Authors' Note: Hey guys! Cody and I have been working hard (he stays up way too late, but it's because he loves you!) and the next chapter is quite long! Please don't hate us after you read it; our original chapter breaks were a heck of a lot worse :P
Chapter 12
"And though we choose between reality and madness, it's either sadness or euphoria." ~Summer, Highland Falls, Billy Joel
It took Dean a moment to realize what was happening, and when he did he turned in Castiel's arms to see his brother being pulled towards them, unable to fight against Castiel's Grace. "No," Dean whispered, then turned back to Castiel and gripped the front of his trench coat. "Please, no, Castiel, you can't do this, please don't hurt my brother, please don't hurt Sammy, you can't, please, please—"
Sam fought against Cas, but it was no use, the angel was too strong. He stumbled over, fear and confusion filling him as he got closer and began to make out Dean's words. What the hell? Cas was going to hurt him? Why? His fear tipped over into terror because Cas wasn't even looking at him, was focused entirely on Dean, like Sam was just any other object in the room.
"Cas, what are you doing, man—" Sam began, but Grace smothered him, literally pushed down his throat and choked him so he couldn't speak.
"Be silent," Castiel ordered, not taking his eyes from Dean's. But Dean was pleading with him and he didn't know why. "Dean, this was your idea," he reminded the hunter gently.
"No," Dean moaned, looking at his brother now, at the confusion and fear on his face. "No, I didn't want this, I never wanted this…" He turned his head wildly and screamed at Castiel. "Dammit, you did this to me! Don't you dare touch him!" He was doing something wrong. He was being bad. He raked at his forearms with his nails, trying to regain control. He knew he still had the glass in his pocket, but the moment it would take to retrieve it seemed too long; he needed the pain now, needed it to clear his mind so he could focus.
Castiel recoiled slightly as Dean shouted at him. Did Sam really have that much of a hold over Castiel's hunter? It was unacceptable. Dean was tense, resisting, but Castiel firmly turned him so that he had his back to Castiel's chest, facing his brother. His hands found Dean's and pinned them to his sides, chin hooking over Dean's shoulder.
"Look, Dean," he growled, power in his voice, a compulsion that Dean wouldn't be able to resist. "That man is coming between us. I looked into your mind and saw your hatred, your desire to be punished, and it keeps you from me." He kissed the side of Dean's neck gently, raising goosebumps along the hunter's skin. "If he is gone, you will be able to let go of that hatred and fully devote yourself to me." It was the only logical course of action, Castiel mused, finally raising his eyes to the man in front of them.
"No," Dean moaned. "I'll do better, I promise. But please, please, not Sam. Don't hurt him." Dean's voice trembled as the angel pressed a cold kiss to his neck. His words, his disobedience, made him try to free his hands to punish himself again, more, but he could not move, not to help Sam or hurt himself. He couldn't even look away from Sam, couldn't blink, just stared painfully forward.
Sam struggled harder as he heard Castiel's words. Shit, he was screwed, he was so screwed. He was going to die and it wasn't going to be a vamp or shifter or even just a car crash, it was going to be his brother's angel, his friend. Tears leaked from his eyes as he tried to scream or beg, but he still couldn't make a sound. Dean was standing only a few feet away and neither of them could do anything but stare at each other. God, Cas, don't do this, Sam pleaded silently, but if the angel heard he gave no sign.
Castiel did in fact hear Sam, and he thought it disgustingly hypocritical that the human would only pray to him at his hour of death. "It is already done, Sam," he whispered, and then he squeezed with his power. Sam's eyes flew open wide as the pressure inside his body skyrocketed, and blood started to leak from his ears and nose almost immediately. Castiel crushed Sam until the man was almost unconscious but not quite, chest heaving with shallow gasps for air as his frail bones and muscle strained against the immovable wall of Castiel's Grace. Had the angel not been holding Sam upright, the man would have crumpled to the floor already.
"Is this punishment enough, Dean?" the angel whispered, nipping playfully at Dean's ear and kissing his neck again, washing the hunter in his Grace and holding him tightly.
Dean could feel the Grace lightly entering his skin, and his body relaxed, his mouth opening to say, "No, this is not enough punishment." Castiel was perfect, he was everything, Dean had done wrong and needed this. But Sam was there, and Dean couldn't look away, and he couldn't let him die. He bit down on the words, stopping himself, and he hated himself for doing it. "Please," he whimpered instead. He could barely see his brother through his tears, even as his gaze was fixed on him. He tried again to pry his arms from Castiel and failed, tried to flinch away to avoid having Castiel's face so predatorily close to his neck. But this time the contact of Castiel's lips sent an intense wave of pleasure through him and he bit his tongue again. He had to think, not just feel Castiel touching him and wanting him and owning him. Dean's head fell back onto the angel's shoulder and he groaned. Sam, Sam needed him to… to… He was drowning in Castiel, and he couldn't think, but Sam...his brother was going to die because of him. There had to be something he could do.
