CW: Extreme seasonal depression, description of disassociation, potentially triggering language for EDs.
A/N: I'm not promising anything concrete, but I'm going to aim for bi-monthly updates. Thank you for your support!
The sky is still blue
The clouds come and go
Yet something is different
The stars still shine bright
The mountains still high
Yet something is different
Dawn's alarm jolts her upright at seven o'clock in the morning. Her arm springs out from the covers, smacking it 'off'. Instinctively, she switches her lamp on.
She stares at her fingers, dangling over the bedside, little tendrils that sprout from her wrist. Her eyes feel itchy in their sockets, like they do not quite fit inside, forced in by the base of someone's palm. Her eyelids drape lazily over them, desperate to fall. And stay.
She stares, and her throat is prickly, her mouth dry. She had been snoring, then. There is a vacuum in her stomach.
She calculates five hours of sleep, but what does it matter when you've barely had any in the last two days?
Dawn can feel the path of panic in her brain from the night before, like the hangover of a migraine. It exudes apathy, exhaustion, slows her connections and firings.
Her fingers twitch.
Why are you awake?
The darkness in the cavernous room is more of a comfort than a fear. Sometimes it presses in on her and sometimes it softens the sharp edges of her mind. She stretches her fingers out as if to touch it, to stroke it.
My alarm went off.
She winces, the self-directed insolence rewarding her with a zap in her skull and a shiver down her back.
She rolls over, bringing her hands to her chest, folded together. Outside of the lamp's amber aura, her line of sight disappears.
The ceiling becomes a canvas for mind games, imagined shapes and patterns hovering in faint blue-green holograms. Ghosts of half-processed visuals her too-big eyeballs will not let go of.
I would usually get up around this time.
To do what, pray tell?
You know what.
I want to hear you say it. I want to hear you acknowledge what you've done.
She rolls onto her other side, her back to the light. She sees the outline of the bathroom door materialise as her brain catches up with her.
I would usually get up around this time to get dressed so I was ready for Castiel when he knocked at the door. And we would go for a walk together.
The vacuum in her stomach starts to churn.
So, why are you awake now?
She squeezes the duvet in her hand. It springs back when she releases her grip, malleable but persistent.
Good question.
Dawn rolls back over and switches off her lamp.
Her last thought before her consciousness seeps into the dark is that the duvet's primary purpose is to insulate its user, but it inevitably serves a secondary purpose to either comfort or suffocate.
The sun starts to rise an hour and a half later, thin shards through the sides of her drawn blinds. Two vertical lines glow in the dark, one corrugated over the folds of a shape in the duvet.
She is still, the breath almost imperceptible as it is inhaled and exhaled.
She remains so for several more hours.
The sun climbs, throwing the mountain's shadows across the ground, long.
It tickles the lake into a glisten, melting the night's frost from the grass.
It whips up a fog, pressing pockets of humidity that cloud the glass windows of the cabin on the hill.
It is observed by many celestial eyes in human form – cold and unfeeling. They are stationed across the area, little black and white suited sticks sprinkled in the green. Many more than before, they are like a cancer in this little cell of the Arctic Circle, multiplying.
Careening over, the sun begins to force the shadows back down again, dissipating them into dark as the daylight dims.
Movement in the cabin.
A morose sense of apathy trails behind Dawn as she steps into the kitchen.
It is two o'clock in the afternoon, according to the massive clock face greeting her by the dining table.
The pull of an empty stomach was a fact that forced her from her bed.
She stares through her windows at the backs of angels stalking the yard. Somehow the added security does not add to her ennui. As if there is a saturation point of despair in surveillance.
It did not matter how many guards kept her in, it seemed – the act of confiscating her only friend was good enough to quell the desire to escape. To stop her entertaining thoughts of freedom.
There was nothing for her anymore. Nothing here, at least. And she was going to be here for…
Oh God.
Her pantry and fridge have been replaced.
Soy milk. Plain Greek yoghurt. Bitter instant coffee. Dense, wholemeal bread. Plain granola.
