Title: Lock Me In
Author: HigherMagic
Pairings: Demon!Dean/Castiel/Gabriel
Rating: PG-15
Word Count: ~3,500
Spoilers: Gabriel exists. Dean was in Hell.
Summary: They had tried to keep Dean as independent as possible, so that Dean didn't feel like a slave. But it hadn't worked. The darkness goes into full-on rebellion whenever both Castiel and Gabriel are not present.
Notes/Warnings: Again, no porn this time. I'll get there eventually.
Unbeta'd. All mistakes are my own.

They've begun to call them 'episodes' – little instances where Dean will have to concentrate, to fight against the desire to follow Sam when he is dark and powerful and so completely all-encompassing. Where Dean will turn his black-ringed eyes to whichever Angel is present with a pleading expression, and the Angel will lay a hand on him and the presence will calm itself.

They had tried to keep Dean as independent as possible, so that Dean didn't feel like a slave. But it hadn't worked. The darkness goes into full-on rebellion whenever both Castiel and Gabriel are not present – when it's just Dean and Sam and Dean has to swallow back his desire to please his General, the frantic need to bask in the glow of Sam's increasing powers and his omnipotent affection. Dean hates Ruby and loves her at the same time – it just depends which line of thought he's taking.

Castiel and Gabriel are not insensitive to Dean's inner struggles – of course they aren't; they're the ones helping him. But they're trying to keep some semblance of free will with Dean – they don't want him to be a mindless creature bent to their will. That's not the whole point of this. The point is to keep Dean under control.

But it isn't working.

Dean keeps…slipping up.

His loyalties have always been torn. Before…before, it was Sam and Dad. Then Sam and Dad's legacy. Then Sam and the world, and now…now it's split three ways – between Sam, and Castiel, and Gabriel, and it's tearing him apart from the inside. The join where the two parts of Dean are locked together are fraying and cracking apart like old, rusty metal. His eyes are more black than green some days.

When they're black, he turns to Gabriel. He needs the Archangel's heavy hand, needs to be put in his place and treated like a servant, like something that needs to and will obey no matter what. He will whine when Gabriel presses a hand to his forehead and sends him to his knees, gasping and snarling and not fighting back because he can't, he doesn't want to. When Gabriel's eyes glow, the presence inside of Dean purrs and rolls over for it, and Dean will claw at the Archangel's vessel, desperate for more of that heavy hand, for more of that all-powerful touch that can render his barbed mind smooth and cleansed again.

But when Dean is a Hunter…when he is more human than animal and left to deal in the aftermath of his desires, shaking from the urges still leaving aftershocks through his body like an orgasm, Castiel is the one to soothe him, the one to stroke his hair and meet his eyes and whisper Enochian affections into his neck. To Gabriel, he submits, but with Castiel…he trusts.

But it's not enough.

Sam's hopped up on demon blood again. Dean can see the swirling evil in his soul and he knows his eyes are turning black. He's just about ready to fall to his knees and swear fealty to Sam – he can't help it. The raw power that's oozing off his brother is like a heavy aphrodisiac, and it leaves Dean panting and frothing at the mouth, snarling with serrated, bloodied teeth and black eyes. He's whining when he pulls his own reins, tossing his head because the spiked bit inside his own mouth hurts.

Please, he begs himself, the darkness coiling, thick and seductive, around the part of Dean that is still human, let us touch. Just once. Just a taste.

And it's like telling Dean not to save someone. It's like telling Dean to kill his little brother. No, he replies, gritting his teeth, shoving back against the bit, freeing his head once more, and he doesn't approach his baby brother who's panting and shaking with a lowered arm and blood around his mouth. Dean's expression is dark and he likes to think it's showing disapproval, but really, it's a war. It's a war he's fighting within himself and he has no fucking idea who's gonna win. He's not sure he wants to know that because – fuck, what if it's the wrong answer?

Sam swallows. "Dean -." His voice trembles with power and Dean feels a shudder race through him, the presence arching up like a contented cat, purring in submission and willingness and it would be so easy, to fall to his knees in front of Sam and offer up everything he is.

Instead, he holds up a hand, and releases himself from the hold of Sam's eyes. "Save it, Sam," he whispers, and he hopes his little brother doesn't see how his voice shakes, how blown his pupils are. It's like resisting lust, resisting Sam – it's like being offered the dream woman (or man) with no strings attached and turning it down.

Dean takes a deep breath, and closes his eyes. Please, he whispers into his mind, to no one in particular even though he knows two someones are listening very intently. I need help. Please.

