Well you can excommunicate me on my way to Sunday school
and have all the bishops harmonize these lines -
how do you dare tell me that I'm my Father's son
when that was just an accident of Birth.
I'd rather look around me - compose a better song
`cos that's the honest measure of my worth.
- "Wind Up," Jethro Tull
It's another hour before Castiel walks out of the courtroom and into the hall, and he doesn't make it two steps past that before Dean has him by the elbow seemingly from out of nowhere, directing him into a blessedly quiet room. Charlie's computer is humming on the table, but the redhead herself is conspicuously absent as Dean lets himself be enfolded into a hug.
Castiel tucks his face into the bend of Dean's neck, closes his eyes, and tries to ignore the nagging sense of everything going wrong as Dean tightens his arms around Castiel's back, the hand between his shoulder blades unconsciously attempting to soothe away the knotted muscles there. "Sorry I picked a fight. Didn't know what else to do."
It's such a distant concern that Castiel can't help a humorless puff of laughter, warm against Dean's throat. Dean sounds gruff, even in apology, and Castiel releases him slowly, making himself step back. "You have nothing to apologize for. I think I undermined your entire court case, so . . ."
"You finish that sentence and I'm going to kick you in the ankle." Jo Harvelle, for all her stature, picked up her mother's intimidating presence. She looks decidedly more ruffled than she did before Castiel took the stand, her carefully pulled back hair escaping in blonde curls that frame her face from her tense fidgeting in the courtroom. She braces a heeled shoe against the door to hold it open for Charlie, who slips in past her carrying drinks from the vending machine for all of them.
"I. . ." Castiel has no idea what to say to that, glancing at Dean to try and get him to explain why he's being threatened.
"She will." Dean supplies unhelpfully, and he steps forward to relieve Charlie of half of the drinks, slapping a bottle of water into Cas's hand. "And it hurts like a sunuvabitch."
"Darn right it does." Jo settles herself onto the table beside Dean, legs crossed at the ankle, and she accepts the drink Charlie hands her with a smile at Sam's assistant that seems the flirtatious feminine counterpart of Dean's charm. "The guy's a snake, Cas. I told you, he did the same thing to my mom and me. Unless you're saying you're smarter than us. . ."
The threat is implicit.
Fingertips pressing to his eyes, trying to force the pain behind them away, Castiel's palms are still clammy as he drags his hands down his face. She means well, they all mean well, but it's just more words to push him and prod him in a direction—guilt or innocence, his own culpability in everything. . . What's the difference between being conversationally led by Crowley, or by the Harvelles? Just because it's something he'd like to hear? He's not ready to forgive himself. He can't handle being useless, and he's useless at words. He needs to be doing something.
"How long until Dean's testimony?"
"Henriksen flipped the other three guys against Hardey and Etheridge. Guess they couldn't afford the lawyer or the county had them on something else. They plea bargained, and part of that is testifying against the other two. He's going to get them up on the stand, and Crowley's going to have to take a crack at them too. So. Couple hours, maybe?" Charlie shugs, spreading her hands slightly. She's good at her job, but she's not psychic.
Three out of five. They've already compromised, the justice system deciding for Dean what justice is, meting out lesser punishments to some: the two who Dean dealt with and one who ran. Lesser punishments because they were handled by the Omega in the situation? Because one fled rather than fight an Alpha?
Feisty little bitch.
Castiel's headache spikes as he remembers the words, and he can still picture Dean's expression as he was pressed up against the car, how his face twisted into the snarl of a man with nothing to lose, who wanted to die. The assailant who encouraged Dean to 'squirm' because it excited him was given a deal. Opening his eyes, he watches the faintly sickened look on his mate's face, and Castiel would wager he's thinking the same, or that it's dragged him off somewhere else in his mind. With a breath, though, Dean's determination is back, and the stubborn jut of his jaw draws Cas's hand in unintentionally. Cupping Dean's cheek, he steps forward and kisses his mate tenderly, sex the farthest thing from his mind, just a brief press of lips because he needs to ground himself and because he thinks Dean may need it as well.
