"Excuse me?"
Cas turns to see a slight woman with blonde hair and glasses, staring up at the two of them.
"Yes?" Pete asks, impatiently.
"I'm sorry to bother you, but do either of you know that young man over there?"
Cas follows her finger and nearly chokes on his coffee.
There, sitting on a bench across the office, staring at him like he was the second coming, is a young boy with startling green eyes. Familiar green eyes.
"Of course," says Pete, "That's Winchester's kid. Well, one of them. Aren't you supposed to be interviewing him?" He asks, eyeing her badge.
The woman bristles lightly, "We're taking a little break," she says, "He's had a stressful day."
"I'm sure," says Pete disinterestedly, turning back to his papers.
Cas, meanwhile, can't look away. He feels like he's seen a ghost.
"How is he?" Cas manages, barely above a whisper.
The woman finally turns to look at him, "Not too great," she admits, "Are you working on his case?"
"Not exactly," says Cas, still staring at the boy. Dean, he remembers from the files.
The woman sighs, "Then I'm afraid I can't-"
"I met him once," Cas interrupts, not entirely sure why, "Years ago. He wasn't doing 'too great' then either."
"You know him?"
"Can I talk to him?" Cas hears himself ask.
"I'm not sure if-"
"FBI," Cas says, flashing his badge, "I need to talk to him."
"Oh," the woman says, a little startled, "Well, then." She gestures with her hand and leads Cas over.
The boy's eyes never stray from Castiel's as he approaches. When he reaches him, Castiel holds out his hand. Dean takes it without hesitation and allows Cas to pull him to his feet.
Cas feels a strange little jolt when they touch. Like a static shock but bigger, deeper. One look in Dean's eyes and Cas knows he felt it too. They let go.
"Hello," says Cas, feeling a little awkward, "My name is Castiel Novak."
"Dean Winchester," the boy says quietly.
"Would you care to talk to me for a minute?"
The boy swallows hard, then nods his head silently.
"Good," says Castiel.
Castiel. His angel has a name. Castiel, Dean thinks over and over, Castiel, Castiel. It's a beautiful name, he realizes. Exotic, holy even. And wholly worthy of his Angel.
Dean sits across the large table from the man who saved his life, from the man who, more importantly, saved Sammy, and waits. For the first time in his breif life, at a total loss of what to say. Unfortunately, the Angel seems similarly afflicted. Dean doesn't like that. It doesn't fit with the picture he has in head of the man who could conquer anything, so he finally breaks the silence with the most important of the million questions raging around his brain.
"Who are you?"
The Angel seems grateful for the line Dean's tossed him.
"My name is Castiel Novak. I'm with the FBI. We're looking into your father's case."
Oh. For some reason, Dean finds that disappointing. He always imagined, should he ever see his Angel again, the man would be looking for him.
"Do you know who I am?" Dean very much needs this question answered too. To his great relief, the Angel smiles. Just a little. Dean gets the feeling his Angel doesn't smile much, so the fact that Dean wrangled even that from him sets his heart all a flutter.
"Of course I do, Dean."
"You remember me?"
"How could I forget?"
Dean smiles. So, so happy.
"I remember you," It's very important the Angel know that.
The Angel looks surprised. "That's..." he searches for the word. "Good," he finally settles on, "I'm glad. But I'm sorry you remember so much about that night. No one should have to live with that."
Dean feels glad the Angel seems to care so much about him.
"Most of it's a blur," Dean lies, he has nightmares about it daily, "But I'll always remember you. You're my Angel." It's very important the Angel know that as well. Castiel must know, already. But it's very important that Dean tell him anyway.
"I..." Castiel seems to stagger under the weight of Dean's declaration. Dean likes that.
"What happened Dean," he says instead, "Are you alright?"
"Why does everyone think I'm not alright?" Dean asks, changing tactics. Castiel may be his Angel, but he's still a fed. In many ways, his father's enemy.
"I didn't say that," says Castiel, throwing Dean off-guard, "I only asked if you were."
"Well, I'm fine," Dean eyes him, "We're both fine."
"You and... Sam?"
