Chapter 4: The Army's Disappointment
Balthazar leaned back against the pillar of the reconstructed food tent, watching Benny tear through his breakfast with gusto. "It's just fish porridge."
Benny shrugged as he downed the last of it, placing his bowl on the ground nearby. "Food is food, brother. And I am fond of fish in almost any form. I'm sorry the army diet doesn't agree with your royal palate."
"Food should be enjoyable, not barely palatable," Balthazar argued, having only taken a small ration of porridge that morning before scoring some fruit. He looked around for a moment, nodding at the few recruits he was related to before nudging Benny with his foot. "Hey, our new friend has finally arrived for breakfast."
Benny looked up as Steve, the disappointing alpha son of General John Winchester, slunk into camp, his muddy green eyes dashing furtively around as he tried to avoid everyone he had pissed off the day before. Well, that was really pretty much everyone. Steve didn't head to the food tent, instead walking toward the area in front of Captain Castiel's tent where the soldiers were meant to gather that morning. He was dressed in the traditional fighting gi that they had been told to wear during practice, and it fit him perfectly, but there was something unkempt in the way he moved, the flow of his gait, even the tilt of his head. It almost seemed that Steve was not comfortable in his own skin, his own identity. If Benny wasn't still so angry at the lean boy for causing them so much trouble the day before, he would have been more concerned about that particular observation.
Bartholomew, the tall alpha who had thrown the first punch the day before, sauntered over to Steve, throwing his shoulders back in a clear challenge. Steve looked away, not a touch of red in his eyes or anger in his scent, his entire stance asking not to fight. He wasn't submitting, exactly, but it was unusual for an alpha to avoid conflict in that manner. Benny leaned forward, intrigued by this young alpha who had single-handedly destroyed half of the camp the day before, but it was clear that Bartholomew was irritated that his advance was being ignored. He growled and grabbed Steve's short brown hair, eyes flashing alpha red as he demanded a fight.
Steve shot to his feet and knocked Bartholomew's arm away, snapping his teeth in a clear warning to back away. "Leave it, man. I'm not in the mood today."
A few of the other alphas who had been involved in the brawl moved forward, their eyes flashing as they angled for a piece of the action. Anna watched curiously, not motivated to stop the coming violence but curious why the newest soldier was still standing so calmly, only a faint hint of anger burning along his cinnamon scent and no red in his eyes. What kind of alpha didn't rage out when faced with a fight?
Metatron cleared his throat as he approached the group, tapping his brush on his clipboard as he attempted to break up the coming fight. "Order people, order!"
Alphas rarely paid any attention to posturing betas, especially old ones, and this was clearly not going to be an exception to the rule. The gathering alphas growled and snapped their teeth, heading closer to Steve until a sharp voice cut through their fury.
"Soldiers!"
The alphas and betas snapped to attention, rushing into formation as Castiel strode onto the field, dressed in a training gi with a scowl on his face. He hadn't used his alpha voice, but it was damn close, and even his siblings found themselves unable to resist the urge to obey.
Dean moved into line with the other soldiers, struggling not to stare at the captain as he strode onto the training field just below the new food tent. Castiel looked amazing in that soft blue-gray getup, the clothes only enhancing his muscles and alpha physique. Dean felt a twinge of arousal at the sight, pushing his instincts aside as he stood as tall as the other soldiers and tried not to make eye contact with Castiel. Beside him, a tiny waif of an alpha echoed his stance, her pale blue eyes following the captain as he strode toward them and slipped out of his shirt, tossing it to the side and nearly giving Dean a heart attack. How was he going to survive army training with such an incredibly gorgeous alpha leading them?
"You will assemble swiftly and silently every morning." Dean truly hoped the other soldiers would obey that edict, as he had no intention of getting into a fight every day with one or more of them. Castiel grabbed a long bow and an arrow from one of the quivers on the training field before continuing. "Anyone who acts otherwise will answer to me."
"Oooh, tough guy." Benny was the last alpha Dean would have expected to talk back to the captain, especially since he was friendly with one of the prince's half-brothers, but Castiel smirked as if he had expected the mild challenge.
"Benny," Castiel called as he spun quickly on one foot, arrow knocked in his bow. The entire line of soldiers scrambled backwards one step, leaving Benny in the direct line of fire. Castiel turned to the side and loosed his arrow, watching as it soared across the field and planted itself firmly in the top of a thick wooden post that had to be fifty feet high. Dean's eyes widened at how effortlessly the alpha had hit his mark, knowing that his own skills with a bow were sadly lacking. "Thank you for volunteering. Retrieve the arrow."
