Fluff. Nothing but fluff. And I totally didn't take the title from an attack in Shadow Hearts: Covenant. Nope, not at all. Get that look off your face, I don't know what you're talking about.

Soul Comet

They're taking a much needed break, spending a slow weekend at Bobby's because God knows they need it. There's been no sign of anything lately, no suspicious activity, no omens, no brutal murders outside the ones humanity does on its own. Of course they're all suspicious but taking the chance to unwind is not something that's passed up lightly.

It's summer, the heat blazing, and Sam has taken to hiding in the basement, nose buried in book after book. Bobby's not so different, only crankier, snapping at anyone who happens to get in his way. Cas pops in and out as he pleases, seemingly unbothered by the heat, even in his trenchcoat. Dean just wants the heat wave to break and has been spending his time under the hood of his baby, fine tuning her, cleaning her, relaxing.

Sometimes Castiel watches him, standing nearby or perched on the roof of a car, head titled as he watches Dean work. Or watches Dean's shirtless back curve as he bends over to attend the engine. Sometimes, very rarely, he helps. Hands tools, make comments, shakes his head when he doesn't understand. Dean doesn't care either way, he just enjoys the angel's presence.

So when he turns around to get into his toolbox and finds Castiel stretched out on the roof of a car, he's a little surprised. The trenchcoat, suit jacket, shirt, and even the tie are in a neatly folded pile on the car's hood and Cas is naked from the waist up, lying on his stomach. His arms are crossed in front of him, cushioning his head, his eyes closed to the world and Dean knows he's not asleep because angels don't need sleep.

But what really draws his attention are those wings.

He would have thought—had actually imagined—that Castiel's wings would be almost impossible to see in the sunlight, the way you can't see a flash light beam unless it hits something.

But the angel's wings are just as glorious in the daylight. They seem to drain the rest of the color out of the world, making everything else look muted and boring, the feathers saturated with a twisting cascade of lion's mane gold, hellfire red, night sky violet, and that specific, impossibly greenest green of every green that is in all the "save the trees" pictures that show the rainforest. Dean even thinks he sees a hint of macaroni-and-cheese orange. The sunlight is pulled into the wings until they overflow with the radiance, so much light being cast forth that it looks as if it is dripping in pure, gold-white spheres that splash across the car, the ground, before drifting back up into the sky. Light is raining up.

Dean leans back against his Impala, simply watching. And wondering a little. Angels didn't sleep so that's not what this was and Castiel never took his shirt off unless there was dire need to. Or because Dean had pushed it off to kiss and stroke. He thinks for a while, relishing the sight and the way the summer heat warms his shoulders and—oh.

Ooooohhhh.

Duh.

Castiel is sunbathing.

Dean almost laughs but he doesn't want the angel to wake up, doesn't want this perfect vision to move, to disturb this god of light. So he quietly sips a beer and pretends to be fiddling with his baby again. Only his eyes are tracing the curve of Cas' shoulder, lingering on that tousled hair, following the bending curve of light-feathers.

What need does an angel have for sunbathing? he has to wonder.

Maybe they're like solar panels and their wings can store sunlight. Or power. Grace. Whatever. Something. But that just seems silly because Dean has never seen Castiel do this before and he's always (almost always) charged and ready to go when the Winchesters are.

Maybe he actually is sleeping. Dean immediately scraps this idea because he knows Cas better than anyone. Cas. Never. Sleeps. Ever.

So maybe this is the angel's way of relaxing, of unwinding, of letting all the tension and the trouble roll off of him. Dean can't help but smile because if this is Castiel's way of relaxing he wouldn't mind if the angel did it a little more often. Cas doesn't like to show his skin and he's even tentative around Dean about so much as unbuttoning his shirt. Dean doesn't even know how they guy's going to feel about sex. If they ever get to that part. His relationship with Castiel is one of the few (the only one? no, that can't be right) that hasn't began and ended with sex. But it's okay, he can wait. Will wait. Because he's not sure he's ready either.

Castiel sighs and shifts on the roof of the car and his wings twitch and oh that's glorious.