He thought dimly of the hex bag around his neck, unreachable now, and how it had toned down Castiel's possessiveness into something more manageable but still… terrifying? Was that how he felt about Castiel? He could think Castiel terrifying as long as he still worshipped him, because Castiel was his god and gods are awful and wonderful and frightening at the same time. So finding him terrifying was good, as long as it didn't interfere with pleasuring him.
No, no. There was something wrong with Castiel; he wasn't a god, he wasn't the universe. Dean needed him, though. No, he didn't need him. But he didn't hate him, though he thought he might have hated him a few minutes ago. He venerated him. He wished him power over all of creation. But he couldn't let him hurt Sam.
And yet there was nothing Dean could do. Nothing he could say. His tried to make enough sense of the grayness in his memory to say something that could change Castiel's decision. When had the angel been kind? Dean's mind was screaming that Castiel was always kind, too kind for the likes of Dean, but some small voice inside his heart whispered Cas. Castiel had been concerned when Dean was talking about Cas, had been gentle and curious. Maybe if Dean reminded him...
"Did you ever figure it out?" Dean mumbled. He could feel all of Castiel's attention focused on him. "Why you aren't Cas?" He let out a tiny laugh that was more of a sob. "I miss Cas." He shouldn't, he should only want Castiel. And he did, he adored him, he wanted him to ravish him, he wanted him to punish him for his transgressions. But… "What happened to Cas?" Dean asked plaintively. He had a strange pain in his chest that he couldn't explain.
Castiel snarled as Dean spoke, unconsciously tightening his hold on Sam until the hunter's ribs began to splinter one by one. "I—" he began, then stopped. Was he going to say he was Cas? Cas was an amputated wreck, half a name for less than half an angel, and Castiel was no longer such a thing. "I am Castiel!" The words tore from his throat as the rest of Sam's ribs caved in a series of staccato cracks. "You do not need Cas," he hissed, spinning Dean to face him, "because you have me and I am better than he was, I am greater, and I am everything you will ever want." Castiel drew in his Grace and let Sam fall to the floor. He would make Dean see; he would punish him properly this time so that no one else would ever matter but Castiel.
The angel was angrier than Dean had ever seen him, eyes white and blinding just for a moment before the world around Dean went dark as Castiel threw him into his subconscious. Even as Dean fell past blurs of memory and selfhood, Castiel was all around him. This was no longer Dean's mind; it belonged to Castiel, and Castiel was painting it with napalm, finding his way down the tracks of knowledge and memory and normalcy and ripping them apart. Dean scrambled to put the fragments back together, fighting because he'd promised to try to remember his brother's name. And he did try, but it was hard as his words to Sam began to fade, turning to nothingness. The angel's presence drummed on his mind and crushed everything else to dust. Castiel. Castiel.
Sam choked, tried to draw a breath, and felt several of his ribs pierce his lungs. It hurt and he screamed, which made him cough, which only forced his shattered bones deeper into his organs. He had fallen on his side, and he watched helplessly as the angel clutched his brother, white light spilling from his eyes and mouth as though his vessel were about to explode. Another wave of pain and oxygen deprivation threatened to overwhelm him, and Sam's eyes drifted closed, but he jerked them open again. Sam couldn't just lie here, Dean was in trouble, and Clem— Movement behind the angel caught Sam's gaze, and he saw the young hunter lifting herself shakily to stand next to the table. Clem's ankle looked like it had twisted badly when she hit the wall earlier, but she managed to put weight on it just long enough to pick up the bowl with both hands and throw it, knocking over one of the candles in the process and spilling wax across the table and floor.
Dean fluttered his eyes open, still struggling to sew together the places where Castiel had marched through his mind. His hands were tangled in the front of the angel's shirt and he was being held, gently now. Something was wrong. No. Something was different.
His head hurt and he loosed a hand from the shirt and put it on his temple. Then he looked at Castiel's face. Blinked. Reached out a hand and touched his cheek with his thumb, then dropped his hand. "You're not Castiel," he said softly.
Then there was a wheeze behind him and he remembered his brother, remembered Sam, what Castiel had been doing to him and turned to look at Sam where he lay on the floor. "Sammy?" Oh god, there was so much blood, and Sam wasn't gonna make it; Dean could see from the concavity of his ribcage and the already-dead look in his eyes. He crushed his free hand into his own face and sobbed. "Sam, I'm so sorry. This is all my fault." He wanted to go to Sam, but he couldn't bring himself to let go of Castiel—Cas.