Benny snorted and bowed mockingly, making a show of pulling up his sleeves as he walked toward the pole. "I'll get that arrow, pretty boy. And I'll do it with my shirt on."
Castiel reached out a hand and touched Benny's shoulder, pausing the burly alpha in his planned leap. "One moment. You seem to be missing something." Metatron, who had been unusually silent since Castiel appeared, joined the captain with two large, thick bronze disks in his arms, clearly struggling under the weight. Castiel took one of them and hooked the thick strap that ran through the middle over Benny's right wrist, holding the man's arm up for a moment. "This represents discipline." As soon as he released Benny's wrist, the man's arm dropped toward the ground as he realized just how heavy thick plates of bronze could be. Castiel grabbed his left arm and repeated the procedure with the other weight, his face impassive as he continued. "And this represents strength. You'll need both to reach the arrow."
Benny growled something unpleasant, heading for the pole with the weights dragging on his wrists. Normally, he could have climbed something as simple as that, but the weights pulled him down every time he tried, exhausting the man long before he was willing to admit defeat. Many of the other soldiers tried, even the slim alpha girl who had been standing next to Dean, but no one got any higher than Benny had his first try. Dean rubbed his sore butt as he headed back to his place in line, having fallen a lot harder than most of the other soldiers when he tried the climb, Castiel sighing as he watched all of them fail. "We've got a long way to go."
Claire was glad that her dad let her into the army and let her train with the other soldiers, but the first day was only half over and she was exhausted. She had tried to climb the pole, just like the other alphas, but she barely made it two feet up before the weights dragged her down. She knew her dad, knew that it was some kind of test, but she couldn't for the life of her figure it out. After the failed pole climb, Castiel had taken them back to basics with bo staffs, which at least she was mildly decent at. She caught her staff in the air as they were tossed to the soldiers, watching with a slight frown on her face as the other young alpha, the blond boy with faded green eyes, was tripped by Benny with a staff before it was tossed to the ground at his feet. Claire knew that alphas could be cruel to each other, especially when establishing their dominance in a new pack setting, but she hadn't seen the boy do anything to deserve that. He didn't even growl, flash his eyes, or do anything to fight back, just accepting the insult before taking his staff.
She faced off against him during part of the training, appalled by his clumsiness and terrible moves. Had his father ever trained with him when he was a pup? She tried her best to help him, to correct his stance, but every mistake he made earned him a jeer from his fellow soldiers and the boy just got worse. When Castiel, who had watched all of the soldiers train with the same unimpressed scowl, called a break at sunset for a meal, Steve slunk off to the trees near the edge of camp, rubbing at his abused muscles and clearly not in the mood to fight through the queue of soldiers for supper.
Claire, who would normally eat with her father in his tent, met her aunt Anna at the food table and asked for two servings of rice, vegetables, and the small ration of chicken that each person was allowed. Eyebrow raised, Anna obeyed the girl, watching as the blonde waif bounced off toward the edge of camp and that Steve boy who seemed so determined not to be seen.
Well, that was a disaster. If his first day of training could have gone worse, Dean couldn't imagine it. Kevin and Cri-Kee, that lucky cricket who apparently thought he owed the omega a life debt, had stayed behind in the tent, though he was sure that they would come to help him train as soon as they realized how hopeless he was. He knew the moves, and generally he had a great sense of balance, but the hostility he scented from the alphas and betas around him kept throwing him off, and the herbs he had to take made him a little lightheaded at times. Dean was sure he could adjust to these small problems, but he really wasn't as strong or fast as a true alpha, and that would become apparent the longer he trained with them. If desertion wasn't more dishonorable than getting kicked out of the Chinese Army, he would consider it.
The blonde girl who couldn't be any older than Adam approached Dean in his self-imposed exile, a bowl in each hand as she settled into the grass beside him. She was a true alpha, already very strong and fierce, and she had beat him with the staff pretty much all afternoon. Without saying a word or making eye contact, the girl placed her second bowl on the ground and pushed it toward him, the smell of seasoned chicken making his stomach growl.
Slowly, when he was sure that the girl wasn't trying to trick him, Dean reached out for the food, pulling the bowl into his lap and taking the chopsticks resting neatly on top. "Uh, thanks."
