Dean looked down at his hands and saw blood.
He had wiped his hands on his jeans so, so many times, rubbed them together and yet still that stubborn, darkening red stayed where it was and bothered him.
It never had before. Maybe he'd never stopped for this long and just looked at it. Maybe it was because this time it meant so much more. He couldn't remember the last time he'd just stopped and looked at the blood he'd spilled. Stopped and acknowledged it.
It was drying on his palms now, staying in the creases.
He stared at them.
Stared at the lines permanently etched into his hands. They had meanings, divinity and prophesy, that people gave to them. They just sat there on you hands, unique to you but so utterly inexplicable beyond basic biology, no wonder they became a focus for fortune and future.
He didn't need to know the future. He didn't want to. No more predestined paths or fates or duties. Because fuck that noise. Fuck those opinions. Why would anyone want their life to be written out for them?
It makes it seem easy perhaps, never having to worry or wonder about what lay around the corner. He could tell them how much it sucked though. And how much energy and effort it took to fight back.
How much blood had to be spilled to break out from it.
Dean studied the creases more closely, staring at the deep lines that wore a criss-cross of smaller ones across them.
The life line, the head line and the heart line, he recalled.
Now they stood out so starkly, filling his life, his head, his heart with so much blood. Keeping him stuck in this hellish moment because if he truly made that last effort to clear it away, to stand and scrub himself raw in the shower and have it gone, then he would have to accept this was real. He'd have to start to carry the weight of this with him.
And red.
There were so many shades of red.
How could blood could be so damn bright then turn over hours or days or lifetimes into something darker? How could it sustain life but be so quick to leave and let it end?
It was dark red, maybe maroon now. Sticky in places but flaky in others as the warmth of his hands helped the moisture disappear. If he sat here long enough and wriggled his fingers enough, would it just drop away? Would time allow all this spilt blood to just never enter his reality if he just sat and watched and did his penance here?
No. He was always covered in blood.
Someone's or something's blood always got on him somehow. Always taking showers in the final moments of people's lives. Too familiar with the way it sprayed and trickled from bodies. Bodies upon bodies, and blood upon blood and all of it on him. All of it marking him and staining him and filling him up. Dripping into his collar and slicking his hair. Darkening his clothes and soaking him to the very core.
And now, in his hands, other hands came to rest.
They were bloodied too.
The maroon blood sat in the folds of knuckles and highlighted nailbeds, was sticking to the fine hairs that were usually invisible. The hands gently gripped his palms and fingers. Held them softly and firmly and so solidly.
He stared at them.
They felt warm and safe.
Those hands were trying to take him away from his study of the blood and he didn't know if he could do that. He didn't know if he could leave the stains on his hands and follow those arms, to those shoulders, to that chest, to that neck, to see the eyes that would burn into him from that beautiful face.
Dean closed his eyes.
Better to see nothing than see those eyes. He loved the colour and honesty that lived there but he couldn't look at what would be there now - pity and disappointment, probably.
It was selfish to close his eyes, he knew that. He knew he'd look eventually because never seeing those bright eyes would hurt too much. But not being the thing that made them light up anymore. That he couldn't face. Not yet.
The hands squeezed gently. Dean opened his eyes and looked at those beautiful, bloody hands again.
He squeezed back hard.
Maybe too hard but he needed the physical knowledge they were really there. Really holding him.
Taking a shaking breath Dean resolved he would look up. He'd do it, no matter what was waiting for him, because this blood would never come off but those hands and that body and heart and entire being was the only other thing in his world. They were the only other thing that mattered, that anchored him.
He would do it. He would look and accept whatever was given to him.
Dean's eyes flicked up and met Castiel's gaze.
He studied the astonishing blue eyes that patiently watched him. They didn't contain pity though and were empty of disappointment.
Dean saw a gaze that was filled with so much. Worry, mostly, but also an overwhelming amount of love.
Love for Dean.
Love despite him.
Love despite his actions.
Love despite all the blood that covered him. That covered them.
Castiel was covered in it to. Haunted by the bodies of so many.
Dean knew that Castiel remembered everyone. That he hadn't stopped counting like he had. That he held every being in his memory. Even though he was a soldier, even though he had been merciless and murderous and insane.
He remembered and stayed covered in blood but still managed to look at Dean like that.
In Castiel's unwavering gaze Dean was held tight.
It might just be enough to save him.