Eggs – caged. Chicken sausages. Iceberg lettuce. Fake cheese singles. Truss tomatoes. Vegan mayonnaise.
Steaks. Potatoes. Green beans. Cans of peas. Cans of corn. Cans of tuna. Cans of soup.
An empty freezer.
Breakfast, lunch, dinner of champions – and that is it.
Dawn does not care. It is fruitless to mourn trivial, luxury things when their source is gone.
Gone.
In the cool, chalk smelling training facility, the silence echoes.
Dawn stares at her sword, hung decoratively on a rack, gleaming in the dying light. She sits on the concrete floor, her chin resting on her knees.
She blinks, and she is sitting at the table inside, forking a piece of meat she did not know how to cook into her mouth. It is black through the window. Clock reads eight.
She chews slowly, struggling to swallow. She feels half removed from the reality she exists in. She cannot accept it as the truth. It is a half-dream bred from sleeping late. She will feel better in the morning.
Dawn feels the same in the morning. Her life does not feel real, which suits her. It removes the persistence of emotion. Her brain is quiet. Her limbs are heavy. She eats when she needs to. She cannot focus to read, so she watches TV, or she picks up her sword. She does not swing it much, it just feels good to carry a heavy thing. She stops trying to maintain a circadian rhythm when the suns stops rising in December. She gets up when she wakes up. She goes to bed when she is tired. She stops going outside when it gets really cold. She just stares at the snow until its outline echoes blue when she blinks. She stops looking at the clock. Her hair grows longer, gets dirty, rarely gets cleaned. Her muscles show less, she gets lanky. She loses the strength she used to have. Sometimes, when there are Christmas commercials or holidays films playing on her channel, she changes it. She does not accept a world outside of the cabin. To do that would be to accept the situation, but her situation is not real to her. She eats when she is hungry – one meal a day usually. Maybe two. She goes to bed when she is tired. She cannot focus to read, so she watches TV. She wakes up and gets up for a few hours. She lies on the couch when she feels dizzy. She eats occasionally. She sleeps on the couch when she is tired. A new year. Used to be a time for renewal and resolutions. It is 2009. She unplugs the digital clock in her room. The angels pass by the window cyclically. It is still snowing. The lake is probably frozen over. The sun does not rise still. She starts to feel fear when they pass by near the door, like they might open it. She worries that the internal heating will fail one day, and she will have to tell one of them. It does not happen, but every grumble or burp it emits stabs fear into her. She wakes and lies in bed and sleeps a little longer. She gets up when she needs to eat and grabs anything that will stop hunger pains. Mindless, mindless, mindless fear, anxiety. Mindless loss. Absence. Disconnection, disassociation. In a dream. Falling forever, falling asleep when awake. Half asleep while walking through reality. Reality is too dense for her frail frame. Distended, no purpose, no prospect. No will – to live or to die. Nothing. Mindless, mindless, mindless.
Numb.
It is February when the apathy starts to lift. The first hints of daylight thaw the thick shell that coats her heart, her mind, her soul. Something made of ice, of dust, of mucus. It starts to breakdown under the idea of warmth.
The sun begins to peak above the mountains and snake its tendrils into Dawn's bedroom. She swings her legs over the side of the bed and sits on the edge, letting out a deep sigh that has been building as she slept.
She rests her elbows on her knees, clapping her hands against her cheeks with her eyes closed. Her hands have become softer since she gave up training, the callouses peeling away more and more with each new layer of skin. She presses her fingers into her eye sockets, pulling the skin into figure eights and ruffling her eyebrows.
Her knees creak as she stands, legs stiff hobbling to the bathroom. She reaches out, jutting her chest forward to feel her spine pop.
In her daze, one that distorts the passing of time and deadens the demands of her survival instinct, she runs the shower too hot.
The shock of stepping into the searing water makes her shriek, and jump back, smacking her head against the tiled walls of the cubicle.
She grunts, reaching around the stream for the cold tap. With her other hand, she rubs her face to wipe away the fright, then the spot on the back of her head that aches.