"Don't mind me. Not weird at all, being trapped on the table by Dean making out with someone." Jo drawls from where she's still perched right beside Dean, and Cas registers the soft thump of Jo being whacked on the arm by an empty plastic bottle, Charlie coming to their defense. Dean breaks the kiss anyway, and rests his forehead against Cas's.
"Crusading?"
Castiel shrugs slightly, accepting the terminology as Dean's fingers release their grip on his hair, palm sliding down the back of his neck and coming to a rest on his shoulder, warm and steadying. He's not sure how Dean is doing this, keeping a level head for both of them, offering Castiel comfort even knowing what he's going to be facing. He's a little in awe of Dean's strength of will, and that twists something in his gut because he knows what Crowley would have to say about that, what the jury and the courtroom thinks of that regard now.
The rest of this trial, win or lose, has fallen squarely on Dean's testimony. Castiel is not going to miss that. "I'll be back."
"Yeah, okay Schwarzenegger." Another reference he doesn't get. Cas tries not to bristle at it, so soon after being mocked for his lack of pop culture awareness, but Dean is perceptive and the hand on his shoulder squeezes at the tense muscles before releasing him.
Castiel doesn't linger—his abrupt departure is probably rude to the two women in the room, but his head is splitting and his patience for anything doing with the court case is at its end. He knows Dean will understand and is probably stuck making apologies for him.
The sun is blisteringly hot overhead, and there's no wind to speak of today to relieve the summer heat. Castiel ignores it on his walk; somehow it seems like weakness to give in to that, the suit and tie his armor against the church looming before him and everything it symbolizes.
Not to the world, but to him personally.
It's beautiful, imposing, but somehow inviting; the doors swing open at a touch, and the air of the vestibule is a cooling balm, a haven against a harsh world. The church is a façade of brick and stone, a fortress of spiritual protection barely containing a kaleidoscope of colors, the sunlight painting the stained glass images like watercolor against the pews and floors. The anger he's been clinging to, trying to prepare himself by building, wavers as he dips his fingers into the baptismal font at the door, making the sign of the cross on reflex.
He imagines explaining this to Dean, the spiritualistic symbolism of rebaptism every time you enter the church, recommitting and purifying yourself. He can picture Dean's tolerant skepticism, just shy of incredulity. Dean isn't a man of faith, religious or otherwise: his trust is something earned, not offered. Castiel gives his faith more freely, and has had it stomped on more often than he cares to admit—and now the world thinks he's a fool for it.
It's instinct to genuflect to the tabernacle and the steady light of the sanctuary lamp that symbolizes God's presence as he approaches the front of the church. It would be disrespectful not to, everything he's been taught reinforces that. Castiel isn't certain what he believes, any more. He knows that he still believes in God. They just haven't always been on speaking terms, over the past several years. The Church, though. . .
It's difficult separating the two concepts in his mind.
The last time he was on his knees, he was worshipping a very different idol; Dean's hands in his hair and his body a canvas painted in signs of Castiel's affections. Now he lights a candle and tries to put the image aside as he drops his eyes from the crucifix and down to watch the drag of the match catching. This feels like the last time he will light a candle in prayer, the symbolic offering to God as he sends his silent fears and his hopes and his pleas to the heavens.
The votive candles smell like rose petals, clean and pure, but vaguely indulgent even outside of his rather Spartan ideals. This was something he never had when he was a priest; he'd never had a parish, a church to call his own—he was the church, the symbol of faith for the soldiers under his care, and whether they were in tents, prison cells, hospital rooms, beneath the open desert sky, or in the featureless Chapel of military bases, it was all window dressing.
St. John the Evangelist has been his church since coming to Lawrence, though, and he knows it nearly as well as he did the apartment he was evicted from. He never took the Eucharist here, never accepted communion. He stayed in his pew as the faithful shuffled past to accept their bread and wine, the lone adult still seated in rows of empty pews. The priest watched him with sad eyes as he left Mass every Sunday without completing the sacrament, but never gave him a condemning word or asked him to leave, even offering an ear when Castiel lost a patient or while he was struggling to find his way.
He can feel those eyes on him now, hear the creak of the door into the rectory closing, and he finishes his prayer quietly before rising to his feet.
