not all used up.
"You have a choice Castiel." A voice he could hear in the darkness that surrounded him said.
The voice seemed to fill every atom of space. It both thrilled and terrified him, so great was the power of its sound.
"You can die, here and now, as is your right. You will cease to be, and your grace will burn into nothingness."
No!
Everything of himself that he could still feel rebelled at the thought.
An angel was not supposed to know life, to feel it as a human did. But Castiel had felt it, had tasted life, known true existence, and wanted to hang onto it. To the feelings life inspired. He wanted to be. He wanted to live.
"Live?" The voice said, as though it could hear Castiel's thoughts. "Beings like you do not live, Castiel, they exist. Two very different things."
Please, Castiel pleaded to the air. Please, Father, forgive me. Let me live. Let me know. Do not forsake me now.
"Hush child. You have worked long and hard for what you thought was right. There is nothing to forgive in that. But is life truly your choice? There will be no going back after that decision is made, and I could not protect you anymore."
Yes! Yes, anything. Please. I don't want to leave.
Tears where not something he knew. The salty water that leaked from human eyes when they where sad, or happy, or scared, or any of a hundred different emotions that could cause such a happenstance had been a mystery to him. But he could feel them now, streaming from his eyse and pooling into the curves around his mouth. A liquid starved tongue darted out to catch one as it drifted down.
"Alright then. This will be the last time I will intercede on your behalf. You shall know life, and you shall know death. But you shall also know what it means to truly live, to know friendship and love. I love you, my son. Now open your eyes."
Castiel gasped as his eyes flew open. He was assaulted with bright, white light. Not the light of his grace. That was warm and golden. This was stark, and it seemed to burn his eyes and cause his head to ache.
"Mr. Winchester!" A female voice cried out.
Castiel turned his head to see a woman dressed in the blue outfit of a medical professional approaching him at a fast pace. With a quick glance around, he saw that he was now lying in a narrow hospital bed, several tubes and wires stretching from various machines to his body.
His body!
He could feel it was truly his now. All his. His mind was quiet for the first time in what felt like forever, and he blessed the silence.
The woman, a nurse he reminded himself, checked several readings from the machines surrounding him, then pushed a call button by the bed. She gave him a beautiful smile.
"You've had several very worried people here, Mr. Winchester. They refused to leave. But don't worry. You're brothers will be here soon. We insisted they go get something to eat."
Mr. Winchester? His brothers?
Castiel tried to form words, but found his throat would not heed his mind's demands. He could feel something blocking the vocal passageways, and bringing one weak, shaky hand up, he felt the tube that had been placed in his mouth and down his throat.
The nurse took his hand and lowered it back to his side. "Don't bother that. It was to help you breath. Now that you're awake, I'm sure the doctor will remove it soon."
Thankfully, the doctor did just that. He was told to cough, and the offending apparatus was pulled from his mouth. Ice chips where spooned to his lips, and he licked at them gratefully.
"I must say, you're a medical miracle, Mr. Winchester." The doctor said, writing something on a clip board he carried. "95% of patients in your condition never wake up from their comas."
"Cas." He finally managed to croak out, his voice sounding raspier then usual. "My name is Cas."
"Yes." The doctor said, looking down at him. "Castiel Winchester. Unusual name. You're brothers said you where adopted from a foreign country?"
"Very foreign." A new voice said from the doorway, a voice Castiel knew well. He turned his head to meet green eyes looking back at him.
Instead of the expected anger and recrimination, he saw only relief and happiness on Dean Winchester's face. Behind him, the wide, earnest hazel eyes of Sam Winchester radiated joy.
Castiel smiled. He was home.