Disclaimer: I don't own the characters of Supernatural. If I did, they would be much happier by now, although I do enjoy watching them suffer.
Credit Where Credit is Due: This fic is based upon a tumblr gifset by noangelsinthegarrison. ( post/55824728925 post/56192110299)
My goal is to write a realistic Destiel fic. I'd been puzzling over how to handle it for a while and the wonderful posts above walked into my life and gave me an idea. There's a serious lack of believable, well-characterized Destiel fics or supernatural fics in general for that matter. I'm going to give it my best shot. Not saying I'll be successful, but I'm sure going to try.
Takes place after Goodbye, Stranger.
"Cas... we're family... We need you... I need you."
Dean prayed that something, anything would get through. He saw Cas's hand reach towards him and flinched away, assuming the absolute worst. But as the angel pressed his hand to Dean's face, he knew he was ready for death. He had been living far too long and far too painfully. But it wasn't his time. The hand on his face sent a glow through him, repairing his wounds. He grabbed the arm it belonged to, relieved and in a way disappointed.
"Seriously, Sam? I go cross country for a dead end?" Dean yelled as he pointed around him at the graveyard.
"Look, next time you do the research." Sam leaned against the Impala. "You suggested coming here in the first place."
"Whatever. I need a motel, a beer, and a burger." Dean got back into the car. Sam rolled his eyes and followed suit. Dean fit the keys into the ignition and they started down a road towards the center of town. The place was bound to have rumors of hauntings given the dreary sense that seemed to hang in the air there. But that's all they turned out to be. Rumors.
"Dean, you alright?" Sam tried. Dean glared at him and kept driving. "I-I know it's stupid to ask but I think we both know there's a problem here."
"And what's that?"
"That we'd jump at any case without evidence. Everything's so messed up I think we just wanted a chance to go back to the way things were. No angels and tablets and prophets. Kevin's cracking, we don't know where Cas is, and now he took the angel tablet with him too." Sam sighed as he noticed Dean's utter lack of response. After a few moments, Dean spoke.
"Sam, we do what we have to do. Right now, I can't be distracted by anything else. If you're going to go kill yourself doing these trials then we might as well go at it with full force. You don't think I've noticed what's going on with you?"
"You already told me-"
"No but seriously, Sam. Think about this. Why didn't you just let me take over the trials, find another Hell Hound-"
"If i die doing this it'll be because it's the right thing to do. I'm not sure that you wouldn't just throw yourself in and be reckless because you don't are what happens to you."
"We're ending this conversation right now."
"Dean-"
"Right now. You wanna lecture me about my life go right ahead but don't pretend I don't care about my job."
The ride was silent on the way to the motel. Dean parked the Impala as Sam went in to pay for their room.
"Damn it." He muttered to himself.
"Hello Dean."
He nearly jumped out of his skin. Castiel was sitting in the back of the car.
"Seriously? What happened to needing to keep the tablet safe from me?" Dean hit the steering wheel. Just what he needed, something so serious that Cas had to stop his mission to talk to him.
"I do. That's why I'm here. Where's your brother? I'm bringing you to Kevin Tran. He's been deciphering the angel tablet."
"He's in the motel." Dean was too tired of these things happening to even protest or point out how infuriating it was for Cas to just disappear and come back demanding things of him. That was just Cas's way. Disappear, betray them, come back as if nothing had ever changed.
"Woah." Sam stepped back a bit when he saw Kevin. He had expected him to be a shell of a boy, worn down from the endless hours of tablet reading. But he was fine. he was dressed, hair combed well, the dark circles gone.
"Hey guys." Kevin let them into the boat house. They ducked through the doorway as Sam took another look at Kevin.
"Not to be rude Kevin but, how-"
"Do I not lok like the ghost of tablets past?" Kevin secured the door closed. "Angel tablet. I guess if the demon tablet tried to torture me it makes sense that the angel tablet would try to heal me."
"Not based on the angels we know." Sam turned to Castiel. "No offense."
"Some taken." Castiel replied.
"Anyway, I'm almost done with it I've got a few more words." Kevin went back to his desk.
"So what, you just put the demon tablet on hold?" Dean squinted.
"For now. Cas said-"
"Cas, we have a mission here. We're right in the middle of it and figuring out that third task is kind of important." Dean faced Cas, gesturing at him.
"So is this. When I touched the tablet I knew it was me who had to go through the trials. You've almost completed yours and I have not even begun mine."
They stared at each other for a moment, stewing in their own sureness of purpose.
"Oh my god." Kevin put his pencil down. They all turned to him at once. "Guys, I found it, the reason why it had to be Cas! The third trial!"
"Slow down. Read what you found out." The three men sat themselves around the table.
"Okay, well the first trial is to kill a nephilim." The began.
"I thought there were none left. They were killed as abominations." Castiel got up from the table and paced, a bit anxious.