"Sure, Steve, no problem. I saw that you weren't really feeling up to standing in that line, and Anna's my aunt so I could just cut to the front. I don't normally want to abuse my relationships, especially here, but I thought you needed something to eat."
"I really did, thanks," Dean replied, shoveling the food into his mouth as fast as he could. It wasn't as good as what his mother made, but for mass-produced army fare it wasn't terrible. "I'm sorry, I didn't get your name."
"I'm Claire."
"And you're an Imperial? You said that Anna is your aunt."
"Yeah, technically. My dad is Castiel, but my mom was a concubine who tricked him and got pregnant during his first rut. She got sent away, he kept me. I don't want to live on his name the rest of my life, so I was hoping to kill some Huns and earn some honor."
Dean looked away at that, remembering his conversation with his dad about being sold to some noble as a concubine. Claire's mother seemed manipulative and vicious, though the emperor himself had multiple concubines of his own that he apparently cared for very much. He hoped that his hesitation would be covered by the rice he was still powering through. "I have a younger half-brother by my father's concubine. Mom didn't like her much, so we sent her away, but he stayed with us. I hope he's never felt like he wasn't one of us."
Claire shrugged. "I have a lot of aunts and uncles who are only half-siblings to my dad, and most of them have a decent place in the Court. Granddad couldn't really legalize them, not with the way Grandma views concubines, but my dad is going to grant me some titles when he finds a mate someday. Still, I want to earn a place of my own if that takes a long time."
Dean tilted his head, already warming to the teen. This girl was probably the only noble even close to his assumed age, so he was grateful that she, at least, didn't seem to want to fight. It seemed that every other alpha here watched him with red-ringed eyes all the time, and that was quite a bit beyond what he would have expected after their first-day fiasco. "I'm surprised your dad isn't mated yet. Isn't he thirty already? That's a bit older than the alphas in my village are when they head to the Matchmaker's hut."
Claire shrugged. "We have a family matchmaker in the palace, and she's offered to help Dad out, but he seems to think that our Ancestors will bring the right omega when it's time. Until that happens, he's going to serve in the army and push the Huns back from our wall. She offered to start looking for me as soon as we return, but I don't think I'm old enough."
Dean nodded in agreement. Sam was technically old enough to visit the Matchmaker, but as he had not earned any honor of his own yet it would be better if he waited a few years. John would want the boy to serve in the army before settling down, but Dean was determined to keep that from happening. There must be some omega out there who would be happy to have a scholar for a mate, even if he was an alpha. "I've visited the Matchmaker, but I don't think I'll find what I want in my village. Dad offered to take me to the Imperial City . . . before the summons came, that is. Now . . . now I don't know if that could ever happen."
Claire tilted her head curiously and sniffed the air. She was still young enough to search for a scent explanation in any situation; Sam still did it from time to time, too. "I mean, won't you come home from the war with enough honor to earn a mate from the City? Your dad's name is still powerful back where I'm from, and people remember him and his family fondly. I think your older brother was born there, right? A lot of nobles would be honored to mate their pups to one of John Winchester's."
"If we come back from war," Dean whispered despondently. "After today . . ."
"Don't think like that, Steve. I know that today was rough, but you'll get better. You're just nervous, being around all these other strange alphas. Give it a chance."
"I hope you're right, Claire."
If Dean thought there was a chance his training would get better, he was sorely disappointed over the next week. He was terrible at staff fighting, as most of the alphas would gang up on him and prevent him from finishing the day's training, though Castiel never seemed to catch them. Claire tried to chase them off in the beginning, but Benny and Balthazar egged the rest of the soldiers on and she wasn't big enough to protect him. Castiel taught them archery, frowning at the lack of prowess among his recruits, though Dean could get an arrow on the right tree from time to time. The martial arts training, part of which required him to balance a bucket of water on his head and deflect rocks that his fellow recruits lobbed at him, was a little easier for the omega, as he did have a natural grace that took the alphas longer to master.
Castiel had an odd fishing method that he wanted the recruits to learn, one that must be more popular near the Imperial City than in Dean's landlocked village. He would stand in the river behind camp and wait for a fish to swim near, then throw his hand into the water and grab one by its tail. It looked ridiculous, but the alpha was fast, and none of the soldiers could manage the feat. Even Claire, who had seen most of her father's training methods before, was stumped. The captain also had an exercise where the recruits would cross the river by jumping from one tall post to the other, something that Charlie, who so far hadn't joined in the alphas harassing Dean, was actively terrible at. She had managed to make most of the recruits fall in the water by the middle of the second week, losing her balance or her nerve usually halfway across. Dean learned from Claire that the beta's parents had died in some fishing accident, but Castiel was never going to care that the girl was afraid of water. He tried to encourage her once, but Benny and Balthazar chased Dean away from their friend and he didn't feel like fighting with them.