Castiel didn't respond as Dean touched his face, the hunter confirming what he already knew. You're not Castiel. Maybe not anymore, but he had been. He remembered with painful clarity the strange behavior, the Grace that he now recognized as part of the spell, the way it had warped him into… into some thing that had harmed Dean. And now he was just Cas, a fallen angel full of Grace that he didn't want and memories that threatened to crush him beneath their horror. Dean twisted away from him and called out his brother's name, but didn't go to him; Cas wasn't sure he could. Not in the state Castiel had left him in.
Cas remembered the crunch of bone and didn't want to look, but he forced himself to. Sam was stretched out on the floor, and Cas was paralyzed by the bright red blood painting his face and chest. As if in a daze he drifted to stand over Sam, Dean stumbling along with him.
"No," he said softly, startling Dean from his whispered apologies. "This was me, not you, Dean." Cas didn't kneel so much as crumple, and Sam's darkening gaze fixing on his face made him want to crawl into a nest of vipers and lie there until their poison ate away his bones. "Stay back, Dean," he said very softly, laying a shaking hand on Sam's forehead.
Dean stepped back obediently, but dropped to his knees behind Cas and grabbed at his coat. "What are you gonna do?" he whispered. He leaned forward until his forehead was pressed against Cas's shoulder. Part of him was terrified that Cas would hurt his Sam, then he shook himself. This was Cas, not Castiel, and if this was Cas, then maybe… Dean hung onto Cas's arm, eyes bright. "Can you fix him? I'll do anything, you know I will."
Dean's words made Cas shudder, reminded him of all the things he had done to the man who knelt behind him, clinging to him in a lost way. "I am going to try to fix him, Dean. And—" Cas's voice caught. "You don't have to do anything." Cas gently pulled his other arm from Dean and wavered over Sam's torso before settling it in the center of his mangled ribcage.
The Grace felt cold and unfamiliar, and Cas fumbled with it, trying to force it to do his will as he felt Sam's heart stutter beneath his fingers. He bit his lip in concentration and remembered rebuilding Dean's body after Hell. This wasn't so different; he could do it, he had to. Small things first. A coil of Grace to Sam's soul, keeping it from slipping away. One to his heart to keep it beating, one to remove the slivers of bone lodged in that vital muscle. As difficult as it was, it took only a few seconds for Cas to maneuver all of the shards of Sam's ribs back to their places, coaxing the cells to heal themselves with soft brushes of Grace and returning what blood he could to the veins. When he pulled his hands from Sam, not even bothering to clean the blood off of them, the younger Winchester's eyes were open and staring at him. Confused, but alert. Alive. Cas let out a breath of relief. He had fixed something. Something important.
Sam thought he was dead but he couldn't be sure; he was getting too many mixed signals from his body. He hoped that Dean was all right, but he couldn't find the energy to do anything but stare blankly at the ceiling, or whatever the darkness floating above him was. Then suddenly he felt something trickling into him, bringing sensation with it. A cold hand on his forehead, the sound of Dean's harsh breathing, much closer than it should have been. A pair of haunted blue eyes just above him. Fear shot through him, paralyzing him. He couldn't imagine what else Cas would do to him. That monster had already… Sam finally registered the general lack of pain in his body. Cas had healed him? But the thing from before wouldn't have done that. He blinked once, to prove to himself that he could. Next Sam rolled his head away, then back, then lifted it slightly. It hurt, but only as much as he would expect from being dropped on the floor. So he could do that too.
Sam took a deep breath, noting the absence of pain. Another, and then Sam sat bolt upright and he couldn't stop his shallow, rapid, painless breaths. He knew he was hyperventilating, but he couldn't stop because everything almost just had, and he figure he had a right to be panicking.
His mind ground to a halt and then lurched forwards, and Sam spun to see Cas sitting back on his heels, studying the blood on his hands as though hoping it would burn through his flesh. Cas, obviously, completely, and Sam let out a breath that may have been a laugh because the monster was gone. Dean was kneeling as well, and Sam pulled him into a hug, gasping and choking as tears started to flow but it didn't matter because Dean was alive too and whatever Clem had done must have worked.
As if his thought had summoned her, Sam heard a soft thump and pulled his face away from Dean long enough to see Clem sitting nearby, shaking and pale, but still alive too. And now Sam couldn't seem to stop laughing because how often did this happen for the Winchesters, a day when everyone survived? So he held Dean and laughed and cried on the floor of someone else's house because there was nothing else he could do.