Settled onto the first pew, elbows across his knees, Father Joshua is nothing like the hard-nosed priests of Castiel's seminary days. His collared shirt sits on him comfortably, unstarched but clean, emphasizing a physique long gone to seed. He's approachable, grandfatherly, unassuming, and wise—he is precisely what Castiel never could have become in the clergy, possessing of a quiet, steady faith that Cas has envied.
"Saw you on the news." Joshua's voice is like antique parchment, coarse and faintly rasping with age. "Wondered if you'd be coming around."
"I'm not here for confession." Castiel warns, and Joshua doesn't blink or respond, as if somehow he knew that. There are younger clergymen, here, tending to the school across the street, handling most of the Masses, leaving the senior priest to his early Sunday morning sermons, his quiet confessionals, and to the gardens at the back of the church. Castiel would have been fine railing at any of the other priests here for the role of the Church in the world, but there's something about Joshua's steady gaze that drops Castiel instead to sit on the steps up to the alter, putting himself on eye level. It's maddening, being so angry at the institution itself without being able to direct that frustration onto any one person within it. "I need to send a message. I'm asking to be relieved of my final vows."
"Chastity?" Joshua's look is knowing, but not judgmental. "I assumed. That's not a bell you can unring, Castiel." He is tired of this, tired of everyone looking at him and knowing intimate details about his life, or assuming them, just because of his relationship. Jaw bunching, he stares flatly at Joshua until the older priest sighs, solemn and sympathetic. "I suppose it's to be expected. Three months ago, though, you were up drinking in my rafters saying you didn't fit out there, and considering returning to the fold. I had hoped. . ."
"I'm leaving the church." He doesn't need to be reminded of how poorly he fits in; he knows. Everyone reminds him—Zachariah rubbed his face it in daily at work, Crowley has underlined it, and even Dean doesn't quite understand him. Dean accepts him, though. He's had acceptance before, but never recognized what it meant until he was alone—Gabriel, Emmanuel, Inias, Balthazar and Jimmy embraced him in childhood, even if they were all so different. Anna and Alfie had welcomed him into their unit, made him family to the soldiers there not just their spiritual counsel. And now Dean has given it to him again, folded him into his own broken little family and made him feel welcome in their lives. He'd been looking for acceptance from the church, as well—though they understood him no better than anyone else—because God was supposed to understand, accept, and forgive.
He had that before, but he slammed the door on it in his grief. Acceptance found him, though, when he needed it most and thought he deserved it least. And now he sees that he's become one half of something that the church can never accept.
"Can't argue with a man in love." Joshua shakes his head, quietly fond, and presses his hands against his knees, leaning forward. "Said I saw you on the news, and I saw your friend with you. I'm old, Castiel, not blind. And not all of us take as direct a route into the church as you did." As Joshua begins rising to his feet from the pew, Castiel beats him to standing, offering a hand to help. "I just hope you know what you're doing."
"I don't." Castiel admits, and he can hear the door opening in the vestibule but ignores it in favor of silently giving his plea for help to the priest before him. "We're making it up as we go. But the Church. . ."
"'The Church,' unlike me, is a little myopic sometimes." Joshua finishes for him, clapping a gnarled hand to Castiel's arm. "I'll pass along your message, Castiel. You just tell me where to send them when they come trying to talk you out of it."
His phone number, the parish in Sioux Falls nearest to Dean's home, and the basics of his request are penned in his block letters as neat as he can make his scrawl, then handed off to the elderly priest with his thanks. Father Joshua calls out to him as he starts past the altar towards the main aisle, his voice carrying in the empty church.
"I'm rooting for you out there, son. But he'd best be good to you." The message isn't for him, and meeting Joshua's gaze across the distance between them, he knows that.
Castiel genuflects at the end of the pew, down to one knee and murmuring the proper Latin as he gives the sign of the cross one last time to the symbol of his faith, vaguely self-conscious of the eyes on him. Dean is leaning against the entry as he turns back, arms folded across his chest with his suit jacket tucked over his elbow, foot braced against the archway as he watches with grave curiosity as Castiel says farewell to the religion that helped to shape and define him.