Balthazar also had a worst event, and Castiel was no easier on his full brother and sister than he was on the rest of the recruits. There was a martial arts move where the soldiers were expected to break a stone with their foreheads as a show of precision, focus, and strength. They started with wooden boards, Castiel explaining that the injuries they sustained in the early attempts would heal and make them stronger, eventually letting the soldiers move up to concrete blocks, one of which he broke with ease in front of the class. If Dean learned anything from his attempts to strike the board, it was that he had a very hard head but poor aim. Balthazar had worse aim, poor focus, and a body that was too accustomed to palace life to sustain even the lightest hits. Anna did slightly better, and Benny nearly managed to break one at the end of the week, but the rest of the class was painfully slow at learning the skill.
Safe in his tent, without the looming threat of war breathing down his throat, Metatron took notes on the trainees, his scowl more disappointed than Castiel's exasperated frowns. The old beta was under no illusions that this ragtag group of pampered nobles could ever form an army unit strong enough to threaten the Huns, and he looked forward to telling Zachariah how Castiel had failed in his training.
By week two, Dean had become accustomed to his herbs and eye drops, feeling a great deal more like himself. He was still terrible with the staff, with the weaponless sparring, with that weird fish thing, and with breaking boards, but his aim with the arrow was getting better. Castiel decided to increase the training regimen, hoping that his new motto of "Success or Death" would motivate his hoard of pupils. Every morning he stared at the arrow buried in the tall pole, and every morning he thought of a new way to test the soldier's abilities.
Day one was sword practice, thankfully with wooden weapons, but Dean was pretty sure that he ended up with more bruises from that than from staff practice. Claire snuck him a jar of cool, soothing ointment which he gratefully rubbed on his abused limbs while Kevin watched on apprehensively. Dean didn't want to disgrace his ancestors, or the little red dragon who was the symbol of their faith in him, so he woke up the next morning, took his herbs, and swore that he would make a good showing in the training class for the day.
Unfortunately, that training class was dodge flaming arrows, which were mostly harmless due to the lack of a sharp tip, but even getting grazed by one risked angry red burns on exposed skin. The soldiers donned their armor and tried to rush through the training field, every one of them cleaning scorch marks from their gear or bandaging ugly welts on their exposed skin that night. Benny had fared the worst, managing to catch his pants on fire at the end, and he even accepted Dean's help when the omega offered to clean the wound and bandage it. Benny growled at their captain that night over supper, but everyone knew that his anger was misplaced. He should have been faster, more agile, and the Huns would never cut him a break if he was too slow. If Benny and the other recruits couldn't learn to run and dodge, they wouldn't last a day in a real war.
Day three the recruits were allowed to spend the entire day caring for their horses, cleaning their tack, or polishing their swords and armor. Everyone knew why, but no one was stupid enough to call Castiel out on needing a day off from his recruits. Claire spent the day with her father and Dean managed to sit with the alphas without starting a fight, but none of them thought there was a chance that they could ever be real soldiers. Castiel was expected to beat them into shape in only three weeks, and the Huns were getting ever closer to the Imperial City. What good were they going to be against that?
Day four was a change of pace, returning to staff training in the morning and intense martial arts in the afternoon. Dean managed to land one blow on Castiel during their session, but the bruises on his chest and face spoke to the alpha's greater speed and accuracy. Kevin and Cri-Kee, who had come to watch their boy fight, tried to encourage him as much as possible as he moved to Balthazar, but the lean alpha was just as much of a challenge as his brother. By the end of the day, struggling to get a spot in line for his meal, Dean knew that he was quickly becoming the worst student. Maybe he had been vain, thinking that an omega could pose as an alpha; he had been stronger than a lot of the young men in his village, but these noble alphas and betas were a far greater challenge. He flinched away and avoided eye contact whenever he sensed Castiel staring at him, hoping against hope that he could just make it through training and get himself killed by a real, live Hun instead of a flaming practice arrow.
