Trigger warning for graphic description of self harm.
Useless.
Castiel has been called a lot of things over the centuries, but this word seemed to sting the most. Perhaps because it was true. He was human now. Without his grace he was simply a "baby in a trenchcoat", as Dean had once said.
In his own opinion, he was more helpful than an infant, but still helpless on many levels. Sam and Dean had to teach him how to be human.
It wasn't all bad; he could taste things now. Food was more than just a combination of molecules. And he could feel things.
Emotions were proving to be the most intense thing he experienced as a human. He didn't just feel anger, he felt rage. He didn't just feel loyalty, he felt love.
He didn't just feel useless, he felt completely und utterly worthless. Self conscious in his own body. It was truly his now; it was more than a vessel. Jimmy Novak was in Heaven.
All the emotions were overwhelming. They could be good, but they could also be very, very bad.
In the eons that he had been alive, Castiel had never cried before. But the night he watched his brothers and sisters fall, and his own grace torn from him...it was devastation that he had never known. He truly knew the meaning of the word now.
And he had cried. No one saw, of course. But the sobs had wracked his body until he was physically ill.
The human body was so fragile. He was used to wounds disappearing almost instantly. The first time he was injured on a hunt, he was shocked. It hurt. It didn't heal. Dean bandaged him up, told him to be more careful, and that was that. It had taken days to heal completely, and even then Castiel was left with a scar.
It was fascinating, really. He had felt pain before, but like everything else about being human, it was magnified. He discovered that the physical sensation was so intense that it overcame even the most unpleasant thoughts and memories.
And so began his obsession with pain.
On nights when he found himself drowning in guilt and frustration, he found relief in the form of dragging a blade across his skin. He loved watching the blood, his blood, rising to the surface in crimson beads. There was something pure about it, seeing the red against white. Almost as if his negative energy was draining away. The deeper he cut, the better he felt. If he lost enough blood, he achieved a sort of high; a dizzy, lightheaded bliss.
The pain...the pain was glorious. It pushed the memories from his troubled mind. It chased away the darkness.
And he could breathe again.