This is my first Supernatural FF, so please leave reviews with positive critisizm in them! TW: Mental illness, suicidal thoughts. Enjoy!
It wasn't meant to be like this, Castiel thought as he pressed his broad shoulders back against the dug-out behind him. The recruitment posters had lied. The government had lied to the boys of England!
"I hate it!" the young man screamed in frustration, his eyes scrunching closed which seemed to distort his battle-worn face. Not that anyone was paying attention to his face, of course, not with all the explosions. Castiel had soon become used to the shrill ringing in his ears, all soldiers had to, especially those on the front line.
The trenches were fantastic protection for hiding, but it meant that as soon as the Germans dropped a bomb into them, the entire place blew up like an apricot ice.
"Shut up, soldier, we're under attack! Take cover-!" the older man commanded to Castiel.
He immediately dropped to the floor, barging his way into the small dugout. The dugout was a mess, there was a bucket to the left of him filled with...with god knows what. And to the right of him was a bed; well, not a bed exactly, more of a metal frame with a soggy canvas cover over the top of it, but since 1914, that was what Castiel knew as a bed.
Another bang from outside made him duck his head, his arms flinging up to protect him instinctively. Cautiously, Cas lowered his arms and allowed his frightened, frantic eyes to scan across the room before him, devoting most of his attention to ignoring the bucket to the side of him. It took him a moment before he realised that he wasn't alone in the room.
Directly across the room from him, his oceanic eyes spotted a trembling mass of dirt and terror.
"Hello..?" he said tentatively, slowly approaching the corner of the room. "Show yourself, soldier. I need to know if you're British or German!"
"No! No! No!" the corner bawled, and a hand lunged forward, twitching and shaking in the dark. "I-I-...I'm not G-G-German!"
Castiel swiped the candle off the table in the centre of the floor whilst making his way towards the corner. His free hand reached towards the belt which was locked tightly around his thin waist, thick, rough digits curling around the blade of his knife. "Come out!" he boomed, adopting the most authoritative voice he could muster.
Slowly, a shadow-cloaked man with dark hair stepped out of the darkness. His hair was flattened to his forehead with sweat, the tips of it touching his eyebrows. The corner of his eyes had creases on them, and it became obvious to Castiel that this man, this odd, odd man was previously a very happy person. All of the life had faded from his features now - everything that ever had made him smile was a lost memory, shrouded by all the pain of death around him. Although his eyes were dead and lost, they were the most beautiful thing that Cas had ever seen. The flickering of the candle was reflected in the emerald beauty of the man's glistening eyes, and every time the candle flicked to the left, his eyes followed it.
"I-I-I...I'm English, a-a...sold-dier. M-my n-n-n...name is D-Dean." he stammered, causing Castiel to tip his head to one side whilst studying Dean's dialect.
"Why do you stutter so much?" questioned the curious soldier.
Dean began rocking back and forth slowly, his hands holding the back of his head, pressing his chin down to his knees which were pressed firmly to his chest. This behaviour, Cas recognised. He had been in the war for three years now, since 1914, it became easy enough to know the symptoms of shell-shock.
"I-I-...the bombs!" suddenly, Dean threw his arms in the air, eyes wide with genuine fear. His teeth clamped down onto his plump lower lip and Castiel noticed the specks of blood that trickled down his chin.
"Stop, soldier! You're hurting yourself!" when receiving no reaction or response from the traumatised man, he placed the candle on the floor and dashed towards him. "Dean! You're making yourself bleed!"
The moment Castiel's hands landed on Dean's arms, he froze, his entire body tensing. His teeth allowed his lip to fall free whilst he swallowed thickly, swallowing the fear, the pain, hiding it all away as best he could. "S-s-sorry, sir," he stumbled upon his words.
"I'm just a regular soldier like you," Castiel said, offering Dean a small smile that he knew wouldn't be returned. "Don't call me 'sir'."
Dean nodded his head, though it was hard for Cas to tell whether or not it was a nod or just one of his twitches. "O-okay." he paused for a moment, and the silence between them wasn't interrupted. The bombing outside the bunker seemed to have come to a stop. "W-what is y-y-your name?"
"I'm Castiel, but everyone calls me Cas. How long have you been out here?"
"N-not long, really. O-on-only a year..." he sighed, placing his hands on the floor to push himself to his feet, a task he couldn't handle.
Cas looped his arm beneath Dean's and helped him steadily up, guiding him over to the make-shift chair that wasn't, in fact, a chair, but a wooden crate turned upside-down. Cas sat himself down on the chair opposite, his forearms resting against his thighs, hands held together so he could lean his chin on them. "If you have shell-shock, why are you still here? On the front line? Why aren't you, you know, in Craiglockhart?" Castiel asked.
"B-b-because I-I'm not a-a c-conchie, o-or a p-pansy," Dean leaned into the table beside him, using it to prop himself up. "I c-came to f-fight for King and C-country, and s-so I will!" he slammed his shaky fist against the solid surface of the table, creating a bang which echoed around the tiny room.
Nodding his head in understanding, Castiel reached into his rucksack and pulled out a flask with grey fabric coating it. He twisted the cap off and poured a handful of water over his hand, then scrubbed away at the mud on his face, an attempt to show to Dean his actual appearance. He lazily unclipped the helmet-strap beneath his chin and pushed it off his head, a deadweight off his shoulders. His hair was a ruffled mess atop his head, long and overgrown. "I signed up when I was 17, stupid, right? I thought I could go home and impress my mum, my pa'. My brothers all signed up, I was always teased for being the youngest in the family," Cas rambled on, uncaring whether or not Dean actually wanted to hear what he had to say. "Gabriel...he..." the soldier paused before taking a deep breath, slowly, loudly. "He died last year, in the Battle of Somme. I found out about it about two months ago." Castiel had to take a moment for himself, forcing his eyes against the ground.
Although he didn't show it, for he possessed the thousand-yard stare, Dean was truly trying to put his full attention to the story that Cas was telling, he was trying so hard to concentrate on the soldier's words that he didn't realise his muscles were twisting into a smile, like they always did when he was dazed, staring absently.
The moment Cas lifted his head, he furrowed his brow when he saw Dean smiling, but soon remembered that he couldn't help it. "What barracks are you in?" he questioned.
Dean remained silent for a moment before snapping out of it and twitching his eyes towards Castiel. "W-Y-A-P-1-5-2-7." he spoke, his voice robotic and monotone, like he had had those words drilled into him.
"That's the one right next to me!" Castiel exclaimed, rather excited. "We have to go back, Dean, the sergeants will be looking for us." Though he fully doubted that the sergeants would care if the two of them didn't sign in, Castiel had to give Dean a motive, a reason to get back up again. "And when we get back you can stay in my bunker. Otherwise they'll just send you away, they'll send you to Craiglockhart, like they did to Sassoon, that conchie who protested against the war.