There was pain, pain, and more pain. But there was no twisted sexual pleasure. No demonic lust coursing through Dean's brain, making him long for agony, death, and orgasm.
Just pain. And that meant this was real.
Shit. This was real.
Dean stopped crying—not that he was crying—his eyes were just allergic to needles repeatedly piercing his skin and muscles. The room stretched and wobbled when he opened his eyes, but he saw enough before closing them again to realize he was on his back on the table in the old man's kitchen, still a hundred years in the past. But at least Cas was still here, too.
Ough, that was a selfish thought. Dean hated himself for it. He also hated the fact he couldn't let go of Castiel's hand, but the angel had slipped his fingers into the spaces between Dean's, and nothing had felt so good in over a week. While white-hot flames licked up and down his thigh, the power of Castiel's firm, constant touch against his palm rivaled the sting, and Dean needed it. He wanted to curl his body around that hand.
"Dean."
Castiel's voice was a breeze through the trees. A sip of fine brandy. The warmth of a campfire.
"Dean, I'm so—"
Dean squeezed the other man's hand. If the angel apologized one more time for things that weren't his fault, something inside Dean would shatter. He wasn't sure if he would break things or fall into a depression too deep to crawl out of, but he knew it would be bad either way. So he held on tight and hoped Cas understood his silent plea.
The angel's heavy sigh indicated the affirmative, and Dean exhaled a shaky breath.
The hunter wasn't willing to open his eyes. If he were to see Cas while feeling the man's hand in his… that would open up painful possibilities. If Castiel were embarrassed or disgusted, every inch of his face would show it, and Dean would be forced to accept Cas's distaste of the hand-holding moment. But right now, Dean didn't have to look. He didn't have to see if Cas hated how Dean had grabbed for him, if he despised the contact or felt disappointed in Dean. So the hunter kept his eyes closed and held on, both to Castiel's hand and the fantasy that Cas might need to feel Dean's hand just as badly.
Doc brought a chair to Castiel, and the angel sat beside the table with a soft grunt of discomfort followed by a murmured, "Thank you."
Dean focused on breathing. There was sharp, stabbing pain; deep, aching pain; labored inhale pain; in-the-wrong-year pain; the can't speak pain and emotional weakness pain. But there was also the warmth of Cas's hand, and Dean made it take up all the vacant space in his mind. Between every pointed barb of fear and all the hollow dread, Castiel's touch smoothed every edge.
Things went foggy. There were sounds of footsteps overhead and below him. A cold shiver made his muscles clench and pulled at the fresh stitches. Dean hissed. Someone placed another blanket over the first, weighing him down. He grew aware of hushed conversation, mostly between Doc and the kid.
Suddenly, Castiel's hand spasmed. Dean struggled back to awareness.
"—Can't leave yet!" Doc was screaming. "I need you to help me with him."
The kid, Jamie, sounded wrung-out when he replied, "Doc, I have to go. If I'm late they'll—"
"Fire you? Nonsense. They need every able-bodied man they can get. Just a few minutes more, then you're free to leave."
"Doc, I can't help you with that."
What did Doc need help with? Was it to do with Dean? Did he need more stitches? Please don't let it be stitches.
Doc's voice sounded strained with false cheer.
"Of course you can, Jamie, my boy! You're doing great."
Dean forced his eyes open, and the room didn't wobble as it had before. The wooden beams stayed straight. The ceiling did not warp. Castiel looked like a statue of marble, pale and unmoving, jaw set and blue eyes fixed forward. Dean shifted his head to the right to see Doc Emmerson and Jamie facing each other. Blood smattered Doc's shirt and pants. He was wiping his hands with a rag that came away red. Poor Jamie looked a shade of green.
"Doc," he breathed. "I can't."
"What utter nonsense," said the doctor as he advanced a step. "You found these two men. You brought them here, you must—"
"I haven't got the stomach for it!"
Silence followed Jamie's panicked outburst.
The young man jerked his head away and stared at the floor, his mouth in a deep frown.
"I'm sorry," he whispered. "I thought I could but…" He balled his hands into fists. He wore his shoulders like earrings. "I can't take any more blood."
Doc studied the young man with a sympathetic gaze.
"All right," he said with a weary smile. "I understand."
"I'm sorry." Jamie turned and hurried from the house without looking up. When he was gone, the doctor turned his attention to Dean and Cas. He opened his mouth, shut it, then leaned back against his sink and crossed his arms.
"Well, we're in a tight spot, fellas," Doc announced. "Dean, how about you try sitting up? Go slow."
Dean grit his teeth and bore down on pure grit and determination to pull himself into a sitting position. His head swam, and while he knew he and Cas still held hands, he also felt more strange about it in a seated position. But the angel hadn't tried to let go yet so neither would Dean. Not as long as the blanket covered their hands, at least.
"How you feeling?" asked Doc.
Dean glared until Doc caught on.
"Oh, right. We should see if we can get you some paper or something."
That was a good idea. And maybe it would be easier to figure out what to say to Cas if Dean could write it all down. He imagined what his opening lines might be.
I'm sorry you're stuck here.
It's all my fault this happened.
I was an idiot—but so were you for following me.
I don't know everything the demoness did to you while she wore my body, but it wasn't me. It wasn't me.
Doc interrupted his thoughts. "I need to patch up Cas's shoulder. Can you help me with that?"
A repeating image of the spear going through Cas flashed before Dean's open eyes, and it staggered him. He gripped the angel's hand and the edge of the table to stay upright and rooted here instead of there. But as he looked to the doctor, the short horror film of Cas being impaled repeated on a loop. His anguished howl pierced Dean's eardrums, echoing. Dean trembled.
Cas spoke his name, worried. His hand tightened its hold.
