Summary: When Gabriel has to use the reader as an emergency vessel, he inadvertently destroys her mind. Now, Sam and Dean have to fight to rescue Cas, find Gabriel and restore the reader's sanity. And they have to do it while dealing with the increasingly severe psychosis that Gabriel left behind.
Rating: T for now, but definitely headed towards an M.
Characters: Sam Winchester, Dean Winchester, Gabriel, Castiel, Reader, Crowley, Charlie.
Relationships: Sam Winchester/Reader, Dean Winchester/Castiel
Trigger Warnings: Angst, Pain, self-harm, violent outbursts, manic/depressive, depression, psychosis, eating disorders, schizophrenia, delusions, hallucinations, hurt/comfort.
A/N – Speaking of canon-divergence- I'm ignoring Charlie's death. Cause it was stupid. And Charlie is awesome.
***Trigger warning for self-harm in this chapter. Seriously. Please be good to yourself and don't read if you think you might be triggered. ****
Sam heaved an enormous sigh and let his head fall back against the stone wall outside of his room. He was holding yet another tray of food, which you had completely refused to even entertain eating. He was starting to think that they were making a mistake by not taking you to the hospital. It had been three full days since the warehouse and until today, you'd been refusing food and water completely.
Sam shook his head to try to clear his thoughts and walked the tray back to the kitchen.
"Well?" Dean looked up when Sam walked in with a raised brow.
Sam shook his head, and set the tray down on the counter. "She finally drank some water. And she didn't throw anything this time. But Dean… she won't eat. It feels like she's getting frustrated with me offering- I don't know what else to try."
Dean blew out a breath and rubbed his eyes hard with the heels of his hands. Sam immediately felt guilty. No matter what your condition, you were still here. They had no idea where Cas was. They'd had exactly zero luck trying to trace him, and Sam could easily see emotional toll it was taking on Dean.
"We're gonna find him Dean."
Dean just nodded, letting his head fall into his hands.
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You were trapped inside your head and it was killing you.
You had brief, fleeting moments when you remembered what had happened, and you knew what you were supposed to be doing. During these moments, the message that Gabriel had left in your head for Sam and Dean was at the forefront of your mind and you ached to deliver it.
But those moments were so short, and were too easily overwhelmed by the riot of feelings that were racing rough-shod around your mind.
Feelings.
Fear. That was at the top of the list. An overwhelming fear that made your heart race and your palms sweat. When the fear was in charge, you could feel your body start to shake and all of your muscles tense. You wanted to run, but you were terrified of what would be chasing you. You wanted to hide, but the thought of a small, dark space made you want to throw up. You were afraid of the light. Petrified of being alone. Scared to move- But too anxious to stay still.
Sadness was an inadequate word to describe the anguish you were feeling. Emotional pain so great that you could physically feel everywhere that it was tearing you apart. You were sure you'd cried more in the last 24 hours than you had in your entire life combined. It didn't do any good to try to figure out the cause of the sadness- because there wasn't one. These feelings existed independently from anything else and they were completely overwhelming.
And then you were so angry. You could feel your blood pressure rise and your jaw clench. You hated- you hated everyone. You hated yourself. You had to move. You felt trapped. You kicked and struggled against your captors, but you were overpowered. And that made you livid. You could literally see red… it was creeping in at the edge of your vision. And you were so angry at yourself. You knew that you were supposed to be strong- strong people did not behave this way. You were so damn furious at yourself. Weak. You were weak.
And over and over, repeat ad nauseum until you were so tired that you collapsed and slept. You did not dream. You weren't ever asleep long enough. You were exhausted.
People came in and out of your room. Strangers. Sometimes they found you sitting in the bed. Sometimes they found you curled up at the back of your closet. Sometimes you met them at the door, kicking, biting and throwing punches.
In the rare moments when you would feel the calmness settle over you, they would offer you food. The first few times, it had scared you so badly you'd thrown it away from you, ceramic and glass shattering and leaving a minefield of sharp, bloody pain for you to navigate as you scrambled to get away. The last few times, you'd simply turned your head, heart pounding and breath heaving in and out of your lungs, tears rolling down your face. You'd finally cried so much that you were impossibly thirsty, and your body had made the choice for you. Picking up the plastic cup and draining it without consulting your brain or instincts which were screaming that it was a poisonous trick.