She allows a groan that ends in a huff. It is like her head was full of settled snow and the globe has been shaken, but she is too tired to process any kind of disturbance right now.
She allows the water to weigh her down. She imagines her fatigue rolling off her body with the rivulets. The tendrils of water dragging down her back as fingers stroking her.
She frowns.
Fingers?
Dawn's eyes open, facing into the stream, and she opens her mouth in surprise, inhaling water. She steps out of the cubicle, spluttering as her eyes sting and her nose burns.
She coughs, slapping her chest. Digging her nails into her skin.
Fingers?
There it is again. A murmur, her own voice, within her. The bite of her nails cutting into her confirms she is awake.
Imagine being so lonely, you have to think of water as fingers.
Yes – because I miss touch. I miss company.
It starts to pour out of her, tumbling from a sack once tightly sealed. Pebbles of realisation, of feelings, of passing thoughts – an avalanche from her mind to her heart.
Involuntarily, she thinks of Dean, remembering his hands down her back, soft lips on her neck. The scratch of his stubble. She thinks of a finger brushing her cheek. She thinks of smiles she has not seen in months, voices and laughter she has not heard in years. All of it all at once, like it had been knocking furiously at a door she had locked. Or perhaps it was a battering ram that inevitably freed caged memories, relentlessly beating against iron. It had finally gotten through, piling on top of itself as the momentum of so much pain, longing, anger, frustration found a give.
Dawn is paralysed by it, the emotions bleeding into her. She presses her back against the bathroom wall, allowing herself to sink to the ground. The shock of the cold on her bare backside, draws her attention to her environment.
The shower still runs, the room becoming fogged with steam. She can hear white noise over the sound of water slapping tiles, and her eyes prickle.
She feels a warm, sticky tear ooze from a duct. Another one breaks through her other eye. It comingles with a drop from her sodden hair, running down to outline her jaw.
She feels the pain encompass her, throttling her chest into sobs that rise and rise, hearty after months of suppression and denial. They are violent, throwing her back against the wall as they rack her shoulders.
She hears herself crying. She has not heard herself in months.
She hugs herself tight. She has not felt herself in months.
She finds that she is half smiling through the grief.
I am still here. I have not completely dissolved. I am human. I feel – I feel so much pain. I feel this loneliness like a boulder forced down my throat. It tears me apart.
But at least I am feeling something.
Dawn laughs out loud through a sob-hiccup. Her nose is streaming slimy strands of snot, the sounds she makes getting thick with mucus. She laughs at the absurdity, at the desolation of this situation. She laughs at the fact that accessing the lowest form of human emotion is thrilling. She sobs again, her head so full now, her neurons sizzling and spitting. Something she had been afraid of, utter panic and overwhelming of emotion, now is welcomed.
Like an empty house that is now full of people – it does not matter if they are arguing or laughing, they are there. The house ceases to be empty and serves its purpose.
She lies flat on her back on the floor, delirious. Out of breath from crying and laughing, body shaking from sobbing and heaving. The ceiling ebbs and flows as steam rises, collects, dissipates.
Dawn strolls through the kitchen, revelling in the knot of grief in her chest to the point of joy.
The emotions run through her like a stream freed from a dam, rushing forward with so much energy. As she sits down with a bowl of muesli, anxiety bubbles to the surface.
I wonder what happened to Castiel.
Why are you only suddenly concerned with this now?
I've been busy.
Doing what? Nothing?
Processing.
There is a bite to her replies, and she is surprised by her own assertiveness.
Wasting away really did something good to your tenacity.
After her unprecedented fit of emotion, Dawn had properly looked at herself. She had wiped away condensation in the little mirror and saw how her skin had gone grey and seemed loose. She seemed so…
Withdrawn. Not wasted away.
Still – seems selfish to just stop worrying about your friends.
What else could I do?
You haven't tried to do anything.
I'm completely out of options.
No. You're never completely out of options.