"Well, that's what it says so there must be one. The second trial is to get the bow of a cupid. The third..." He paused, unsure if he should say it. "The third is to extract the grace of an angel in love with a human."
Castiel stopped and swallowed hard. A tangible tension filled the room. Dean must have heard that wrong. And it was stupid to assume that that meant either him or his brother... but really what other humans did Castiel really know?
"What?" He asked almost immediately. Kevin didn't answer. He looked back at Cas. Sam looked on, confused and shocked by it all. It had to be Dean. It had to. The look on his brother's face was completely blank. he almost looked put off. He was thinking something, something difficult. But what it was Sam couldn't be sure. He lowered his head. "Is that true?" He heard Dean ask of the angel.
Castiel could only stare back. He suddenly left, entering Kevin's bedroom, and shut the door behind him. Sam furrowed his brow. Dean stood as still as he did before.
"What do you think they're talking about?" Kevin twiddled a pencil in his hand.
"What do you think?" Sam had seen Dean look just as stone-faced as he did before following after Cas. What he was thinking Sam couldn't even begin to tell. "You shouldn't have done that."
"What?"
"You should have changed how you said it to us and then told Cas later." Sam shook his head.
"I thought of it! I was top of my class at one point if you remember. Way before you guys and all this happened." Kevin got up quickly. "I'm gonna make some food."
Castiel was sitting on the bed utterly confused. Did he love Dean? He had never truly thought about it. But sorting through his memories... He only had trouble killing Dean in Naomi's training. He had been broken of her control simply by Dean needing him to. But he had never known love before. He knew they shared a bond, nothing a family couldn't feel for each other. Simple, platonic. Who said it had to be romantic? But with the previous trials in mind they all seemed to be romance related in some way. Yet he didn't feel that way. He couldn't. So what was it? It wasn't sexual. It wasn't the kind of thing he saw watching earth; couples going to coffee shops and movies. That was to be sure.
But it was love all the same. After consideration he knew that now. Not lustful, not frivolous, not something that resides in the heart. Dean was in his soul somehow. It didn't matter what he made of it. He was connected to this hero of a man and that was all it had to be. That didn't stop a tightness from settling in his chest. He'd been searching for clarity in everything he encountered for as long as he could remember and now suddenly he had come as close to it as he might ever get.
It was in this state that Dean found him.
"Hey, Cas, mind if I sit?" He took a chair in front of the bed though the angel didnt say a word. Castiel found a sudden breath to his feelings and looked up to the ceiling, his face beginning to pucker with the first strains of what he guessed were going to be tears. He lowered his head again and nodded. they sat there for a while. Dean breathing deeply and allowing the understanding in the room to settle. He looked down and said in a tone that could have been anything; earnest, disgusted, causal... "You in love with me, Cas?"
There was a little more silence. Dean straightened up. He allowed himself to drink in what he was feeling and thinking. The uncertainty of it all. He felt the same way Cas did. There was something there, indescribable but known. He supposed it always was, but he had also never given it any real thought.
"Cause you know, if you are..."
Castiel swallowed hard. Dean knew they both understood this now. In a time when he felt that he wanted to give up, maybe even die, there was someone that knew what he had gone through and had gone through worse. Someone who wasn't Sam, wasn't technically family, but who might as well have been. There was someone who loved him even though they had seen the worst of him. That was something to keep living for.
"Well that's the best news I've heard in a long time." His voice broke on the final word. He had found a reason. And whatever form of love it was that he had for Castiel, it had come to him in that reason.
Cas smiled slightly, relieved. They looked at each other in the eyes for the first time since Dean had entered that room.
"I don't know what I'm supposed to do." Cas grumbled. Dean smiled slightly at him, he was Cas again. But that smile faded.
"We don't." Dean sighed. Castiel came closer to him as if to kiss him. Dean inched away. "No. You know it's not like that."
"I just don't know what one does in this situation, it seemed..." Castiel sat back down. "You're right. It doesn't feel like that." He wasn't even sure what that was but it was whatever emotion came with kissing.
"Nothing changes, right? I mean it's always been this way with us. So nothing changes." Dean reassured himself that this good thing they'd always had going wasn't going to shift. He didn't want to try to make anything into something it wasn't.
"No." Castiel replied. "Nothing."
They returned to the kitchen where Kevin and Sam were eating a bit awkwardly.
"Sam, finish eating we have to get back to the motel." Dean swiped the sandwich out of Sam's hand.
"The motel?" Sam took the sandwich back.
"There is a ghost presence in the town you just missed it." Castiel rolled his eyes.
Sam was completely befuddled. Were they seriously going to act like nothing had happened?
"Hop to, Sammy." Dean and Cas stood waiting for Sam to join them. They looked at each other and back to him. "We've got a boo brother to gank."
AN:
I tried my best! Hope you liked it. Leave constructive criticism in the comments if you want and I'll be sure to think about it and probably implement it. I also wrote this from like 1-3 am so it may be totally terrible and I'm just okay with it because I'm tired. Oh well.