Day five was cloudy and dark, the mountains threatening rain as a bitter wind blew out of the north. Castiel introduced the troops to cannons, the one true advantage the Chinese had over the Huns and the rest of their enemies. Each recruit learned the explosive properties and safe storage of gunpowder, lining canons up along the practice field and attempting to destroy a target that looked suspiciously like an overweight Hun. Benny, Balthazar, Charlie, Anna, and Claire each managed to land their shot in the field, but Dean's shot was thrown wildly off the mark by a well-timed kick from his lean nemesis. His canon destroyed Metatron's tent, though not the scribe himself, and earned him a fierce reprimand from the captain. Dean accepted the censure without a word, silently wondering why his ancestors had any faith in him at all.
"I don't know if I can last any longer, Kevin," the omega admitted that night as he curled up on his mat and huddled under his thin blanket. "I was a terrible omega, but I'm an even worse alpha. I can't seem to do anything right."
"Nonsense, you're doing great," Kevin replied, using a small cloth to clean soot from the boy's face. "We have faith in you, and we know that you'll make it through training and become the best warrior China has ever seen! It was bound to be hard at first, you just need to push through it. What's the challenge for tomorrow?"
"Something about endurance. Omegas aren't really known for their ability to run long distances, only for short bursts. I've never run further than from our farm to the village, and some of these guys have been running the mountain trails for most of their lives."
Kevin shrugged, running his claws through Dean's sooty hair in an attempt to straighten it. "In the other camp, the one not for nobles, the alphas from your village are probably doing the same training. If they can make it, you can make it."
Dean nodded and closed his eyes. "Alright, Kev. Thanks."
Castiel watched the sun rise over the mountains as his recruits gathered near the base of one, some of them staring at the path that snakes up the side and the others looking at the thick bamboo poles with attached bags of rice piled neatly to one side. He counted heads as the formation came together, noting his daughter standing near the back with that hopelessly clumsy alpha, Steve. Castiel kind of liked the boy from time to time; he seemed nice, Claire spent all of her time with him, and he might even have been doing better in training if the other alphas would stop harassing him for one minute. He couldn't take pity on Steve, though; an alpha who wasn't willing to stand up to his teammates wouldn't be much use on the battlefield, and the others just treated him like a beta runt. They would never respect him, and an unwanted soldier was one of the few things that could destabilize an entire unit.
Castiel waited for Metatron to ride up on his horse, clipboard in hand, before reaching down for one of the long poles and swinging it over his shoulders. The sacks of rice, which would at some point be boiled for consumption, were heavy but not unreasonably so. As was his custom when training recruits, Castiel didn't bother with a shirt, though most of the recruits still wore theirs. Benny joined him and took one of the poles, Balthazar and Charlie following quickly behind him. Claire took hers and staggered somewhat under the weight, but she was just past her first rut so all of those hormones would give her plenty of strength to complete this challenge. Steve was last, as usual, but he didn't seem to mind the weight at all. Satisfied that his small army was ready, Castiel turned toward the mountain trail and started jogging up it.
The alpha had never measured the distance, but he was pretty sure that the path he had chosen was almost thirty miles long, snaking from one peak across a spindly bridge to another before returning to the ground. The first five miles were easy, everyone keeping pace with their leader and barely panting, other than Metatron who enjoyed complaining even though he was on the back of a horse. Castiel silently urged the brown beast to throw his rider off a cliff, but alas animal telepathy was not one of his gifts.
The second five miles were harder on the soldiers. Alone, Castiel could do the entire path in four hours, and his older brothers Michael and Lucifer often trained with him doing just that. As the laziest of Chucks four legitimate alpha sons, Balthazar had never joined them, and he was clearly regretting that decision now as he struggled to keep pace with the captain. Benny, Bartholomew, and Castiel's younger half-siblings Muriel, Benjamin, and Hannah ran in the lead with him, while Charlie and Anna stayed in the middle to encourage the struggling soldiers and Claire ran with her friend Steve at the back, Metatron keeping pace with them. The group spread out more as the hours passed, the speed slowing from a brisk run to a loping trot that was barely faster than walking. As long as everyone was keeping the same speed, Castiel had no complaint, but he did let himself fall back to run with Metatron as they neared the top of the first mountain, knowing that he would lose the group if he stayed up front.