Light refracts across every surface like a disco ball made of rainbows. Streaks of lover's pink and cobalt blue are dashed across the ground, lines of light flooded in dandelion yellow, diamond white, and molten silver whip along the cars, and rainbows and drops of sunlight splash along Dean's bare chest. His fingers come up and play through the beams of light bouncing off of Castiel's wings and he can't stop the smile from coming to his face.

Cas makes that pleasant humming noise he makes when Dean starts playing with his feathers and shifts again. His wings stretch out even further, resting on top of the cars on either side of him. Beams of light and color bounce off and slice through the air. The angel's acting like it's the best thing in the world. And maybe it is because Dean has certainly never seen Cas so stretched out and relaxed.

He jumps when Castiel's gruff voice says, "Take a photograph if you want to keep staring."

Not exactly the right phrase but Dean laughs all the same, "Nah, I don't think the camera could handle your wings. 'Sides, I like playing with the light." As if to demonstrate, he sticks his hand into a shaft of rainbow refracting off of the windshield of the Impala, fingers tickling the air as if it were a physical thing.

Cas still hasn't raised his head or opened his eyes but the smallest of smiles lifts the corners of his mouth and he makes that humming noise again.

Dean raises an eyebrow at him, "Can you feel this?" He swipes a hand through a cluster of light to test.

The angel on the roof of the car makes a noise halfway between that pleasant hum and a giggle, pushing his face into his arms. Dean grins and starts brushing his hand over globules of ice blue and sunlit white that seemed to hang in the air beside him. The humming noise comes again, low and happy, and Castiel's wings lift off the car roofs before dropping in a lazy beat. The motion kicks up dust and the lights and colors scatter, racing around and around in glorious blazes of disco panic. They hit glass and metal and are doubled, tripled, lighting up the car lot like the scribbles of a child's coloring book.

Dean can't help but laugh as he watches the display. Then he looks down at himself, arms spread out to the sides, the lights spinning across his bare arms and chest, curving around his stomach, tangling in the dirty wrinkles of his jeans, twisting amongst his fingers. And he can almost feel them the way he can feel Das' wings; warm brushes, like a breeze sifted with silk across his skin.

"Do it again." Dean finds himself saying, arms still held out to the sides.

Cas' eyes slide open into tiny slits, the barest hint of blue looking at Dean. Then he smiles, raises his wings again and drops them once more.

Dean tilts his head back and lets the lights play across his frame. And before he knows what's gotten into him, he's spinning. He's spinning around like a kid trying to see how dizzy he can get before he can't walk in a straight line anymore. And it makes the light display even more beautiful, all of it blurring together like a painting of every color known and unknown to man.

He thinks he can hear Castiel laughing but he doesn't want to stop but it feels good. He hears the wings beat again. The lights and color flash. Warmth seeps into his bones—not the dry summer heat warmth but the kind of warmth he gets from simply letting go. Cas is sharing his elation, his simple happiness, the relaxation and looseness of a well-earned day off.

"Dean, what are you doing?"

Dean stumbles to a halt, tripping over his own feet, and almost falling. He catches himself on the still open hood of the Impala and blinks, trying to stop the world from spinning. When it eventually settles, Sam is standing in front of him, looking confused, a little worried, and not a little bit amused. Dean feels the heat starting to creep up his neck; he was just spinning around in the yard like a child and Sam can't see the lights that Castiel's wings give off so Dean figures he probably looked pretty stupid.

"Er, Cas was—." But when Dean turns to point out Castiel sunbathing on the roof of the car…there's no one there.

Sam raises an eyebrow, "You okay?"

"That fucking…I'm gonna kill him." Dean mutters but there's not heat in the words. He raises a fist and shouts towards the sky, "You better watch your back, Cas! You're not the only one who can pull a prank!"

Sam makes a face, puts a hand on Dean's shoulder, and gently steers his older brother inside, mumbling something about being outside in the heat too long. Dean's not listening to him, to busy thinking up ways of getting back at Cas and trying to shake the feeling that someone's laughing eyes are trained on his back.

Somewhere out there, he knows Cas is laughing at him.