Dawn swallows a mouthful of oats. She stares at her fingers holding the spoon, how alien her skin looks. Almost unblemished. Her arm thinner.
No – I guess you're right.
I always am.
Dawn's sword is much heavier than it used to be – she almost drops it from the shock of her arms giving out from under it.
She unsheathes it, leaning its tip on the floor. It glimmers blue like a reflex, and she feels the ebb of strength burn down her arm.
She lifts it from the floor and dares to swing it. Dares to strafe above her head. Finds it difficult – but doable.
A curl of red falls from where she has tied her hair back. It is shiny and springy. She blows it out of her line of sight but leaves it as it slips down again.
That night, and the nights following, the same momentum that drives her to start training again also forces Dawn to watch the news in earnest.
Desperately, she tries to pick up leads to the whereabouts of her friends, omens of seals breaking or worse: the possibility of an apocalypse.
Angels scrutinise her as she walks to and from her cabin during daylight hours to train. As the months pass by, the hours extend.
Slowly, her strength returns to her, taking twice as long to regain than to lose. She revels in the challenge, determined to come back more formidable than she had ever been. She is fuelled by anger and the subtle desire for revenge.
The conversations she has with herself are no longer so heady or belligerent. She wonders constantly at the fate of her friends, particularly of Castiel.
She realises that his absence cuts the deepest. His consistent presence had shaped her routine and habits, and given her the inside information she needed to comprehend the complex world she was forced back into. Their conversations were not usually natural, often stilted and awkward, laced with misfiring and misunderstanding, but they had been improving.
I hate to think what he had to do to keep his position, and eventually lose it.
And to think that you were so ungrateful and demanding.
I don't think that asking for freedom is too much. He knew it, too. That this whole situation is… just wrong.
In April, daylight's presence is close to normalcy. It is still cold, still rainy, but anything that makes it easier to get out of bed is something in Dawn's mind.
She chews her lip, staring outside from the kitchen sink. Trying to pinpoint what is off about the landscape.
Something unbalanced… Something not right…
She rinses the plate she is washing without looking away. She reaches to lay it in the drying rack. As it clatters, a realisation chills her.
Usually when Dawn looked out, she would see the backs of about five angels – three directly behind the glass, others along the hill – and then between seven to ten scattered across the landscape.
Now – she can only make out three in the whole area.
She drops her sponge in the dishwater, rushing to turn on her television. In her panic, she struggles to remember which channel number connects her to the American news. She punches in several combinations until she gets it right, her hand shaking.
She arrives in the middle of a broadcast showcasing the inside of a warehouse. Scaffolding is torn down and there are stripped wires jumping. Utter destruction.
"…and authorities believe this scene is connected to a recent string of mass, unexplainable deaths that occurred all over the world last night."
Dawn's jaw drops. Footage of bodies strewn across scenes of disarray – mass car crashes, forests uprooted, plane crashes – all with the charcoal scar of angel wings framing them.
"They believe these so called 'accidents' were the result of mass hysteria following the abnormal spike in ritual killings and strange occurrences in 2007, which led to the destruction of infrastructure and massive internment of bodies."
The screen shows a strange symbol draw in blood on the warehouse's wall. Dawn believes it is Enochian but cannot put her finger on its meaning or function.
"No bodies were recovered from the sight, despite evidence to suggest a massive conflict took place here. Authorities are asking anyone that might have information to step forward and call this hotline."
A string of numbers flash on the screen.
Dawn blinks, muting the broadcast as the station moves onto a new story.
Her mind shakes into chaos, panicking at the implications this information has on the fate of her friends.
"Oh God…" She murmurs to herself. The sound of her own voice, mostly unused in the last few months, comforts her.
It reminds her of something Dean had mentioned – the way he had learnt to get Castiel's attention.
She clears her throat.
"Hey, uh, Castiel," her voice trembles. She sits on the couch arm, knitting her fingers together on her lap.
"Dean said this helped, sometimes. Praying, that is. I'm officially praying…. now. I swore off it when I was a kid because I didn't believe in it, but you know, I guess you've convinced me of a lot of things I didn't believe in so I owe it to you to try. I owe you a lot, actually.
