Author's Note:
Warnings: Gore. Torture.
14.
We have video…
Dean didn't think twice about the offhanded comment from the woman before. It was just sound filtering into his mind, in one ear, out the other. It didn't mean anything. But looking at the photos, Dean longs for his earlier ignorance.
He's seen bloody murders before. He's caused plenty. Carnage has become an unwilling buddying factor to his life. But there's something different about it when you know the victim. More intimate. Sickening.
Pictures of wings. No, not pictures. Stills from a video, with the timestamp plastered onto one corner. Black, bloody, patchy to the point it's almost pathetic, but Dean knows them. Like he knew the feather. The red tipped edges of the feathers, burned by hellfire. Those are Cas's. Severed clean from his body or true form, or whatever, but resting on the table like they're dead butterflies to be kept behind glass.
Gone.
Removed.
Taken.
Son of a—Garth's grip on his wrist is sudden and sharp, stopping the .45 before Dean can make proper aim at Bevell's forehead. The gun discharges, firing into the ceiling, breaking plaster and scraping the edge of the ugly light.
Distantly, so distant it feels like another person, Dean realizes that they're going to get the cops called on them. Let them come, a part of him challenges.
"Let go." Dean growls.
"Dean." Garth warns.
"Let. Go."
Dean struggles in the grip, trying to shove past the hunter, but Garth has risen to his feet and is blocking his path. "Just hang on there for a moment—"
"I'm gonna kill her."
"Dean."
No. Stop fighting me. Let me rip her freakin' eyes out.
"If it's any consolation," Bevell's voice is oddly quiet. Not remorseful; quiet. "It wasn't my decision. This is no longer my detail."
Then whose was it, part of him wants to demand, who authorized this?
Dean laughs. Cold and bitter. Right. And the fact that she didn't protest doesn't mean a thing. Or that Cas's freaking feather is in her apartment? Yeah. No. Nothing. Aiding and abetting is still enough to get you thrown in prison in a lot of places.
"You mutilated him." Dean hisses, looking past Garth's lanky frame to glare into her eyes. The cold, empty stare is all that blinks back at him. How can she care so little? What gives her the right? She did that to Cas and she's...if anything, she seems smug. "Is Cas even still alive?"
There weren't any photos of him directly.
Dean feels sickened when he realizes how relieved he is by that. But the thought of seeing Cas so bloody...so hurt makes him want to puke. Cas isn't infrangible, he knows that, but this...is something else.
"Last I heard." Bevell answers, careless. Her head cocks, "You struck me as more of a professional than this, Mr. Winchester. Yet you're oddly attached to something that isn't human. It's just a halo."
That's her excuse.
It's just a halo.
That's the excuse!?
"His name is Castiel," Dean growls. He fights with Garth for control of the gun, unsuccessful in his efforts. He slams a fist against the hunter's chest in anger, hopelessness, helplessness, but Garth seems unfazed by his violence. His teeth set and he hisses out his rage between them harshly. Garth manages to wrestle the gun from his grip, eyes flicking yellow in clear, silent warning. Back down.
No.
They took Cas's wings. "Go to hell."
Bevell huffs, as if this is funny. He can't remember the last time he's wanted to hit someone with a barbed baseball bat more.
"I think," Crowley's voice is toneless, "that some coordinates would be your best path of action. Before we release our attack dog on you."
Attack dog. That's a new one. Better than cockroach.
Dean sneers at him.
Sam's unconscious. Cas is...who knows how Cas is. How long ago did this happen? Bevell said that the last she'd heard Cas was still alive, but when was the last time she checked? Hours? Days? Weeks? He doesn't know what happens to an angel when you do that to them. He wasn't even sure it was possible.
And they…
His fists clench.
Bevell slowly pulls the MacBook towards herself, typing something down on the screen. The confidence of her fingers assures Dean that she's lying. What would it take to draw the truth from her? How on earth are they supposed to find the freakin' Men of Letters if she keeps leading them in circles. She'll die before she talks.
But…
Those cameras. That's live feed. Which means that she's getting a signal from them. Dean may not be the tech-savvy genius of this family, but he's not an idiot. He could pin the source. Which means they don't need her. Just the laptop and a Wi-Fi signal.
Thank God.
Dean shoves Garth bodily to the side and slams his fist into her face. Bevell is thrown from the chair from the force, smacking the edge of her head against the table's rim. There's a sharp crack from her skull, but he could care less about whether or not she has a concussion or permanent brain damage.
His muscles are pulsing. Burning. Fingers flexing in and out, teeth set.
More.
This is not enough.
She deserves it.
Lying snake.
"Dean!" Garth exclaims as Crowley makes an indignant noise. Bevell lays in a heap on the floor, blood leaking from her forehead where the table got her. Dean shakes his hand out loosely, turning back to the MacBook without a word of explanation. The photos stare back at him. Bloody. Feathers. That must have been agony.
"Balls, Winchester!" Garth shouts, "What the heck did you do that for!?"
"We don't need her."
Crowley makes a wordless noise of disagreement.