"Yes," Dean's very happy his Angel remembers his brother. That's important too.
Castiel slides over the closed file sitting next to him and opens it. He can practically feel the judgemental eyes of Karen, Peter and the others drilling holes in the back of his neck, urging him to get on with it already.
"Looks like you've been traveling," Cas says casually.
"To hell and back," Dean mutters, rolling his eyes.
"Is that how you got all those bruises?" Cas asks.
Dean shifts uncomfortably and doesn't answer.
When he does, one of his sleeves shifts upward revealing a particularly nasty-looking scar.
"What happened there?"
Cas boldly reaches over and gently lifts the boy's sleeve, flashing back to the moment he'd grabbed ahold of the terrified four-year old and pulled him and his brother from the burning building.
Dean shrugs.
"It's a tattoo," the boy says dismissively, pulling away.
"What does it mean?" He asks. As far as Cas knows, tattoos usually represent some sort of personal significance for the barer.
"Nothing."
Cas drops his eyes, thinking.
"What?"
"Do you know why we're holding your father?"
"Because you're idiots."
"You think we shouldn't be holding him?"
Dean shrugs again.
"Do you know what he's accused of?"
Dean stares at the table top for a long minute. He nods.
"Is it true?"
"Even if it was true, why does it matter?" Dean snaps rather suddenly, "It's not like he's hurting anyone."
"Is that true?"
Dean falls silent again, refusing to make eye contact.
"Dean," Cas starts. "I'm going to be honest with you. We're not exactly sure what your father's been up to, but looking at this," he gestures to the file, "I think it's a fair guess he is hurting people."
Dean shuffles his feet.
"Is he hurting you, Dean?"
No answer.
"Is he hurting Sam?"
That did it.
Dean looks up, eyes shiny and wet, "Are you going to stop him?"
No matter how many times she goes through this, it's always difficult. It always aches in that small spot just to the left of her heart when she learns that the people or person who were meant to love a child most in this world had taken that trust and abused it. Had thrown aside their obligation to love and protect and had chosen instead to hurt and instill fear in their own flesh and blood.
Karen stares through the mirror at the tears in the young boy's eyes. The boy who had tried so hard to fight it. To stay strong for himself and for his little brother and she feels her heart break just a little.
And yet he'd chosen to open up. Not to her, but to a man who was... what exactly? She didn't know how these two men knew each other. But if a federal agent with no specialized training could get this kid to admit what she, a social service agent, could not, there must be something very special between them. And Karen intends to find out what.
Cas lets out a slow breath he didn't realize he'd been holding and he feels a cold sickness settle in his gut at Dean's confirmation.
"Can I see my brother?" Dean asks quietly, "Please. I need to see him."
"Of course," says Cas, without hesitation, "Wait here?"
"Don't go!"
Dean reaches out and grabs Cas's sleeve. Cas feels that same, deep electricity, where their skin brushes.
"I'm just going to get your brother," Cas says.
"Don't go," Dean pleads.
"Okay." Cas sits back down.
The door opens and Karen walks in.
"Would you like to go see Sam, Dean?" She asks.
Dean looks from her to Castiel, torn.
"Agent Novak can come with us, " she promises.
Dean nods.
Diana has to admit she's impressed. She's been a detective for a long time. Been blocked by the best of them. But this guy, this guy takes the cake. Two hours in interrogation and the man has said nothing. Not when she threatened him, not when her partner mocked him, not when they brought up his sons. Nothing. He sits there like a brick wall, staring at the mirror, taking full advantage of his fifth amendment rights. He doesn't even ask for a phone call or a lawyer. Just sits there.
She finally gives up well after two hours, leaving him on his own to stew in his juices. Maybe Pete will have better luck the second time. She'd kicked him out when he'd started yelling at the man. As frustrating as this was, decorum still has to count for something.
She sits at her desk, pouring through the file once again. There's something strange about it, nagging at her. Something that doesn't quite sit right. She stares at the list of suspicious deaths Winchester is thought to be connected to. All but one are known connections to the Tiger Lily drug ring, and all took place in towns where Winchester is thought to have been damaging graves at the time. But the connection is as flimsy as that. Who is connecting these dots? Where's the motive? The means? Why this man?