Dean touches two fingertips to his forehead a vague salute to Father Joshua's 'orders,' and then falls in beside Castiel as they take the steps down and veer towards the park between courthouse and church, again.
Castiel doesn't let himself look back, and after a few minutes he shoves his hands into his pockets, lets out a controlled breath, and begins briefing Dean on what to expect from Crowley in the courtroom.
xXx
The only way this situation could be more awkward for Dean is if Bobby, Benny and Garth managed to show up from Sioux Falls carting John Winchester's ghost in to make sure the whole gang made it, just for maximum discomfort. Maybe they could televise it into all the bars he's frequented over the years, just to make sure everyone gets the full effect of his fucked up life. Barring that unlikely scenario, though, everyone whose opinion he cares about is taking a front seat to the freak show, and there's no real point to asking them to leave.
This is a test run for what his life is going to become. He'd better get used to court cases and his dirty laundry being aired in public, even if it's unsettling as hell that even frikkin' Ash, the guy who's been crashing on the pool table at Ellen's for the past decade, is listening intently, or that his grade school teacher is still scowling at him, and that it looks like his little brother is about to start taking notes or something.
He sent Castiel into his testimony angry, hoping to make him ignore all of this crap and react instinctively, but Dean needs to try a different approach. He's got one shot to make an impression that's got to last while Crowley trots in every person he can to tear Dean down. It could be days of trial once Crowley takes the floor, and reading over the subpoenaed defense witnesses didn't tell him everything to expect. He shook his head grimly at a few completely unrecognized names as she read them out, reading the computer screen over Charlie's shoulder.
He's trying not to think about what these faceless strangers know about him—he's got a few ideas, given his history. None of them are good.
Henriksen, for all it's his first time questioning Dean on the stand, is respectful and professional, though it still leaves Dean bruised and trying to hide it, trying to ignore his family as he recounts being raped and beaten as a teenager. Someone could probably argue that Henriksen's examination of Dean as a witness goes better than Sam's did, though Dean wouldn't ever tell Sam that. Henriksen's not as emotionally compromised by this case as Sam was having to question his big brother on the stand, and it's not a fair comparison. Sam's an awesome attorney; he was just a little too close to the issue, and it was his first time hearing most of this. He doesn't dig, though: Henriksen's reluctance to put a 'victim' through hell on the stand seem to be pretty consistent. Henriksen isn't the problem here.
The problem is the smarmy jackass who leans against the witness stand after the prosecutor sits down; there's something about Crowley's expression that makes Dean want to punch the guy's teeth in. He's smug: he knows he played Cas, and he's certain he can do it again to Dean.
Castiel's a really straightforward guy (if only mostly honest), but Dean's been a conman most of his life. He's had to be. He's convincingly lived a lie since he got out of Lawrence, and covered for his Dad for years long before then. More importantly, though, he's talked himself out of more trouble than he's even had to fight his way out of, and this round isn't nearly as high of stakes for him as Castiel's trial had been. For now, he's fine. His anger is like a few shots of whiskey, a slow burn warming him from the inside out, just enough to be slightly reckless, with the rest a reservoir of bitter frustration he can reach for if he has to.
"Dean, how would you describe your relationship with Father Novak?"
Dean arches an eyebrow slightly, leaning back in the witness chair and folding his arms, his voice sarcastic. "Well, Fergus, so far so good. He can't cook for crap, but I think I'll keep him anyway." Dean lowers his voice slightly, a challenge in his eyes. "Wouldn't call him 'Father,' though. He hasn't been a priest in like eight years, and he's not into roleplay. I don't think he wants you calling him Daddy, either."
Someone in the room brays laughter, and others on Crowley's side of the courtroom rumble discontentedly. Judge Turner's call for order settles the room again, but doesn't drag Crowley's stare away from Dean, eyes narrowed as he considers his next approach. It's worth Cas's amusing attempt to neither sulk nor look embarrassed, just to have scored a point and made them both a bit more human, all while underlining how ridiculously transparent how Crowley chose to refer to them was. He just watched Cas turn his back on the church, and the irritated squint at Crowley from across the room was sign enough that it bothered Cas, so why not fuck with Crowley right back?