Your heart ached, exhausted from racing. Your lungs and throat burned, from taking heaving breaths, from crying, and from screaming. You had had a pounding headache for the last two days, no doubt caused by the wild fluctuations of your blood pressure. Your emotions were killing you. Literally, they were going to kill you.
You sat on the floor of your closet, knees pulled up to your chest as you rocked. Your hands found their way down to your bandaged feet and you pulled at the bandage. Sharp, hot pain jolted up your legs from your feet, making tears spring to your eyes reflexively and you gasped and yanked your hands away.
But something else happened during that electric flash of agony... Your mind cleared. The fear, the anguish, the rage- it all faded. Replaced by a calm, slow feeling. You could almost think. There were thoughts. Ideas and questions swimming around, just beneath the surface in your mind. If you could just stay calm-
But you could already feel the fear creeping back at you. The pain was fading and the panic was ramping up- instinctively you reached out and wrapped both hands around your mangled feet and squeezed viciously. This time, the pain shot straight through you and made you cry out- a loud choking gasp. But it chased the panic away. It was almost like… like your brain couldn't contain both the emotional and the physical pain at the same time. And you knew for damned sure which was preferable.
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Sam and Dean heard you cry out, and were halfway down the hallway to your room before they realized that it was probably a bad idea to just burst in on you. Dean rubbed the blossoming bruise on his ribs where you'd landed a particularly vicious kick when he went to check on you that morning.
"You go ahead. I'll stay out here, in case-" Dean trailed off, uncomfortable with giving voice to the idea that Sam might need assistance restraining you.
Sam pushed the door open slowly, peering around it into the room. When he didn't immediately see you, he opened it the rest of the way, pressing it flush against the wall and then slinking forward slowly. His eyes flicked to the closet and he saw you sitting there, huddled against the wall, gripping your bandaged feet tightly in both hands, but looking more lucid than you had looked in 3 days.
When he knelt down just outside the closet and you didn't flinch away or begin to cry, he extended a hand towards you.
"Hey…. Y/N? Are you alright? You're hurting yourself-" he reached towards your feet to try to loosen your grip, but you looked him straight in the eye and said with authoritative clarity "Sam- stop."
Sam rocked back onto his heels- his surprise at your sudden presence of mind and recognition of him momentarily making him forget about the fresh stitches on your feet and the death grip you had on them. In the three days since returning to the bunker, you hadn't acknowledged or seemed to recognize either of them even once. Sam experienced a brief shining moment of white hot hope, but as he watched, your eyes went unfocused and you squeezed them shut, a fine trembling broke out along your arms and shoulders and your chest began to heave as you started to pant. Tears sprung to your eyes and Sam finally leaned forward and squeezed your wrists- carefully detangling your fingers from around your bleeding toes and winced at the fresh bloody mess you'd made of your feet.
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You were trapped again in the whirling cyclone of pain and terror - too far gone to even think. You could feel hands, holding you down and far away, quiet behind the crashing sounds of your mental prison, you could hear voices, murmuring softly. It was impossible to make out what they were saying, and at times, it seemed as though no sounds could reach your ears at all; the deafening silence going on and on until it almost started to physically hurt- and then it would be replaced with a veritable hurricane of sound, so loud you could feel your body remotely, flinching to get away from the noise.
Somewhere far outside your neon madness, you felt a stabbing pinch and felt your body begin to drift away. You had a brief, anxious thought that you were dying, and then nothing.
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"Jesus Christ Dean- what the hell is that?"
"Ketamine. It's a horse tranquilizer. That vet at 'Fish and Wildlife' in Eugene had a whole box of it on his desk. I just liberated a bit. Thought it might be useful."
Sam just raised his eyebrows. "Doesn't Ketamine cause…like, crazy hallucinations?"
Dean had already unwrapped the bandages from your feet and was carefully disinfecting the wounds. "Like she isn't having those already? Come on man."
Dean was carefully prodding the bottom of your left foot. "I'm a little worried we didn't get all the glass out of these the first time. And she's ripped out nearly half the stitches. I think I ought to just start over- or" He glanced at Sam, a calculating expression on his face.