True, Winchester has a large number of unsavory associates and yes, there is a very real possibility he is abusing his children, but murder? It doesn't fit. It seems to her Winchester is more of a menace than anything else.
There's a piece missing here. Something big staring them all in the face. But everyone is in such hurry to pinhole John Winchester into a jack-of-all-trades nutcase-shaped slot, she's worried they may never get to the bottom of this ever-stranger puzzle.
Karen, Novak and Dean move together to the neighboring room, a small conference area where Sam and Karen's partner are waiting for them.
"Dean!" Sam cries, face lighting up at the sight of his brother. He races into the older boy's waiting arms.
"Hey, Sammy," Dean says, hugging him back, "It's alright. I'm here, buddy."
The little boy's face is wet with tears and he shakes a little as he turns to Karen.
"Can we go home now?"
"Not just yet," Karen replies.
They all sit down.
"Where is home for you, exactly?" She asks, directing the question at both boys.
She's met with matching shrugs.
"Where does your father take you when you're not...traveling?"
"Uncle Bobby's" says the younger boy.
"Shhh!" Dean hisses. "Nowhere," he says, "We stay at motels."
"Who's Uncle Bobby?" Karen asks.
Sam looks at his brother who shakes his head, and just shrugs.
"Dean?"
"Nobody," Dean insists.
Karen sighs.
It's going to be a long day.
Pete has just about had it with this guy. Four hours now, and nothing. Nothing! How exactly is he expected to work with that? How can you hang a guy if he bogarts all the rope?
Pete needs this guy to implicate himself. Without his confession, without his crazed white-supremacist, apocalypse survivalist, paranoid rantings against society, government, Tiger Lily, whatever, Pete won't be able to convince anyone that this is man they're looking for. And he really needs to convince them of that.
Pete's only hope is the nutjob's children, but truthfully they seem to be just about as stubborn as their father. The little one is a sniveling mess and the older boy seems to be going for the moody-teenager of the year award, with his apparent willingness to cooperate swinging back and forth so violently they're all getting cricks in their necks.
One minute he's calling them idiots and the next he's confessing to being abused by his father, and the third he's back to shruggy silences. Pete has half a mind to storm in there and knock some sense into the smug little bastard, but he holds himself in check. If he is to have any hope of getting anything useful out of the boys, he knows he's going to have to play it their way for the time being. And Sam's way seems to be Dean's way and Dean's way seems to be utterly dependant on Agent Castiel Novak's being in the room.
That's fine. They can work with that. So long as the fed doesn't sentimentality get the better of him.
They have a fucking job to do here.
Castiel can't stop staring at Dean.
The boy looks like he's had a rough ten years. His face is gaunt for a fourteen-year old's, like he doesn't often get his three squares. His clothes are baggy and rugged, army-surplus style, just like his father's. He wears a single piece of jewelry: a funny-looking amulet on a long black cord around his neck. The boy's skin is tight over muscles far too defined for someone so young and his movements are careful and measured, like someone twice his age, fully comfortable in their body and all too well aware of how to handle it. The flesh itself is layered in cuts, scrapes, and bruises, not even mentioning the mark on his shoulder that Cas noticed earlier.
It doesn't look like a tattoo; it looks like a burn. A really nasty burn in the perfect shape of a human handprint. Cas recalls the brisk autumn night he'd pulled Dean and his brother from the fire. How his flesh had burned when he'd touched the strange yellow substance, how Dean, in turn, had flinched when Cas touched him in that exact spot. But that was ten years ago. Even the worst of burns would have healed by now. At the very least, it wouldn't look so angry red as it does. Cas wonders if maybe Dean did have a burn and then got the tattoo when it started to fade. Wanting to hold onto the mark for some reason. It's a chilling notion.
Why would you want to remember something like that?
"Dean," Cas speaks up and everyone else in the room falls silent. Cas can feel all their eyes on him, the only pair that matter are Dean's.
Those brilliant, green eyes.