Dean let Sam hold him, feeling his brother's heartbeat and his tears and his laughter against him, but after a moment he grew too uncomfortable and started to pull away. He was supposed to be paying attention to Cas, and he knew it was wrong to feel comforted by his brother's hug. With a push against his brother's chest get Sam away from him, Dean turned back to the angel. He chewed his lip slightly, his body shaking and head bowed in repentance and gratitude. "Thank you," he said. "I didn't deserve—" He flicked his eyes upward and saw the strangest look on Cas's face. His eyebrows were drawn like they normally were when he was curious or puzzled, but there was a tightness around his mouth that Dean didn't recognize and his eyes had a sad, broken sort of cast to them. Dean curled his shoulders inward and slid a hand into his pocket, fingering the piece of glass that he'd stashed there. He stared at Cas's lips. The eyes were too painful, but the lips, the lips he understood. And wanted. "Are you hurt?" he asked hesitantly, withdrawing the glass and pressing the cool edge to his skin. Everything was too hazy, too confusing.
"Dean, no!" Cas moved as fast as he could but Dean still broke the skin. His words held none of the compulsion from earlier, only pain and guilt. He had done this, had reduced Dean to this, to drawing his own blood. Cas's hands covered Dean's and he almost healed him immediately, but stopped himself. It was too much like what he had done before. Instead he pulled the glass out of Dean's fingers, throwing it away from them, and cradled Dean's hands to himself. The hunter's wrist bled sluggishly into Cas's lap, mixing with Sam's blood from earlier.
Sam started to scramble up when he saw Dean pull the glass out of his pocket, but Cas intervened and he dropped back down. He had been watching Cas warily, waiting for the angel to snap back into his vengeful, spell-induced fury, because surely this couldn't have been that easy. But when Cas looked at Dean, Sam saw the self-loathing in his eyes, heard the terror in his voice as he realized what he had done. He let out a shaky breath, allowing himself to hope that it might be over.
"No, I'm not hurt. And don't thank me, I did this, I did all of this!" Cas's voice rose in a panicked shout, and he had to force it down. That unfamiliar Grace was still pooled inside him, stagnating, and Cas knew he needed to use it or maybe just purge it because it didn't belong; it was just a leftover reminder of what he had done. Cas tried to control his scattered thoughts, tried to focus. Sam was healed. He glanced across to the girl, Clem, and she winced when he made eye contact, scooting further away. Terrified of him, of course. And injured, he could see, but it was minor. And, miraculously, not something he had caused. He turned his attention back to Dean, the one that he knew truly needed help, and forced himself to examine him thoroughly, inside and out.
Dean's beautiful soul was crushed, crumpled like a piece of paper that Cas had wadded up and throw away. Everywhere Cas could see the Grace that was not his, laid over and filling the crevices, smoldering slowly where it touched Dean. Of course, Cas thought numbly. Dean would never have let Cas own him like that willingly, so the only way to control him had been to break him. The Grace had already done a terrible amount of damage, although Cas could see Dean's soul struggling against its corruption. For a moment, Cas wondered what he would do if he couldn't fix the hunter. Would Dean prefer to be dead rather than the way he was now? He shook off the thought almost immediately. Failure was not an option. Cas would save Dean even if it took every last drop of Grace he had and more. "Dean, how could I do this to you?" he whispered, searching the hunter's eyes for some acknowledgement that his actions had been irredeemable, some bit of the old Dean that must hate him and everything he was. But all he saw was confusion, and fear, and childish hurt, and over it all the shine of adoration that Cas loathed because he had created it.
Dean didn't understand and Cas's gaze hurt him. It shouldn't bother him; he was wrong to feel the way he did, but it was like the angel was looking through him. Sam looking at him like that, Dean could understand, but he'd never thought Cas would do that to him. And what the angel said… Dean didn't completely understand, but he knew Cas wasn't happy with him. Fear flickered through him even though he didn't have to be afraid anymore. Cas wasn't like Castiel. Cas wouldn't hurt him or Sam or anyone else. Even if Dean deserved it. But he couldn't shake the fear from himself; it clung to him like wet clothes on skin. His hands twitched where Cas held them, and he wanted desperately to dig his fingernails into the cut he'd just opened up, but he remembered the angel's order not to. Instead, he pulled his wrists out of Cas's hands and knelt before him, head bowed. "I'm sorry I'm bad," he whispered.