Just before they reached the bridge that would cross to the second mountain and the downhill half of their run, Metatron coughed to get Castiel's attention, nodding toward the back of the pack. Castiel turned and frowned as he watched Steve struggle to keep running, wobbling on uncertain legs as his heavy bags pulled him to the side. As soon as the alpha fell, Castiel turned back and jogged toward him, his scent drowning in disapproval. Steve looked up with his murky green eyes, struggling to rise on legs that wouldn't stop shaking. He froze at Castiel's growl, watching helplessly as the captain reached down and hoisted his pole, easily settling the second pair of rice sacks over his shoulders. He watched the young recruit collapse in shame as he turned and ran back to the group, leaving this feeble, useless pup behind. He didn't look back again, nodding at Metatron as the old beta marked something on his clipboard. Steve, despite his illustrious parentage, would never make a good soldier.
Dean laid on that dusty trail for hours before he managed to rise and limp his way back to camp. His legs were still on fire, and his arms just hung limply by his side, exhausted from carrying the pole and bags of rice for ten miles. He had been doing fine for the first five miles or so, but the longer they ran the further he fell behind until he just fell. Kevin, who had ridden along tucked in the back of his shirt, had been silent since Castiel took the pole and jogged away, both of them knowing that this was the end of the omega's time in the Chinese Army. He would be sent home in disgrace, and he would have failed both his brother and his ancestors. When Metatron came to his village to recruit soldiers next time, Sam would have to go.
"You tried your best," Kevin whispered, Cri-Kee unusually silent on Dean's shoulder as he slowly entered camp.
"I should have been better," Dean growled, feeling the first slow burn of anger deep in his chest. For the first time since he joined the army, he let his fury grow, knowing that his eyes would be glowing omega gold if it weren't for the stinging drops he put in that morning. "I'm too alpha for my village but not alpha enough to keep up here? What the hell is wrong with me?"
Cri-Kee chirped something and Kevin snorted, shaking his head. "That's terrible advice."
"What did he say?"
"He said that you should start being yourself."
Kevin and Cri-Kee dove back into Dean's shirt as the omega reached the open courtyard, raising his head to meet the red-tinged eyes of his captain. "You're not suited for the rage of war, no matter how excellent your lineage," Castiel growled, throwing a tied scroll at Dean's feet. He recognized it as his conscription notice; returning it was a clear dismissal from the training program. "Pack up your things and go home; you're done here. After today, I don't see how I could make a warrior out of you." With that, the raven-haired alpha spun on one heel and stalked away, returning to his tent as Dean stood in the center of the open courtyard, alone.
A snicker from the tents to the left caught his attention as Benny and Balthazar emerged into the rising moonlight. "You're the worst excuse for an alpha that I have ever seen," the bigger man jeered, pointing at the scroll on the ground. Bartholomew, Ishim, Inias, and Isaac joined Benny on one side of the omega, while Balthazar and his three half-siblings hovered on the other side. As betas, the three of them were more interested in watching the troublemaker get chased out of the camp, but the alphas all had eyes ringed with varying levels of red and they were spoiling for a fight. Dean's first instinct, his omega instinct, was to submit to this horde of alphas, to avoid the fight that had been building for two weeks, but Cri-Kee's suggestion, you should start being yourself, rang in the back of his mind. And Dean Winchester had never, in his twenty years, backed down from an alpha.
An instant later, Dean struck.
He lunged toward Balthazar, both because he hated that lean blond the most and because he only had a trio of curious young betas for backup. The alpha yelped as the omega decked him, giving him a black eye and probably a broken nose, kicking out as Muriel jumped on his back. He threw her halfway across the empty field, closing with her mate Ishim and tearing into him with claws and teeth before twisting his arm behind his back and using him as a launching point to close with Inias and Isaac.
The two alphas hadn't anticipated this rage, and they quickly retreated after exchanging a few blows with the big omega, though Bartholomew and Benny jumped Dean as soon as they moved away. Dean roared his fury, sounding exactly like the alpha he had been playing for two weeks, falling backwards and burying an elbow into Benny's side as he slammed the alpha to the ground, wrapping his legs around Bart's chest in the same motion. Benny grunted and tried to roll away as Bart screamed, the sound of his ribs breaking encouraging the other combatants to retreat to the safety of their tents. Benny managed to get free as Dean used the martial arts skills he had learned in camp to toss Bart, watching unsympathetically as the alpha landed wrong on his left wrist and twisted it painfully to the side. Balthazar grabbed Bart and pulled him away from the growling omega, snapping his teeth in an ineffectual threat display as all of the alphas and betas retreated.