Dean pulls up the Google maps and hits enter, just to prove his point. The map takes a second to load, lagging as it tries to pull up nearby roads and other locations. It finally settles on a small, isolated McDonalds about thirty minutes from here.
Yeah.
Not that surprised.
Dean slaps the lid down and tucks the laptop under his arm. "They're giving live feed. Which means they're getting a signal. I can get us their location from that."
Garth is still gaping at him like he murdered a small dog. He's not facing Crowley, but he suspects that the demon has gathered himself together. His poker face has always been quick to settle.
Dean's eyes slide to the feather, and his fingers bounce anxiously for a moment before he pulls his sleeve down and reaches across the tabletop to grab it. He's going to return it to Cas. He doesn't care how long it takes, or what it takes to get there, but he's going to give Cas the freakin' feather back. It's the least he can do at this point.
He lost his wings, and all Dean can do is hand him a measly feather.
"And what," Garth asks, patience lost, "do you plan to do exactly once we know where they are? We're only three people, Dean. They're an entire organization."
"Beanpole bears a point." Crowley remarks, idly shoving at Bevell's unconscious body with the edge of his shoe as if to make sure she's not faking it. She rolls listlessly beneath his manhandling, bloodied face rocking up towards them.
Dean thinks of the DefTech 37mm grenade launcher stuffed in the bottom of the duffle he forced Crowley to take when the demon ferried their weapons from the States to London.
His fingers tighten around the MacBook. "I have a few ideas."
000o000
I need...
His mouth tastes like blood.
Not like he bit his tongue, or the inside of his cheek. More like when he was sick with the Trials, and coughing it up all the time. When it would linger in the corners of his mouth where his tongue couldn't reach and water wouldn't clean.
I need…
...more.
It's stained across his teeth. When he runs his tongue across the front, he wipes it off, and swallows the bittersweet substance. It feels like glass when it tracks down his throat. What happened? Did he hit his head?
His senses are almost buzzing. He can heart the slow beats of his heart with a clarity that isn't normal. Every breath in and out is a rattle.
There's something across the lower half of his face. His nose. It's...not uncomfortable, just...weird. There's a soft hissing, the sound of someone breathing, he can hear the quiet tapping of fingers against some sort of wood.
For a moment, a hesitant, awful moment, Sam thinks he's lying in some sort in-between state of consciousness and reality inside of a motel room. When he opens his eyes, his brother is going to be sitting on the other bed, or at the table, going over papers or looking at some sort of screen, doing that unconscious thing where he moves his fingers. Drumming, tapping—whatever. Dean's always been weirdly aware of his hands.
But it doesn't last.
He can only hold himself inside of this blasé, crass attempt to forget reality for so long before it slips away from him.
Sammy…
He's not sure if the voice is inside his head, or outside, but he tenses up anyway. His head lolls away from the direction, shifting against the pillow—pillow?—and the straps of some sort of tubing move against his chest.
Sam.
Sound feels sort of like he's swimming through something.
Sam keeps his eyes closed, trying to ignore the voice, cling instead to his fantasy. He's five. If he closes his eyes and pretends hard enough, obviously he can bend reality to his will. Despite his mild disgust, Sam doesn't attempt to face the world.
The sharp, acidic pain in his right hand forces him to let go.
Sam jerks up with a garbled gasp, eyes blurrily trying to make connections between where he is and what's happening. He's already trying to move his hand to bring it closer to himself, a base instinct of human pain, but he can't. It's caught on something, and pulling only intensifies the pain.
Sharp, panting hisses strain to pass through the nasual cannulas. He's in a hospital of sorts, restrained to the mattress by his ankles, his hands strangely free. The ceiling above him is broken into large tiles, separated by long metal rods.
His eyes wildly move from the ceiling, down the walls, to his hand.
One of Cas's feathers is stuffed inside the middle of his hand, pinning it to the mattress. Blood is welling, spilling out and painting the white sheets. Blood. Like his mouth. The strong scent of iron arouses something in him.
(More.)
He feels sick.
Sam releases a slight noise, reaching out to try and pull the feather from his hand. He knows that removing penetrating objects without immediate medical care is stupid, but he's in some sort of medical ward. And he's not—
A hand wraps around his wrist, halting his progress; fingers tight and restraining. Freezing.
Sam's muscles bunch up. The deep, deep dread that settles into his stomach is one he hasn't felt in a long time. Sam slowly lifts his eyes up from the bloody sheets to the figure on the other side of the bed.
Lucifer's head tips slightly, baring teeth. He looks terrible. Sweaty and disheveled, like he's recovering from a terrible illness. He's hunched over himself just slightly, one hand wound around his vessel's abdomen. He's in a hospital gown, tucked inside some sort of robe. He looks...vulnerable. And...and Sam doesn't know what to do with that.
Lucifer stabbed his hand. That much is pretty obvious. It hurts, but dully.
"Hey, sunshine," Lucifer's voice contains a false levity. He hasn't let go, his grip hard enough that if Sam fights against it, he's afraid the bone will snap. His fingers are starting to go numb. Yell, Sam wants to plead, because anger is predictable, scream, shout—something.