"Or what?" Sam's response was almost tired, like he knew what was coming.
"I feel like we might be in over our head. She needs a hospital."
"We can't take her to a hospital Dean. We'll be arrested on the spot."
Dean continued as if he hadn't spoken. "I feel like she's getting worse- the hallucinations, refusing food, the insomnia, the crying, the screaming- I feel like we aren't really equipped to- " He broke off at a particularly fierce bitch-face from Sam.
"We don't have to be the ones to take her in. Charlie could-"
"No. It's too dangerous. In a hospital she's completely exposed."
"Ok. You're right." Dean nodded and went back to silently stitching up the cuts from the shards of glass you'd scrambled over trying to escape your best friends.
"Look Sam, I know you said you didn't want to strap her down, but she did this to herself-"
"We're not tying her up either."
Dean just nodded and quieted, glancing up every so often at his little brother. Sam was staring down at you with a guilt-filled expression, alternating between combing his fingers through the hair at your temples and brushing them lightly across the fresh and fading bruises on your neck and shoulders. He knew that the majority of the bruises were self-inflicted, but there were also a good number of them from his hands. From Dean's hands. Accidental ones from holding you down- from trying to keep you from hurting yourself.
"It's not a long term solution of course," Dean continued carefully- "Just until Cas can-"
"Cas? Seriously? We have made exactly zero progress finding Cas! We don't even know if-" Sam slammed his mouth shut and ducked his head, a guilty expression bleeding onto his face.
"Right. Well." Dean tied off the last knot, pushed himself up and walked to the door.
"Dean, wait-"
Dean answered him by slamming the door behind him.
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You were warm. Blissfully so. And there was a warm, soft light all around you. You knew instinctively that it was a dream, but there was an overwhelming feeling of peace, and so you weren't overly inclined to fight it.
The light gradually faded, and you were able to focus on your surroundings. You smiled and took a deep breath as you recognized your surroundings. The scent of warm chocolate was almost tangible- you could practically taste the air. You turned in a slow circle- taking in the cool white walls and the black and white tiles before stepping up to the covered glass display case that ran along an entire wall and held an impossible assortment of fancy chocolate candy.
You heard him before you saw him. Somehow, in your mind, he felt familiar. He felt safe and comfortable. And he was smiling broadly as he walked out behind the counter and stopped in front of you.
He was wearing a white, short sleeved button up shirt with black trim and a black tie. He grinned and propped his elbows up on the top of the display case and winked at you before holding out a small brown paper cup with a fancy chocolate truffle in it. "Sample?"
You took the candy from him and popped it in your mouth.
"You know- I used to come to this shop all the time when I was a kid. I love this place" you said with your mouth full of chocolate- just like when you were a kid except this time, your step mother wasn't here to scold you and the chocolate tasted just slightly sweeter without the flavor of guilt mixed in.
"I know, kiddo. I took a joy ride through your hard drive, remember?"
You looked at him more closely. You'd never seen him before- you would have remembered that face, but he still felt achingly familiar to you.
"Who are you?" you asked, licking the remainder of the chocolate out of your mouth and wishing you had something to wash it down with.
"Gabriel. My name is Gabriel." A tall frosty glass of milk appeared on the counter in front of you and you picked it up with both hands and took a long sip and then grinned.
"Thanks, Gabriel."
"Nothing for nothing, princess. I need an assist." He looked briefly guilty. "Again."
You were curious about that, but you also knew this was a dream. Somewhere in the back of your mind, you knew that you weren't standing in the middle of a chocolate shop with a handsome stranger, drinking an icy glass of milk and you almost felt as though your body was actively pulling you away.
The lights in the shop dimmed momentarily and Gabriel glanced up at them.
"Straight to business then, gorgeous. I need you to deliver a message to your boyfriend."
"My boyfriend?"
"Oh come on toots, you know the one. Tall, dark and shaggy? Answers to Moose?"