Kevin, who had grabbed Cri-Kee and dashed for the safety of the pole in the center of the camp as soon as the fighting started, slunk back to Dean's side, resting his claws gently on the side of the omega's leg. "Well, if that's you being yourself, it's certainly the most alpha I've seen from you in the past two weeks."
Dean, the gold faded completely from his eyes, chuckled as he wiped the blood from his lip. He wasn't sure which of the alphas had managed to land a hit, but he had felt a surge of satisfaction when he heard Bartholomew's ribs break. At least that arrogant asshole would suffer greatly from that injury, even if Dead did have to go home in shame.
The omega looked down at the conscription notice on the ground, turning away from it to stare at the heavy pole reaching fifty feet into the sky with its single arrow mocking the camp. "I don't want to leave, Kevin," Dean murmured, slowly walking toward the pole and the weights sitting patiently on the ground nearby. "This arrow thing . . . it's a test. If I can figure it out . . ."
Three hours later, with dawn creeping nearer, Dean still was no closer to the answer. He was still tired from the climb and he had to be out of camp before Castiel woke. Turning away, Dean lowered his arms to release the attached straps, watching in exhausted fascination as the two weights swung toward each other and the straps twisted, holding for a moment before releasing each other. A surge of realization filled the young omega and he spun back to the pole, swinging both arms forward hard enough that the weights spun around each other, effectively knotting their straps and giving him a new way to climb the pole.
Using the straps to hold his weight, Dean pulled himself the first few feet off the ground, placing his feet against the wood beneath him to keep balance. He was holding all of his weight with his arms, fingers wrapped in a death grip around the black straps as he swung the weights higher and pulled. Slowly, using this method, Dean inched his way higher and higher on the pole as the sun peeked through the mountains and touched the arrow sticking out of the top. He heard shuffling below him as the other recruits started to stream out of their tents to prepare for the day's training and spotted him nearing the top of the pole. To his surprise, he heard calls of encouragement and hoots, even Balthazar and Benny calling his name. He nearly slipped barely a foot from the top, but calls of "You can do it!", "Don't give up, Steve!", and "Prove that you're a real alpha!" gave him the strength to tighten his grip and pull himself just a little higher. A moment later, he reached the top of the pole and pulled himself up, sitting on the top as he jerked the arrow free.
Castiel groaned at the noise outside his tent, distinctly remembering his orders to the recruits that they would assemble silently every morning. It was barely time for breakfast; why were they being so ridiculously loud? He glanced at Claire, who had just finished braiding her hair, and nodded toward the door of their tent, flinging it open with a furious command on his lips.
All words faded as an arrow whistled down and sunk itself into the ground at his feet, the metal tip making a satisfying shunk. He looked up, disbelief in his azure eyes, to find Steve Winchester sitting on the top of the pole at the center of camp, the weights slung over his shoulder as his fellow recruits jumped and cheered from the ground. How was it that he was the first one to figure out the test, and why were the alphas and betas who had harassed him for two weeks now singing his praises?
"He beat the leaders up last night," Anna whispered from his side, smiling at the alpha sitting so proud fifty feet above camp. "I guess he was angry, really angry, and he just lost it. He broke a couple of Bart's ribs and bloodied up Balthazar, Benny, Muriel, Ishim, Inias, and Isaac. Cool fight; you should have watched." Claire nodded from her aunt's side; apparently she had seen it, too. "It's about time he stood up for himself."
"He fought them? He beat them, all of them? And he reached the arrow . . ." Castiel raised his head to meet Steve's eyes from across the field, and for the first time they didn't look faded or muddy. That alpha had eyes the color of Imperial Jade, the loveliest shade of green that Castiel had ever seen in his life. Something flashed in his mind, some memory of green eyes, but it was gone before he could grab it. Steve smirked at Castiel from his perch, reaching up to touch the weights slung over his shoulder as a reminder that he had played by the alpha's rules. His eyes seemed to flash gold for a moment, but that had to be a trick of the rising sun shining directly on the boy. Smiling, Castiel bowed his head in acknowledgement of the feat and acceptance of the alpha's place in the army. Walking through the gathered soldiers, the captain leaned down and grabbed Steve's conscription notice, raising it in the air triumphantly before tucking it in his belt to the raucous cheers of the alphas and betas clustered around him. If Steve had learned how to stand up for himself enough to have the respect of his fellow recruits and he was smart enough to figure out Castiel's test, he could stay.