"You…" Sam doesn't know what to say. All the words he wants to speak are only going to get him hurt. His throat aches, but it's oddly slimy. Like it was, when he, when it, when they—his limbs stiffen. "What did you do?"
Lucifer snorts softly, eyes narrowing a fraction. His words, like everything else about him, is without humor. "I don't know where to be offended or pleased that you assume it was me."
"It's always you!"
Lucifer's grip tightens enough that Sam releases a strangled sound. He yanks against the hand in an effort to ease up the pressure, but it doesn't do anything. Lucifer's fingers are iron. His lip quirks up a fraction, "That so? Well, then, I'm flattered."
Sam's teeth grit together. "Go to hell."
Lucifer leans forward, and Sam pulls back. Lucifer bumps the feather with his elbow, and the spasm that washes through his fingers leaves Sam momentarily breathless. Lucifer's fingers flex slightly, adjusting their grip. "You know, as I was laying there, feeling the Rit Zien pull the bullets from my grace, I couldn't even think. Even when Auntie Amara had me strapped up, I was still present. But you—you removed me. For nearly two hours."
I wish it was more, he doesn't say, I wish I shot you in the face. Maybe then you'd be dead.
Sam's tongue pushes against the back of his teeth. Every breath feels like a tentative test against the universe.
"So? You gonna torture me?" The words feel harder when they come out than they were in his mouth. Inside, they feel weak, pliant.
Afraid.
"I could," Lucifer promises, lax. "But laying there, looking up at that ceiling...it just didn't seem to fit." The archangel snorts softly, "I fought Bevell for this detail, y'know that? So when I say something happens, it happens. Oddly satisfying, I gotta say. Demons are so...demonic. But you humans...you're robots. So when I sit up and you're laying in the bed, your heart attempting to give out, you know what I told the Men of Letters?"
Sam's spit tastes like blood.
I know, he doesn't say.
"We should see if demon blood serves as a catalyst to make him heal faster." Lucifer clicks his tongue. "I'm supposed to be questioning you about Ruby, but I could write a dissertation about your relationship. But Sammy. Almost two centuries sober. I'm so disappointed. Dean is going to be so disappointed."
No—no.
Sam jerks toward him, intending to be violent, but regretting the action as soon as it forms as a distant thought in his mind. Lucifer releases his wrist, but it's only to grab the end of the angel feather and stab it deeper through his hand. Sam releases an agonized sound, eyes squeezing shut despite himself as he tries to learn how to breathe around the pain.
"And we all know how much Sam values big brother's opinion." Lucifer's voice has gained a high edge of mockery.
"Stop...it," Sam forces out. He pulls his eyes open again, only to be met with blurring vision. It's not like your intestines are being pulled out through your throat. Get a grip, he chastises himself. Slow, staggering breaths fill and spill from his lungs. Sam looks down at his left wrist for a moment. The skin is bright red and purpling around the edges. It almost looks frostbitten. But it's not broken. He knows that his left will be a mess. He doesn't want to look at the gore.
I feel violated. I need to throw up. I have to get this out.
And the quiet thought, unbidden, I need more.
"You're hopeless," Lucifer sighs.
Sam pulls his arm against his stomach, carefully tucking it as close to himself as he can. "Then why don't you kill me?" The question is an honest one. Wrapped inside spite and hate like a hug. Stop playing with me, for once, stop playing.
Lucifer laughs. "Are you insane? Do you know how much joy it gives me, knowing that you're suffering? You would beg for death. Why do you think I would give you it?" Sam's eyes sting. He feels all of six. "Besides, it would only be temporary. True vessel and all that."
Sam's eyes close. He breathes in. The only thing he expels is fear. Somewhere distant, Sam thinks he's beginning to panic.
It's not okay. It's not okay. It's not okay—
"Why?"
His eyes open, catching Lucifer's head cock to the side in slight confusion. "Pardon?"
"You want to hurt me? Fine. But demon blood?" Sam can barely get his tongue to form the words. They feel like condemnation to even speak. It's in me. Crawling. Like a poison. "Cas's wings? What are you honestly hoping to achieve here?"
"You think I'm going to explain myself to you?"
Sam could laugh. Decades and decades they spent together. Michael and Adam may have been there, but they were hardly a buffer. Michael didn't care, and Adam…But Lucifer—Sam knows him better than he knows Dean. Than he knows himself.
"You don't have to. I don't know what happened with Chuck and Amara. But if he's not here, he's not coming back. He left you here. And you know what? I bet he's relieved. He doesn't want you, how could he, with what you are?" Sam's never been very good at making his words into blades. Digging something open and splaying it to bleed. But the look on Lucifer's vessel—it's as satisfying as it is horrifying.
Lucifer's eyes flare red and flicks with his true face for a heartbeat.
Sam stops breathing. Pinned. I made a mistake. I shouldn't have—
The archangel reaches out a hand, and what he intends to do, what he intends to take, Sam doesn't know. He never will. Because at that moment, the ceiling explodes and the world erupts into flame around them.
Author's Note:
Prompt: Fire.