Outside of the courtroom, Dean gets the feeling this guy would probably have a snarky rejoinder . . . possibly even beat Dean for the sarcasm. Dean wants to remind him that Cas isn't the only one in the room who'd have to mind what they say. Dean's smile is tight, pointed, and weaponized.
He doesn't care if these people think he's a sarcastic shit. It's probably the most accurate impression they'll be given of him this entire trial.
"Mr. Winchester. . ." Crowley distances himself verbally and physically, and the walk across the room puts Dean's assailants in his line of sight, making him tense in his chair again reflexively. "…do you know what 'Slick' is?"
"Cheaper than lube, and better. But you'd have to actually get an Omega into it to know that, so I figure that's what's throwing you off." What the hell kind of question is that? Planning to ask if he knows how a dick works, next?
"Clever." There's something predatory about Crowley, and not in a way Dean's used to. He doesn't seem even remotely sexually interested in Dean, but he's a professional predator, and sees Dean as prey while he's on the stand. Plucking up a piece of paper from the table beside Hardey and Etheridge, he reads off of it. "Lutropin and human chorionic gonadotropics, LH-hCG, combined with dydrogesterone and. . ." Crowley drops the paper from before him, disarming in his smarmy way. "…Well, then it just becomes a mess of chemical formula. Maybe we could ask your mate to help, it is his area of expertise, isn't it?"
The offhand remark has Dean's gaze darting to Castiel, whose furrowed brow and concentrated stare at Crowley and the paper he's holding is pretty clear indication that he'd like to see for himself, but it's not what Crowley is actually aiming at.
"So, I'll ask again. Do you know what Slick is, Mr. Winchester?"
Yeah, he's figured it out now, he just never knew there was a catchy street name for it. Dean takes a deep breath, closing his eyes, and when he opens them again he speaks through a clenched jaw without looking at anyone in particular. "The heat drugs."
"The kind favored by Omega prostitutes, for the effect it has on Alpha potential clients." Crowley agrees, flattening his hand on the paper at the table indicatively. "The exact same drugs found in your blood tests the last time you wrongfully accused an Alpha of rape."
The reactions overlap each other, Henriksen's powerful voice not managing to override Dean's snarl. "Objection!"
"You mean the last time some asshole lawyer. . ."
The gavel is like a thunder clap in the room, Rufus Turner's impatience with their courtroom drama silencing all parties with a curt demand that the two attorneys approach the bench. There's a moment where Crowley's locked eyes with Dean, and there's something almost like a smirk threatening to tug up the corner of his mouth, before he joins Henriksen at the sidebar.
Shit. Shit, he was being baited and he fell for it. Scrubbing a hand over his hair, Dean shakes himself off mentally, and makes himself look to his family as the judge and two lawyers begin a heated debate in lowered voices, keeping the jury out of their issues. He's tried not to look at his family too much; he fixed on Henriksen through his testimony, feeling like a selfish jackass for it the entire time. He couldn't handle looking at them while talking about being pinned down and raped as a kid, can't handle seeing Ellen remember the damage, Sam trying to piece together childhood memories in his head to match, or the others forced to imagine it.
He's up there ripping apart his own carefully projected image, and he's too chickenshit to handle seeing he aftermath as he does it. But it's clear right now that there's aftermath to see. Ellen has a hand on Sam and on Jo both, one between Jo's shoulder blades comfortingly, and fingers of her other hand curled over the top of Sam's shoulder as if to keep him in his seat while providing a mother's comfort, his brother's hand white knuckled over the edge of the wall as if he'd been about to leverage himself to his feet and give objection himself. His brother was crying or trying not to cry earlier (he can tell, he can always tell, and that stab of failure at his primary objective is hard to ignore) and is furious now, staring at the lawyers as if he can will himself into the conversation to argue down Crowley's tactics.
Ash is leaned around Jo on the seat to talk to Ellen, voice low but an urgency in his face that seems strange on the typically laid-back stoner, and Dean can see the glow from his lap that's either a tablet or phone hidden behind the wall from the jury and the bailiff—the Harvelles are researching something, and from the looks of it it's not going well. Dean's eyes skim over Charlie beside him, where she seems to be counting jury, before locking on Castiel.