Sam suddenly appeared before you, the lights dimming again and the smell of chocolate being replaced with the smell of damp stone and antiseptic. You could feel Sam's large hands on your shoulders and hear his voice, far off like, trying to say something to you. It felt like-
You squeezed your eyes shut, trying to get back to that chocolate shop in California, trying to get back to Gabriel and the truffles and the milk, but that feeling wouldn't go away. It felt like…. Like….
"Y/N? Can you hear me?"
A heavy cloud of anguish settled over you like a blanket filled with bricks and you began to cry.
It felt like waking up.
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Sam was pacing. He'd stayed until you'd woken up. At first, you'd looked… better. That was the only way to describe it. You looked refreshed. Like you'd slept for the first time in weeks. And then you'd very quickly started to cry.
He'd stayed through the first wave of tears. Stroking your hair, your arms, anywhere you'd tolerate him touching you, until the despair and misery had given way to anxiety. He wanted so badly to wrap you up in a strong hug and make everything better, but how could he? He couldn't even see the things you were afraid of. All he could do was stay.
He stayed through the first hallucination. Your head had jerked up, nostrils flaring.
"Help!"
Sam swung around to look behind him, knowing from three days' experience that there was nothing in the room, but years of living a hunter's life leaving him helpless against the instinct of checking.
"Help! Oh god- Something's burning!"
He took a couple of steps towards you, but you flung up your hands and backed into the corner again.
"Can't you smell that? It's so strong! Something's on fire!" you voice was high and panicked. Sam's heart started racing, but he forced his voice to be calm. He put his hands up- palms forward.
"Nothing's burning. Everything is fine."
You sunk down onto your heels, wrapped your arms around your knees and tucked your head. Sam edged towards you, sitting himself down a few feet away and talking quietly the whole time.
He talked about his father. He talked about Bobby, and Ellen and Jo. He talked about Charlie and Kevin. He told you about his stint in the mental institution. He told you about Gabriel and Michael and Adam and the cage. And he told you about how conflicted he was. How badly he felt about Cas, how guilty he felt about Dean. He told you how he felt like he needed to be out, helping Dean look for Cas. He told you how scared he was to leave you alone.
You heard none of it.
All he could do was stay.
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Dean padded quietly down the hall. Everything in your room had gone quiet about an hour ago. He thought- he hoped- that you were sleeping. He hated to come in and disturb the peace, what little of it that there was, but he was pretty sure he had finally caught a break.
He twisted the door knob and pushed the door open slowly, expecting to see both you and Sam. Instead, he saw no one. The light was on and the door squeaked quietly as he pushed it in. He spotted you first, curled up in the closet, eyes open and staring at something on the floor on the other side of the bed from him.
Dean could hear his heart pounding in his ears as he crossed the room. You'd been reacting with such unpredictable violence- he didn't really think that Sam would allow you to hurt him, but….
Dean heaved a sigh of relief when he got to the end of the bed and saw Sam, stretched out of the floor, chest rising and falling steadily.
Dean leaned over slowly, wary of the girl in the closet acting like a frightened animal and shook Sam's shoulder to wake him.
Sam jerked awake with a gasp.
"Hey- hey. Rise and shine sleeping beauty. Caught a lead."
He waited for Sam to sit up and watched him rub his hands through his hair before peering up at him blearily.
"Lead?" Sam grunted.
Dean bit back a sarcastic comment about cave men.
"Morning paper from Milwuakee, WI is reporting signs of major demon activity in the area- if we leave in an hour we can be there by two."
Sam blinked at Dean, and then looked at you over his shoulder. "What about-"
"Listen. I know it isn't ideal, but I think we have to take her to the hospital. We can get Charlie-"
"No Dean! Forget it! A hospital is too dangerous. You go. I'll stay here."
"Sam. I need you man. Cas… needs you." Dean stared at his brother- willing him to see sense.
"What if…" Sam trailed off, trying to think through the ramifications of his next suggestion.
"What?"
"What if we just ask Charlie to come and sit with her? I'm sure she'd-"
"No- that's a good idea. I'll call her. You pack."
A/N- I took a four-month hiatus from this story, but I feel REALLY accomplished about it. I moved my six-year-old and myself to Washington state, started a new job, found a new house and got the offspring settled in her new school. But my point is, that it's not going to be four months before I update this again. I'm aiming for a chapter a week