Dean stared at the real-life Cas, (who looked concerned and afraid), and tried to scrub the nightmare vision from his brain. That horror was in the past. Cas had survived. They had to move forward, now. It was time to fix Cas, and Dean couldn't afford to lose his mind.
The images faded.
"I can h—" Dean swallowed his silence and nodded.
Doc seemed grateful for half a second; then his expression fell into deep thought and an even deeper frown.
"Cas," he said.
The angel lifted his chin.
Doc continued, "I think it best for you to tell me exactly what happened and what I might find in that shoulder. I want to be as prepared as possible for what to expect."
Castiel's voice took on a vacant husk, a tone Dean knew well and despised for its lack of humanity. Castiel never sounded more like his old self than when speaking of things like this—of confessions that should be emotional but seemed like nothing more than a comment on the weather.
"The woman had a spear. The spike was probably seven inches long and made of steel. My arms were tied above my head when she stabbed my shoulder. I assume she pulled the spear out the same way it came in, but I wasn't conscious then so I can't be sure."
"Dean, is that accurate?" Doc asked.
Dean nodded and realized with a sinking in his gut that the time to release Cas's hand had come. The angel's voice indicated how far he'd withdrawn. There was no way he would want to be physically connected to Dean now. So the hunter released the other man's fingers, took the top blanket from his lap and wrapped it around his shoulders. His empty stomach churned.
"Next question," Doc began. "How long was it openly bleeding?"
Cas looked pale and confused. It seemed he wanted to turn and look at Dean but stopped himself and stared at Doc Emmerson instead.
"An hour?" he guessed.
Dean held up six fingers.
Doc looked appalled. "Six hours?"
With his hand and a teetering motion, Dean indicated he'd given his best guess, but it might have been a little more or less. A lot depended on the events of the Succubus-as-Dean and Castiel after they were out of his sight. But Dean felt the passing of each minute of his life as Castiel lay unmoving and bloodied on the floor of the basement, and he knew that was at least six hours.
"Christ almighty," Doc swore. "I knew it was a miracle you both survived, but now I'm wondering if you ain't angels or demons yourselves."
Cas choked and brought his left hand up to his face. Dean longed to hold those trembling fingers again.
After a sharp breath, Cas monotoned, "We aren't."
Doc's voice matched. "Then you're the luckiest sons of bitches I ever met. Now, how did you clean the wound? How did you stop the bleeding?"
Castiel replied, "It—um—I don't think anyone cleaned it. Unless the dem—woman did while I was unconscious?"
Dean shook his head. The demoness had cut Castiel down, let him fall like a sack of bricks and lay in his blood.
Dean glanced at Doc to gauge whether that was bad or very bad news. The inner corner of the doctor's left eye twitched. His mouth seemed too tight to form words, but he hummed and annoyed 'continue' sound.
Cas did so. "And Dean used strips of my clothing."
Dean's heart pounded against his ribs like desperate fists on a locked door. This was where his and Castiel's stories began to differ. This was the fork in the road where Dean remained trapped and alone, and Cas believed he'd escaped with a friend while remaining in enemy hands.
"Did he bandage your shoulder?"
"He stuffed the wound."
Doc blinked. Dean forgot how.
The tense silence shattered with a word from the doctor. "Explain."
The tremble in Castiel's fingers extended up to his shoulders.
"He… he filled the wound with strips of fabric. He used his fingers and pushed them in. The puncture might go all the way through. I-I'm not sure. But it's at least as deep and long as Dean's first three fingers."
The corners of Dean's vision flooded with red. Abject horror made him feel like a bomb ticking down to an explosion. Tick, tick, tick.
Castiel stared at his hands—his shaking hands—and his voice rose in pitch.
"I think he thought I'd pass out, but I didn't, and he kept going." Emotion crept into his tone, a hysteria, a high-pitched tension in his throat that transformed his voice into something unfamiliar and painful. "He held me down, so I didn't thrash much. I-I don't think it did more damage."
There was no blinking, no breathing, and no moving under the weight of Doc's judgment. Tick, tick, tick, tick. Dean was about ready to die.
"I see." The doctor's voice was deep. His searing gaze burned Dean's skin. "And did he make a sling for your arm?"
Tick, tick—
"In a sense. He tied my wrists to a pipe so I couldn't move and hurt myself further."
BOOM.
Dean lurched over the side of the table and vomited violently. Only bile and hurking noises came out.
That fucking BITCH!
Dean wrapped both arms around his middle and convulsed again, spewing nothing but acid and rage.
She would fucking pay. Goddamn her.
And goddamn himself as well. If Cas could believe Dean would treat him that way under any circumstances, Dean had been the worst friend in the world.
"We need to get that wound cleared, cleaned and stitched." Doc's voice was firm and sharp. "Cas, you want a drink?"
Castiel shook his head.
"Dean, you?"
Dean unwrapped one arm to present an empty, grabbing hand. The bottle slapped against his palm, his fingers gripped it weakly, and he drank several gulps like a desperate fish. It burned all the way down and then some, throat stinging, gut revolting. But Dean kept the liquor inside. He needed the booze to take the edge off. This was fucking awful, and it was only going to get worse.
Filthy, sweat-stained, bloody fabric had been stuffed in Castiel's shoulder for days now. His body might have started healing over. Doc would probably have to open the wound again to get it out. And everyone thought it was Dean's doing.
Ultimately, it was.
Dean had the urge to upchuck again but gripped his stomach and forced down more liquor instead.
Doc removed the bottle from his hands and gave him a stern glare. "Enough."
Dean nodded.
Doc turned to Castiel. "This is going to be very painful."
Cas's jaw flared. He nodded.
"I am sorry."
"It's okay," he rasped.
But it wasn't. None of this was okay.