Cas looks wounded, meeting Dean's eyes across the room.
Someday, Dean is going to get up the nerve to ask what it's like being on the other side of their relationship, to be the one apparently receiving whatever the hell Dean's putting out at any given time. He's seen Cas recoil before Dean has the time to freak out, or start shifting in his seat and growing hard because Dean was in the mood, and he's seen him even fast asleep curl a protective arm around Dean because he woke up silently terrified, living in his nightmares. Dean's used it, too, laid a hand on Cas's arm and calmed him down just by making himself calmer, though he wasn't thinking about it in terms of them being mates. It's obviously vague, and obviously subconscious, and less comic book telepathy than it is one of those cheap mood rings from a cereal box, but the fact that Cas can read him even that much freaked him out when they met, and now...
He's not sure why none of his family can see it. Even with Castiel's usual stoicism his eyes are red rimmed and creased at the corners like he's in pain, a furrow in his brow. His shoulders are square, his chin level, his posture precise and militaristic, but otherwise he looks like Dean feels.
He warned Cas, told him that he didn't want to hitch himself to Dean and all his baggage, and now here it is paying the cost for it. They all are. He's fucking Cas up, screwing with his head.
The old self-loathing has hit in full force by the time he wrenches his eyes away from Cas and looks to the attorneys, the meeting with the judge is breaking. Henriksen flashes him a look that's simultaneously angry and apologetic as he returns to his seat, and Dean doesn't need to know more than that. It was too much to hope they'd shut Crowley down.
"Mr. Winchester, five years ago you were under the employ of Alastair Hawthorne, when..."
"No." He can taste bile, and he flexes his wrists unconsciously, testing against a phantom pain, as he addresses the wood grain of the witness stand in his interruption. "Five years ago Alastair dropped something in my drink at a bar, shoved me into the trunk of his car, and then I spent four months being drugged into heat and sold in shitty bars and empty warehouses. He wasn't my employer, he was my master."
Such an obedient little slut for me, aren't you Dean-o? Just look how you open up and take him. You were made for this.
His chest is tight, his voice reedy with the constriction. There's nothing here, he's free, no cords, no weight pressing him against the concrete, scraping him raw. He's on display up here on the stand, but there's no rack keeping him there. Its his mind that's cracked open and raw and bleeding memories. And like fuck is he going to let some little bastard like Crowley see that.
"So now you're alleging that all of your many clients also sexually assaulted you?"
Ah-ah-ah! Good pets know when to beg, don't they? He wants to hear you, bitch. Beg for his knot, Dean-o, and maybe we'll take this off you. You'd like that, wouldn't you, you little slut?
"No, I'm telling you that I didn't have any damn 'clients.' Alastair got me first and last, and used everyone in-between like a goddamn tool to keep me in my 'place.' All while making them pay for it." Dean's voice is louder, trying to drown out the whispers in his head, the sibilant sing-song voice that slithers in sometimes when he lets his guard down, resonates through all his nightmares, the voice he has heard every time he's gone into heat for the past five years. He's been relying on Cas to keep it away, keep him safe, like the bitch Alastair told him he was nothing more than.
I take off the ring and you can come just on some stranger's knot, can't you? He could be anyone and you'd never know. Some sweetheart from when you were younger, taking a piece of that fine ass? Daddy dearest, who let me walk you right past him? That little brother you used to beg to save you? They know this is all you're good for.
He can't swallow, throat burning as he tries, and he's got to focus.
"Perjury is a crime, Mr. Winchester." Crowley's voice is velvet over gravel, and it infuriates him-he grabs hold of that anger before it can slide away, familiar heat to flush out the cold. "You called it rape after you were paid..."
Don't you dare leave your rack dirty, filthy little whore. He paid good money to breed up his bitch. Clench down, keep it all in. That's right. Can't have that little fuckhole getting too loose, you've got another playmate here ready for you. And if you won't beg for him, I'll put your mouth to better use.
"You know what else is a crime, Crowley? Rape." The word is barbed-it tears at his throat before hitting the room, sharp and dangerous, and now he's focused again, scowling at Crowley from the stand. He's not testifying any more, he's lashing out while he can. "Two times now some lawyer's managed to get someone out of that because I'm just some Omega who must've been panting for it. And now they're up for trying it again and the person being put trial for rape seems to be me, here and now."