I think you've really stuck out your neck for me, more than I've seen or known of, and it's gotten you in a lot of trouble. I feel responsible for that. I don't know where you are, or if you can hear me, but I wanted you to know that I think I understand what you were trying to say to me when I ran away.
You've always seen more in me than I can see within myself, and you do the same for Dean. I can tell. I truly think that you have the best intentions for humans – maybe the only angel that does. You believe that there is more to my life than being a Sin, that I can make it more than that. The others certainly can't see past the roman numeral on my arm…
But it's a choice, and it's hard work. Living is that, anyway. Just… fucking difficult."
She sighs, staring hard at the carpet. Where am I going with this?
"I'm praying because I'm worried about you. I can see on the news that angels are being killed. I haven't seen you since…. Well, you know that. So, I don't know where you are. But, I wanted you to know that I hope…. That I hope that you're okay."
She cringes at the weakness of her words.
"I'm actually starting to realise that this is more for my own benefit, actually. I haven't spoken to anybody for months. I've hardly spoken at all."
Her voice is starting to falter on cue, losing power. She sighs.
"It's not like I can do anything to help you. I'm pretty good at killing monsters, but I'm useless against celestial power. I guess that I hope my words can reach you if you're having a hard time." She laughs at herself. "Understatement of the century, I'm sure."
Dawn lifts her gaze, looking through the windows. She looks at the lake, and the pocket of trees that are swaying a little next to it.
"I'm looking at that pine tree. It's been cold. The sun's come back. It was really hard when it was gone. I kind of… I don't know. Left the building – metaphorically!"
She rubs her face, embarrassed by her poor choice of words.
"I hope we see each other again." She admits, a little surprised at her honesty. "I miss our walks. I hope that you are alive and can hear me. Yeah."
She steps off the couch, determined to stop her rambling. "It feels unnatural to talk to someone I can't see or hear. Praying is weird…"
Despite her discomfort, the act of speaking as if she could be heard makes her feel content. It staves off the worry for a little while, and the idea that Castiel might hear her gives her a small hope.
A week passes. The limited number of guards remain, and they switch out more often than before.
Dawn can sense a tension colouring their auras. She trains for longer to distract herself from worry.
More mysterious deaths are discussed on the news – more signs of angel conflict and death.
She feels the inevitability of change charge the air. Every morning, she senses that the world is closer to the precipice. She fears for the Winchesters, she fears for Castiel, she fears for humanity.
She finds herself praying almost every night, quietly, before bed. Saying much the same. Craving the comfort of a sound she can control, something to fill the emptiness. Always to Castiel specifically, hoping it will prevent other angels listening in.
Because she is helpless – Dawn cannot leave, she can only watch, celestially sidelined. Every new piece of information she scrounges sends her stomach into freefall, anticipating the worst. Although she has regained control of her psyche, she still feels as if she is falling towards an oblivion that she has not created nor one she can stop.
So, talking to herself under the guise of divulging to a friend, whom she may never see again, can settle or distract from that fear. Anxiety that goes nowhere except into more anxiety.
One day in May, Dawn finds the landscape completely devoid of angels.
She checks the front. She checks the back. She even calls out.
All the while, her stomach hangs in perpetual drop.
She tries the television. She channel surfs, switching between several news channels until she lands on a more obscure one. The sound is muted, but the headlines and scenes in front of her are exactly what she is looking for, though she did not know it.
An unexplainable blinding light beamed from St Mary's Covent in Maryland disrupted a flight. The church was destroyed, but the flight landed safely.
The hairs on the back of Dawn's neck stand up. Finally, mercifully, her stomach hits a wall, landing from its long fall.
She drops the remote she is holding. It slaps against the leather couch.
"Oh shit." Is all she can manage.
Something rattles behind her. It would have been imperceptible, were it not utterly silent in the room, and were she not accustomed to complete solitude.
Dawn's hair prickles. Slowly, she turns around.