Piper's hazel eyes, wide with fear, made Dean's heart ache. He wanted to pull her into his arms and take her away from this stupid fucking lab, away from this stupid, arrogant angel, and away from the sight of Bobby, bloodied and still, lying on the floor near them.
Unfortunately, all of that shit still had to be dealt with, so he couldn't just bundle her into the Impala and run.
Later, baby, he thought as he started to sit up.
The… Things wearing Cass were pacing, their attention diverted away from the humans in the room. Dean used the distraction to sit up completely and try to take stock.
"Bobby," he hissed. "Bobby."
Bobby finally started to stir, sitting up and blinking around. There was blood splattered oozing from a cut on his cheek and down onto his shirt, but he looked relatively unharmed otherwise. Thank Christ, Dean thought fervently.
He looked back at Piper, but she only had eyes for Cass, who was staring back at her in a way that was raising Dean's hackles. He opened his mouth to snap, anger overriding fear and common sense, but his mouth closed when he saw the line of black goo starting to ooze from Cass' dark hairline.
Not Cass, he reminded himself. That's not Cass.
"How many of you ass-clowns are in there, huh?" he asked, starting to get to his feet. "A hundred? More?" More of the goo started to drip from Cass' left hand onto the floor, making little splat sounds as it hit the concrete. Dean smirked and met blue eyes with his own. "Your vessel's gonna explode, ain't it? Wouldn't do anything too strenuous." He shrugged. "In fact, I'd call it a day, head on home, yeah?"
Cass sneered at him. "We'll… Be back for you," he said laboriously. He turned and shuffled away. His shoes squelched as he did so, and Dean could only assume that they were filling with that same black goo.
"Cass," Piper said softly, her hand raised halfway into the air as if to stop the angel. He kept walking, and Dean had to watch Piper's heart break all over again as the angel walked through the door and they listened to him go down the hall.
"Well," Bobby said gently. When Dean managed to glance at him, he saw that his eyes were glued to Piper, too. "That's a new one."
"We have to go after him," Piper whispered, her eyes filling with tears. "We have to… I mean, please."
"Yeah, kitten," Dean said. "Let's go find Sammy and we'll follow Cass wherever he's going, okay?"
She nodded gratefully and Dean took that as his signal to stand. He held out a hand to help her do the same, and her palm was cool and clammy in his as he pulled her to her feet. He pressed a hard, brief kiss to her temple, wishing he could do more in this moment when she so obviously needed him, then turned to get Bobby up, too.
Once everyone had been checked over for injuries, big or small, Dean led Piper down the hall by the hand. He kept his eyes up and looking for any sign of Sam, but he knew she was staring down at the floor where the drops of leviathan ooze had splattered. Fuck.
He found Sam down a few corridors, Piper and Bobby trailing behind him. Sam had his back pressed against the wall and his eyes were wide with fear and disbelief, staring at…
Nothing?
Jesus fuck.
"Sam!" Dean barked, nearing the end of his rope. "Sam. Sam!"
Finally, his brother jerked and he looked at Dean. His eyes were wild with fear and desperation. It made Dean's heart clench and he put a hand on Sam's chest to steady him.
"Woah, woah," he muttered. "Hey, look at me." When staring at Sam did nothing to calm the distress he saw in his face, Dean grimaced. "All right. We gotta button this up. Come on, let's get out of here."
Following the leviathans' path around the lab and to the reservoir got easier and easier the further they got. The goo seemed to be getting more abundant the longer they were stuck in Cass' body, which Piper could only imagine was not a good sign.
Hang on, Cass, she thought, maybe a little hysterically. Hang on, I'm coming for you.
When they through the gate and toward the water, Cass was knee-deep in the reservoir and steadily striding out toward the middle.
Piper panicked. "Cass!"
She didn't get more than one step before her husband's arm wrapped around her like a band of iron, effectively stopping her desperate attempt to pull her angel out of the water. Even though she knew he was right, his murmurs of, "I've got you," and "let him go, kitten," were right, she fought him hard.
"Let me go!" she hissed, her eyes glued to where Cas was now chest-deep in the water. "Let me go! We have to try!"
She stopped fighting and watched helplessly as Cass finally went completely under the water. She held her breath, hopeful for a beat that he'd come back up, sputtering and miserable and guilty and hurting but alive.
Instead, from where he'd disappeared, a whirlpool of water and black liquid appeared. The black radiated out, soaking into the rest of the water, and then all traces of Cass and leviathans alike disappeared.
Piper felt her legs give out and she felt Dean catch her, but they were distant sensations, felt only through the rapidly rising feeling of completely numbness wrapping her up and leaving her feeling disconnected and floaty.
Cass, she mourned, praying as hard as she'd ever prayed to God. Cass, I'm so sorry, Cass. Oh, God, I'm so sorry.
"Damn it," Dean said sharply, frustrated.
"You said it," Bobby agreed. "Those… Whatever you call 'ems…"
"Leviathans," Piper supplied dully. She felt Bobby's eyes on her but ignored them to keep looking out at the water.
"Right. If they're in the pipes, they got themselves a highway to anywhere."
"Awesome," Dean snarled, kicking at the ground.
Something moved in the water and Piper's heart jumped into her throat. She lunged forward before any of the men could stop her and waded into the water. She was knee-deep before she came upon the bundle that had risen, and she felt tears finally start to fill her eyes when she realized what it was. Helplessly, she cradled Castiel's dirty, bloody, oozy trench coat in her arms gently, like it was precious, and turned back to the boys.
She raised her eyes to meet Dean's and the raw pain there made her suck in an unsteady breath.