Crowley's next question is right on the heels of his outburst, not giving anyone time to derail Dean with objections or calls to order. "I take it you have some resentment towards those attorneys, and my clients." Stepping forward, closing in on the stand, Crowley goes for the kill.
"Is that why you used the same heat drugs you favored as a prostitute to entrap my clients, and then manipulated the brother of the attorney for your most recent 'rapist' into attacking your first supposed 'rapists?'"
xXx
The ten minute recess isn't a relief. They're prolonging things, forcing him to stay longer, prepared to shove him right back onto the stand once the judge deems everyone cooled down enough to resume trial after that last outburst in the courtroom.
Or when the prosecution's star witness stops puking his guts up in the bathroom like a fucking wuss.
He made it out of the courtroom past them all without giving himself away. Then he bit Cas's head off when he laid a damp paper towel across the back of Dean's neck in the bathroom, recoiling away from being touched, and the hurt look he'd gotten in return as Cas gave him the space he demanded is going to fuck with his head even more. Getting rid of Sam is harder; his gargantuan little brother is leaning against the sink and giving him the solicitous stare through the open door of the stall that Dean hates because it's unfair.
"I didn't know..." Didn't know Dean's head was this fucked up? Didn't know about the drugs Alastair had used? Didn't know this was Crowley's plan to discredit him? He'd figured out about the rapes, he was building a case around it himself. He knew Alastair was going to come up.
"Yeah, well, you weren't supposed to know." Dean finally croaks, leaning his head back against the tile beside the toilet, eyes closed. He's going to burn this fucking suit when this is all done. It feels disgusting now, from the flop sweat and sitting on this damn bathroom floor, even if it doesn't look it-or maybe that's him, the filth creeping under his skin. He wants to scratch it out, peel it away, but he's got enough presence of mind to know that doing the wrong thing right now would freak Sam out. "I'm fine, Sammy."
"Don't..." Dean grimaces at Sam's raised voice bouncing off the tile walls, but it wasn't a flinch. His brother starts again quieter anyway, as if he spooked some sort of wild animal, and that puts Dean's teeth on edge. "Don't tell me you're fine, because you're not. You're pretty far from 'fine.' I hate that word."
"Yeah, and who do we know that's 'fine,' then, Sam? We're all screwed up somehow." Dean leverages himself to his feet, flushing away the evidence of his weakness and shouldering his brother out of the way so he can make use of the sink, cupping his hands beneath the faucet and rinsing his mouth out with water that tastes like rust.
"You could have talked to me, Dean." There's something small and hurt to Sam's voice, and Dean hates to hear it. He slaps the water off and turns to face his brother.
"And said what? What the hell am I supposed to say? And what's the point of dragging you into my problems? You got out, Sam. You've got a great life now, and..."
"I was never trying to get away from you, Dean! You don't have to do this alone. You've got me, and you've got Cas now, and we want to help..."
"Yeah, well, maybe Cas needs to be free of my crap too. Maybe you both do." His gruff interruption finally succeeds in shutting Sam up.
Sam is gaping at him, preparing to launch himself back into arguing, when two sharp knocks come on the bathroom door, announcing Castiel's return before the door opens with a protesting squeak.
Dean doesn't know if Cas heard that last part. He doubts it, since Cas is hardheaded enough to jump right into the argument himself. He's subdued though as he stops a few paces back from Dean, extending their toiletries bag taken from the Impala, back to the letting Dean set the limitations on their relationship, down to how close he can be. "I thought you might want it before they put you back on the stand."
Dean takes the bag without touching Cas, digging through for his toothbrush, and he can feel them watching him, knows it'll be Cas who asks. "What can we do to help?"
Dean snorts bitterly, focused on keeping his hands steady so he doesn't drop the damn toothpaste cap down the drain. "This would be easier without all of you guys watching."