"No, Dean, you're not," Cas said softly, and Dean looked up at him with a hopeful, pleading expression. The hunter tentatively moved closer, spreading his knees to either side of Cas's so he could lean in and wrap his arms around the angel's shoulders. Ducking his head, he buried his face in Cas's neck, and the angel reflexively hugged Dean back in an attempt to comfort him. Then he felt the hunter press a gentle kiss to his collarbone, and tried not to stiffen. It was his fault Dean was like this, and Dean wouldn't understand if Cas pushed him away now.
"Dean," Cas said gently, but the hunter just kissed him again, so Cas had to repeat himself, a little more emphatically. "Dean." This time, Dean pulled away slightly, eyes meeting Cas's, and for a moment Cas was at a loss for words. Dean was staring, the uncertainty in his expression growing into full-on panic. "It's all right," Cas said hastily, and Dean's face relaxed marginally. "Just… Not right now, okay?" Cas broke eye contact to glance up at Sam apologetically, praying the younger hunter could tell that he didn't want this.
When Dean crawled up to Cas, nuzzling into the angel just as he had before, the last shred of hope Sam had that his brother wasn't still enthralled to Cas dissipated. Of course, the damage had been done. Cas shot Sam a look that let the hunter know that he was just as lost as Sam. Knowing that the angel was unsure did nothing to reassure Sam. What if he never got Dean back; what if his brother remained this twisted shadow of himself forever? "Cas, please, you have to help him," he whispered under his breath, too low for Dean to hear, but Cas's eyes flashed up at him briefly. Sam wasn't even close to being able to deal with the emotions he saw there, so he turned to Clem, who was watching Dean and Cas carefully, something like revulsion in her eyes.
"You okay?" he asked softly, and she nodded without looking away.
"I thought breaking the curse would fix everything," she said softly, watching Dean guiltily look away from Cas and hang his head. "Why's Dean still acting like this?"
"Cas didn't put a spell on him, he…" Sam fumbled for the right words. "I don't exactly know what he did, but it's more permanent than that."
"Is he going to fix him?"
"God I hope he can," Sam muttered, turning to watch Cas and Dean.
Sam's words carried to Cas and his heart twisted. He was going to try, but Dean was so broken, so lost. This wasn't like Hell because Hell had been careful, spinning Dean's soul into twisted blown glass nightmares, and Castiel had simply made it the right shape again. Now there were fractures running through Dean, and pieces missing, and it was all his fault. Cas had taken Grace, something pure and divine, and used it to destroy a soul against its will. He wasn't sure he could bring himself to shape Dean's soul again, not even to repair the damage, without Dean's permission. If Dean was still capable of giving it.
"Dean, look at me." Cas got one hand between their torsos and pushed Dean away. The hunter obediently shifted back, but not very far, and he seemed unwilling to take his hands off Cas's shoulders. "Dean, you need to let me help you. I'm going to try to put you back the way you used to be, but you need to let me, okay?"
"I'll do anything you want," Dean said, staring reverentially at Cas.
Cas felt numb as he stared at Dean and wondered how on earth he could have done this to the man, how he could have thought this was acceptable. He didn't need to wonder though, because Cas knew already, remembered every minute, every thought of his that had created this crippled soul that didn't even know it was broken.
"I want you to think about yourself, about how you are. Doesn't anything seem wrong to you?"
Dean blinked confusedly, and shook his head without really thinking about the question. What could be wrong? Cas was here.
The angel saw that the hunter wasn't grasping what he was saying, so he spoke again. "Try to remember, Dean. You aren't here, not all of you." Cas knew his words would upset the hunter, but he had to know if Dean was even aware of what had been done to him.
"I'm right here," Dean mumbled, then shook his head. "I'll try," he whispered. But only because Cas had told him to. It was hard, thinking about himself, because he only wanted to think about Cas. Cas was all he should think about. But Dean couldn't disobey, so he took a deep breath and thought.
The truth was, Dean wasn't sure what Cas was talking about. His memory went back to Castiel holding him in the middle of a ring of holy fire, and then petered painfully out. He remembered Sam and Clem telling him that he should be someone else, but he had no idea who that other person was. Dean hadn't existed before Castiel.
Had he? He must have… He must have been a child at one point. Must have had parents, must have grown up. Dean shook his head. No, that wasn't right. Castiel could have just created him as he was now. The thought pleased him, to have had Castiel's Grace build him atom by atom. That was true belonging.
"Dean?" The sound of Sam's voice startled him. Sam. His brother. Castiel hadn't created Sam, Dean was sure of that. If he had, Sam would have loved him like Dean did.
Dean shifted, confused, and looked back at Cas mournfully. "Castiel didn't create me, did he," he said softly, almost disappointedly.
Cas stared back at Dean, completely lost for words. Sam answered instead, in a strangled sort of voice. Cas couldn't bring himself to look up at his expression.