"Pipes," he started, then shook his head and came to her. She fell gratefully against his chest, trying to control her shuddery breathing, trying not to break down at this reservoir where her friend had…
Where her friend had died.
"Let's go," Bobby said gently behind them.
Dean watched that night as Piper lovingly hand-washed Castiel's coat, meticulously cleaning off every spot of blood, goo, and mud that was spattered on the canvas. She didn't speak a word while she did it, but he saw the tightness in her shoulders loosen gradually. She wasn't okay, not by a long shot, but he thought maybe, with time, she would be.
Because he didn't see how they would get Cass back from this. He wasn't trying to be negative, but the dude disintegrated after eating a bunch of Purgatory monsters. As resilient as Cass was, and he was damn resilient, Dean knew, he was pretty sure the angel was gone for good.
"Pipes," he said finally, after watching her for almost thirty straight minutes. When she looked up at him, her eyes were red-rimmed but dry.
"Let's go to bed, kitten."
She shook her head and looked back down at the coat. "I… I can't," she whispered, her voice harsh and raspy. "I can't. Cass is gonna…" She swallowed hard. "Cass is gonna need his coat."
"Piper…"
She shook her head again, more frantically. "No, no, Cass is going to need his coat because he's coming back, and he's going to apologize, and we're going to forgive him, and he's going to need his coat because he's finally just going to stick with us and he's going to hunt with us and ride with us and he's going to be fine and we'll all be fine-"
Dean was around the table like a shot, scooping Piper into his arms and holding her against his chest as she started to cry in earnest. He cradled the back of her head and pressed kisses to her temple, her cheekbone, her ear.
"I've gotcha, kitten," he whispered. "Let it all out, baby, that's right. I gotcha. It's okay."
Late the next morning, Piper sat down on the edge of Sam's bed where he was sleeping, still pretty deeply. She had a glass of water, a glass of orange juice, and a huge pile of toast balanced on a tray she'd managed to scrounge from the depths of Bobby's cabinets. She set it on the nightstand and laid a gentle hand on her brother-in-law's shoulder.
"Sam," she said softly. "Sammy, come on, it's time to wake up."
Despite her attempts to be gentle, he jerked awake like a gunshot had gone off in the room. His chest heaved and his eyes darted around as he swallowed hard. His gaze finally settled on her and she smiled, trying to hide how badly he'd startled her.
"Hiya," she said, watching as he relaxed minutely bit by bit. She handed him the orange juice first. "Drink this." He took it from her and took a sip. "How are you feeling?"
"Like hell."
"Well, you slept for about twelve hours."
He finally seemed to shake off whatever had spooked him and focused on her. He smiled a little, and it was shaky but she counted it as a victory. "Breakfast in bed?" he asked.
"Don't get used to it," Dean said from where he was leaning in the doorway. Bobby stood behind him, watching all of them silently.
Piper rolled her eyes, making Sam smile again, and held out her hand. "Give me your hand, I want to check your bandage."
He held it out dutifully and she unwrapped the gauze and started to disinfect the cut there again as the men spoke around her.
"So, ooze invasion? Any leads?" Sam asked.
Bobby answered from behind them. "I got all my feelers out. Whatever they're up to, it ain't about going Mothra down Main Street. It'll turn up."
Piper finished with the dressing and taped the edges of the gauze to fasten the bandage.
"Now," Dean said, his voice hard. "Onto our other big problem. How're you doing? And don't say 'okay.'"
"I'm not okay," Sam said tiredly.
Dean snorted. "You think?"
"Hey," Piper said firmly. "Take it easy."
"There's nothing easy about it, Pipes! We acted like he had everything under control!"
"I get it," Sam said softly. "I'm sorry. Look, I didn't exactly want to crack up, you know?"
Piper put a hand on Sam's arm, bringing his attention back to her. "What happened?"
"Well, it's not just flashbacks anymore."
She frowned. "What's going on, then?"
"It's more like… I'm seeing through the cracks."
"What's that mean?" she could hear the frown in Dean's voice.
"It means I'm having a difficult time figuring out what's real."
"Hallucinations," Piper breathed, dread rising in her chest.
"For starters."
"Well, for starters," Dean snapped, "if you're tripping Hell's bells, why would you hide that?"
"I wasn't hiding it, Dean!" Sam protested. "I was just not talking about it. I mean, it seemed like we had enough going on as it was." He sighed, indignation leaving as he deflated a little. Piper thought he looked exhausted even after twelve hours of sleep. "Look, I… I just figured, try to hold onto the safety bar and ride it out, y'know? But it's getting more… Specific."
Piper frowned. "Specific? Specific how?"
Sam sighed. "It was… Look, it's… He says none of this is real."
"Who?"
"Lucifer."
"Lucifer?" Dean snarled
"Dean," Piper scolded without looking back at him. "If you're not going to be helpful, go downstairs and do something else."
He growled a little, but ultimately stayed where he was.
Sam waited until it seemed like that had been decided before going on. "I'm seeing Lucifer. He's strong, like, physical with me, too. He can touch me and hurt me, and it's so…" He wiped a hand down his face. "So vivid. I can smell the iron of the cage and the hellfire coming through the bars, it's like… Clinging to his clothes, or whatever. And he looks just the same."
Outright fear was making Piper's stomach cramp. Shit. "What does he say?" she asked.
"He… He says you guys aren't real. That he created this whole thing, the soullnessness and the apple pie life for you guys and all of it. He did it to fuck with me, and I'm still down in Hell with him. I'm still there." His eyes had taken on a desperate sheen.
"Pipe," he said softly, his voice trembling with fear. "Pipe, am I still in Hell?"
… Fuck.