They know he doesn't mean brushing his teeth. He also doesn't mean the two of them; Sam needs to see the court case, even Dean's fucked up end of it. That's just strategy, before he has to be ringleader of this circus. And Cas has seen this all before, coaxed Dean out of these memories and nightmares, stilled him when he needed to keep Dean from hurting himself, and stepping back when Dean's memories made him fear Cas. God knows what Cas has heard from him in his sleep, that makes him cling so tightly.
In reflection, he sees Cas and Sam exchange a look, and Cas seems to draw the short straw again. Behind him, his boyfriend puffs out a sigh, straightens his shoulders, and marches out to the hall to face the ire of Dean's family while asking them to stay out of the rest of Dean's testimony, probably terrified of Ellen and Jo's response to that.
No one can say Cas doesn't have guts.
"He's drawing you into narrative answers. Don't go for it." Sam begins as Dean starts brushing his teeth, all business again, and that helps. Dean is rapidly reassembling his mask, and he needs something to fight, something to aim his anger at outside of himself and his disgust at his own break. "Give him yes or no, and short responses, especially about you and Cas. It's not the kind of attorney he is, and it'll throw off his attack." Dean digs out his aftershave, dousing himself with it unnecessarily to hide his scent, and it's comforting to be hidden again. "Henriksen is going to need to redirect question you, to counter the character assassination, that's where you give detail again. Anything you give Crowley, he's going to twist. He's digging at you and Cas's relationship, so end on that in Henriksen's questioning, and make it stick."
"Yeah, okay." Dean agrees, zipping the bag back up, crumpling up the damp paper towel and tossing it into the trash. Sam wants him to dig his heels in and mulishly clam up for a while? That suits him just fine.
"He's still looking to the civil case, which is just me and him. He wants a settlement, neither of us think that's going to end up in the courthouse again except for filing paper. This is his thing. He's trying to spook you both, and me too, to get Cas to pay up."
Dean's stopped by Sam's hand on his shoulder as he reaches for the door: Sam isn't that kind of threat, even Dean's screwed up subconscious gets that. He doesn't throw off the touch, letting himself be turned to face his brother as Sam pleads with him again, trying to get the last word in on the argument Cas interrupted.
"You're my big brother, man. You've put up with my shit my entire life... I wish you'd let me help. And Cas is in love with you. I know you feel the same way. Don't. . . Don't do anything stupid, okay? Give this a shot?"
Despite himself Dean laughs sharply, brittle as broken glass. "That's new. What happened to 'he's a killer' and 'he hurt you' crap, Sam?"
Sam opens his mouth, shrugs, and has the good grace to look a little sheepish about his Alpha posturing around Cas. "He's growing on me."
Cas is waiting outside the bathroom when they emerge, and Dean's pretty certain during his conversation with his brother the men's room of the Douglas County courthouse had a scary intense bouncer silently intimidating everyone into going down the hall. Dean doesn't know what Cas said to his family, and where they are right now, but he doesn't want to ask. He's being selfish again, and he can't make himself think about it. He could handle them hearing about how stupid he'd been as a kid, how he'd let these assholes get the drop on him. Alastair is something that's supposed to be locked up in his head, behind steel doors and padlocks and iron bars, and he can't open that vault with them watching. He doesn't want to open it at all.
Cas turns when the door creaks, arms dropping from where they'd been folded across his chest, and he falls in beside Dean as they make their way back to the courtroom, an Alpha at each side. Everyone's already settling back in, and the bailiff seems to be waiting on Dean.
Dean bumps shoulders with his brother (well, bumps his shoulder against his yeti little brother's arm) and jerks his chin at the door. Sam gets the hint, and Dean catches Castiel by the elbow before he can go in, drawing him back. "Five seconds." He promises the bailiff, who presses his lips into a line, but waits beside the door as Sam enters.
He can't just kiss Cas right now, can't make himself go that far when he's already on shaky ground, though he knows it'd help Cas feel better. Cas will hang on to the shaving kit, for now, like he once did Dean's luggage, just like he's reassuring himself Dean can't abandon him with everything Castiel owns in his car.
All Dean has to give him is a little bit of borrowed anger, arming him as best he can.
"He's trying to get under your skin, Cas. I need you to hold it together in there, 'cause I'm. . ." Because he's really not. After a few seconds and a searching look, Castiel nods, and that's the best he's getting for now.