"Do you not remember—not even Mom and Dad? The fight we had when I went to Stanford? Hunting?" Sam's voice rose with every word until he was almost shouting. "Not even going to Hell for thirty damn years, Dean?"
"Sam—" Cas began, which turned out to be a mistake. There was a scuff of shoes on the floor and the next instant Sam had punched him so hard that Cas thought he might have broken at least one finger.
"What the hell did you do to him, you son of a bitch? Give me back my brother!"
Dean lept to his feet and grabbed Sam's jacket, hauling him away from Cas. "Don't you dare touch him," he hissed. With a solid push, he sent Sam sprawling backwards, but he was on him in a minute, hands at his throat.
"Dean!" In an instant, Cas was hauling him off his brother. "No, don't!" Sam didn't even try to stand, just lay there and covered his face with one arm.
Dean flinched away, body shaking. He covered his face and then raked his hands up through his hair before looking to Cas for guidance. "He hurt you!" Dean insisted.
"I know, Dean. I know. But I deserve it." Cas deserved a great deal more than a punch in the face, but there was no sense is trying to explain that to Dean. "Let me heal you, Dean. Please. You had a life before me, I swear. I just want you to have one after me as well."
Dean just stared at Cas. He didn't understand why the angel was acting this way, why he thought that he deserved to be harmed, and it disturbed him. More disturbing, though, were Cas's last words. About a life after him. That didn't make any sense. He made a soft sound of distress in the back of his throat and shook his head at Cas, even though he knew that he shouldn't argue with the angel's wishes. In a breath, he was curling his arms around Cas, crushing his face against the angel's neck and trying very hard not to cry. "But you are my life," he whispered.
"I never used to be," Cas murmured, then shook his head slightly, trying to focus. He drew Dean away from his brother and seated him on the floor again. "Will you let me try to fix you?" Cas asked, sitting in front of him. Of course, he could just order Dean to let him, but that would defeat the purpose.
Dean ducked his head. He knew Cas wanted him to say yes, and that alone should convince him in an instant, but he hesitated. There had been something… wrong with him before. Otherwise Castiel never would have fixed him. And he didn't know if he could deal with that, with being inherently broken. And he couldn't imagine that anyone could possibly want him like that.
"If I do this," Dean said slowly, looking up at Cas and then turning his eyes downward, "and I don't end up the way you want me to be…" He squeezed his eyes shut for a brief moment. "Will you still love me?"
Cas drew Dean against him and held him tightly. "Of course, Dean," he whispered, even though his heart nearly stopped at the thought that Dean would be irreparable. "I'll love you no matter what." The angel hesitated, glancing over at Sam. The hunter had sat up, and Clem was kneeling beside him with a comforting hand on his shoulder. He wasn't looking at either of them. "Sam will too." At that, Sam's head jerked up, and he threw an unreadable glance at Cas.
"What are you going to do now, Cas?" Sam's voice was wary, but the violence of before had passed. The angel tried to give him a reassuring smile.
Cas examined his Grace, calculating the amount this would take. He thought he had enough. He must. "I'm going to try and put your brother back together." He hesitated, then quickly added, "It may get uncomfortably bright in here." He glanced at Sam, then at Clem. Sam would stay, of course, but perhaps Clem would leave. The fewer people in the room, the better; Cas wasn't sure how the hunter would react when he realized what had happened.
"Clem, why don't you find a phone and call the others, tell them where we are and what happened." Sam's words were an order, not a question. The young woman looked back and forth between Sam and Cas for a moment before nodding slowly and standing. She squeezed Sam's shoulder comfortingly, then shakily exited the room, giving the demon's remains a wide berth.
"Very well. Now, Dean." Cas turned his attention back to the hunter, who was waiting patiently in front of him. Every time he saw the dependency in Dean's face Cas wanted to gag, turn away, but he couldn't. He needed to hold himself together, just a little longer, for Dean. Afterwards he could run as far away as the world would allow, but this needed to happen first. "Dean," he said again when he saw the hunter's attention wandering, eyes dropping to Cas's lips before snapping back up to meet his gaze. "This might hurt, but I don't know for sure; I've never done it before. I do know that I can't do it on my own. You need to try to return to who you were, or it won't work."
Dean glanced nervously at his brother, who gave him a small smile that wasn't particularly reassuring. Then he looked back at Cas. With a slight shake of his head, he stared down at his lap. He didn't want to try. It was too much to ask when Dean didn't want to do this to begin with. But because Cas had asked it, he would. That didn't stop him from being nervous, though, and so he reached forward and took Cas's hand in both of his, not holding it as he normally would, but looking at the palm, the delicate lines that ran like tributaries into larger rivers over his skin. He touched the skin there lightly, gently, then turned the hand over, smoothing his thumb over Cas's fingernails and knuckles. There was a strange tremor to Cas's hand that Dean didn't understand, but it was calming for Dean.
Cas shuddered as Dean touched his hands. The contact was so gentle, curious, loving even. It made it ten times worse when Cas realized that Dean would never touch him like this again, assuming the hunter was even willing to look at him once he was healed. Cas sighed heavily, blinking, and felt moisture clinging to his lashes. He shouldn't cry, it would only upset Dean, and yet two tears fell anyway, landing on Dean's hands. "I'm so sorry, Dean."
Dean started and stared at the droplets that were on his hands. Tears. He looked up at the angel and his heart constricted. "Why are you saying that? Why are you apologizing?" he asked, reaching his hands to Cas's face and wiping the tears with his thumbs. "Don't cry, please don't cry, I don't want to make you cry." Dean started to sob too, and he wanted crawl into Cas's space again and be close to him, take in his warmth and stay there, but he didn't because Cas had just seated him where he was. He had never seen the angel cry before, and it scared him. Getting up on his knees, Dean kissed Cas's forehead. "Don't cry, Cas, it's okay, everything's okay." He pulled away and put his forehead against Cas's. "I'll do my best, okay? I promise, I will."
Cas felt as though Dean's tears should burn his skin, because they weren't right and they were Cas's fault, but they didn't. He forced himself to stop crying, cursing his body for betraying him with such a human reaction. Reaching up he wiped his eyes, then Dean's, smiling shakily at the hunter. "Thank you, Dean." He settled Dean on his heels, then changed his mind and pulled the hunter down, arranging him so that he was lying on the floor with his head in Cas's lap.
"I'm going to start now, Dean, and you have to stay still until I'm done." Cas leaned over the hunter, staring down into his wide green eyes as he steeled himself. He wasn't sick anymore and he didn't have unlimited amounts of Grace to use, so he had to do this the hard way. He placed one comforting hand on Dean's cheek, giving him his best reassuring upside-down smile, then sank his free hand into the hunter's chest.
Cas grasped for Dean's soul as gently as he could, but it kept pulling back from him, slipping away, as though it recognized the hand that had so callously damaged it earlier. "Dean, please," Cas gritted through his teeth. "You have to let me touch it, please, just once more, trust me."
Dean's shoulders stiffened as Cas's hand slid into his torso and he let out a strangled cry of pain, wanting to move away, but Cas had told him to be still so he focused on looking up at the underside of Cas's jaw above him. It hurt, but Dean had to try; he had promised. So he forced himself to relax and allow the angel to do what he wanted to him.
Cas knew Dean was listening to him because his soul surrendered to Cas, allowing the angel to touch it despite its fear and pain. Cas was aware that he was muttering reassurances under his breath, a constant stream of "It'll be okay Dean, you'll be all right, everything is fine."
The extent of the damage startled him until he remembered all the soft brushes of Grace, the little reminders that he had given Dean that worked the barbs in further. He felt sick, unworthy of touching Dean again after doing this to him, but there was no one else who could save his hunter so Cas would have to step in.
In his mind, he could envision the compulsion that he had left on Dean, wound about and tangled through his soul like razor wire, and he began to pick at it. His very Grace seemed to be fighting him, but Cas bent it to his will and forged on, tugging his corruption from Dean's mind and piecing back together the fragments of memories Castiel had damaged. Every time Dean twitched under his hands, or moaned, Cas wished he could have just died before laying hands on Dean. He wished that he had burnt out his Grace and withered away in Dean's apartment long before any of this had happened. Tears began to fall from his eyes again but neither he nor Dean noticed.
The pain was overwhelming. Dean felt as if his mind was being dismantled, and he kept getting lost as he tried to follow what Cas was doing to him. He didn't understand, couldn't make sense of it, but every now and again the angel would hesitantly tug at some part of his mind and all of Dean revolted, sure that this was breaking him, sure that Cas was taking out everything that was holding him together. But then he'd hold himself back, tell himself that it was okay, that Cas was making things better, that he just had to trust him. Every time it got harder because the places Cas changed were tender and bleeding and filled with anger and pain and fear. He couldn't see, he couldn't make sense of what was happening, but he told himself he had to hold on a little longer, just a little while longer. He followed Cas closer, wanting him out, barely keeping himself from trying to remove him. He couldn't keep this up much longer, as the sense of hurt, of betrayal, choked him tighter and tighter.
Cas could feel Dean's growing discomfort, knew that the hunter wanted him out of his mind, and he tried to move faster, tried to clear out all of the hidden places where some portion of his poison might be hiding. If he didn't get it all, if he left some of Dean's mind freed and some of it still under his influence… Cas didn't know what would happen. Maybe Dean would finally shatter under the weight of his conflicting emotions, into tiny fragments of stardust that Cas would never be able to piece together again.
So the angel moved his free hand from Dean's face to his shoulder, pinning him as he began to resist, searching out every speck of himself from Dean's soul and banishing it. "Just a little longer, Dean," he begged. "A little more and I swear I'll never touch you again." The words broke his heart, but he meant them.
He was still there, the bastard, still doing things to him and Dean had had enough of that, had had enough of his murmured comforts that meant nothing, had had enough of his hands on his soul. Only a small part of him still told him to wait, that Cas would be gone in a minute, that Cas was helping him, freeing him. But the son of a bitch was the one who had done it in the first place and that was something Dean couldn't even begin to understand. And it hurt, overwhelmingly, and Dean wasn't sure that he could take it any longer. It would be so easy to just let himself crumble under it, to stop trying to heal his wounds and just rest. The pain was too enormous to fight anymore. But he had to keep fighting because he was Dean Winchester and that's what he did. Except… that person was gone, wasn't he? So what was the point of fighting?
"Sam," Cas gasped, as he felt Dean wavering. He had underestimated himself, underestimated his own cruelty, and now the pain of being purged was crushing Dean. "Sam, you need to talk to Dean. Tell him to hold on." Cas hardly knew what he was saying because he wasn't finished yet but Dean was fighting him now, him and the pain and he couldn't defeat them both.
Sam jerked back to reality when he heard Cas call his name—he had been mesmerized by the glow of what he could only assume was Dean's soul interacting with Cas's Grace. Now he scrambled across the floor to his brother's side. Dean's eyes were half-open but glassy, and he was panting harshly as though in great pain. He hadn't thought that they might lose Dean now, right on the cusp of getting him back to normal, and the revelation terrified Sam. "Dammit! Dean, it's Sam, all right? You've got to hold on." Sam took his brother's hand and squeezed gently, then harder when Dean clenched his fingers around Sam's own. He was careful not to disrupt Cas from whatever he was doing. "Come on man, stay with me," Sam pleaded.
Dean couldn't do this. He was going to die. Simple as that. He didn't even mind; it would be easier. The pain would be gone, Castiel would be gone, everything would fade. It was already fading, the pain was whiting everything into oblivion, and he reached out to embrace the whiteness.
But then he heard his brother's voice. Dammit. The poor fool couldn't just let him go. Except Dean was the fool because he was the one who knew that dying would be a kindness and Sam was just blindly calling his name in the dark. Sam didn't know anything that was happening. Yes, Dean was a fool because he started to fight again, and when his brother gripped his hand somewhere at the edge of his consciousness, he clamped hard over his fingers, grounding himself. And the pain that had been fading came back, doubled, because Cas was still in his mind, still hurting him, and Dean cursed him, chasing through the trail of ruin in his mind, not sure if he should try to reconstruct the lesions left behind or if he should find Cas and tear at him until he fled.
Cas pulled the last scrap of tainted Grace from Dean's mind and continued attempting to heal the damage left behind, but then felt the hunter's presence there, cursing him, full of incoherent rage that had no words and a pain so deep it was a wonder he was still alive. The angel obeyed the half-understood threats, dragging himself away from Dean, trying to help the hunter patch himself up, but the force of Dean's thoughts was too great for the weakened angel and he tumbled back to himself with a dismayed gasp.
He released Dean's soul and scrambled away from the hunter, barely cognizant of Sam cursing and catching Dean's head before it could smack the floor. Cas cowered in the farthest corner of the room, Grace extinguished, unable to fly, too weak to even stand. He imagined that he could still feel the force of Dean's wrath and betrayal even from here, and he curled away, wrapping his arms around his head and drawing his legs up like a frightened child. His shoulders shook with sobs as he waited for the inevitable explosion that he knew was not far.
Sam was still talking to Dean, saying anything that came to mind and praying his brother's hand wasn't about to go limp in his, when Cas suddenly jerked like he'd been electrocuted. Sam's cry of "What the hell, ~Cas?" went unnoticed as the angel struggled to put as much distance as he could between himself and Dean. Sam could only stare in shock as the angel shied away from them, balling himself up until he was just a shivering lump of canvas. Sam was about to ask what had happened when Dean stirred in his hands.
"Dean?" he croaked, voice choosing now of all times to die on him. "Hey man, look at me, you all right?"