They come. They always come. Gabriel arrives first and Dean almost sobs when the Archangel's commanding presence looms over him. Immediately the darkness' attention shifts towards the bright, pulsating light, and Dean looks towards him with relief and gratitude in his eyes. Gabriel smiles a little.

"Having fun here, boys?" he asks, putting a hand on his hip and looking at the carnage of slain demons. The scent of their blood and abandoned hosts burns at Dean's sensitive nose and he's trying to breathe through his mouth as much as possible.

"Gabriel," Sam says in response, wiping at the blood around his mouth and Dean bites back a whimper, sighing only when Gabriel steps closer to him, and closes his eyes once more, forcing himself to relax. He knows his eyes are turning black and so he doesn't look up until he hears wings cutting through the air one more time, and his release is absolute. Castiel's here. Dean feels like he could cry. "Cas."

"Sam." The short greeting is all that's necessary. Castiel looks around, taking in the bodies, then looks back to the abomination he's falling to protect. "Was this an ambush?"

Sam nods, concern in his eyes as he surveys his panting brother, how he's flanked by the two Angels, and it seems like it's three against one. Sam feels hunted, defended against, like he's attacking Dean without realizing it. He takes a step back just because he feels a little safer there. "Yeah. They just jumped us outta nowhere," he says, pushing hair out of his face. "Can you guys mojo us back to the room, maybe?"

The Angels nod. Gabriel touches Sam's forehead, and Castiel lays a hand on Dean's shoulder, and the four of them disappear.

There's only so much Sam knows. They refuse to tell him more than what's strictly necessary. They had to explain the mark on Dean's neck because it's not exactly inconspicuous, and Sam had been curious. Castiel had, truthfully, told him that the Angels' influence was intended to help Dean cope with the horrors of Hell, and that it tended to get worse whenever Sam and Dean were fighting demons. Sometimes it demanded their physical presence, to revel in that connection and keep Dean safe and pure and away from the dark.

All of this is completely true. It's just not the whole truth, and Sam knows it. But he's smart enough to know when to leave well enough alone, and he's not sure he wants to know if his brother's having weird kinky threesome gay Angel sex or something. Or, if it's something darker than that, he still doesn't want to know. Dean's coping. He's okay with being kept ignorant.

But Dean's not coping. He's shaking so hard he damn near fires his gun when Gabriel appears in Dean's room after dropping Sam off. His arms are folded and his brows are knit together in concern. Castiel has yet to take his hand off Dean's shoulder.

Dean's staring at some point between Gabriel's feet, and there's sweat coating his face in a fine sheen. He looks ill and his eyes are becoming black around the edge. When he swallows, the sweat stings at Gabriel's handprint.

"Help me," he whispers, turning imploring half-green eyes to first Castiel, then Gabriel.

The Seraph sighs, shaking his head. "Dean…" He hesitates, squeezing lightly at Dean's shoulder. "We have already done so much. There's only so much we can risk doing before you become completely dependent on us, completely…"

"What?" Dean asks, with a dreadful kind of certainty in his voice.

"Owned, Dean," Gabriel finishes, stepping forward to stand in front of the Hunter. There's sincerity in his voice and an awful kind of gentleness that makes Dean shiver with the implications. "Until we own you, body, soul, mind, until you can't breathe without looking to us for permission. You don't want to live like that."

But, God help him, he does. Behind his face, there's thoughts of obedience and orders – just be the good soldier. John's voice taunts him from the darkness' mass – take orders, be a good boy, Dean. Look after Sammy. Can't look after Sammy if you're a slave – can't look after him if you aren't.

He barks out a harsh, bitter laugh. "We all know how this will end," he says, seeing the resignation on Castiel's face and the harsh twist to Gabriel's mouth. They both care about him – they don't want him to be a mindless drone. The thought strikes Dean as novel. He pushes himself forward, so he's kneeling in front of the two Angels and looking up at them. "Please. You have to. I know you don't want to, but you have to. Please…I…I can't go on like this."

The look in Castiel's eyes breaks his heart. The Seraph kneels down in front of Dean and takes his chin in hand. "We don't want to dominate you, Dean," Castiel whispers, his eyes shining and it's not just from Grace. "You don't want to -."

"I have to," Dean replies fiercely. "I…I do want to." At least, some part of him does. Wants to be owned and wanted so entirely, so absolutely, that there's never another hesitation in his mind over where he stands with the Angels. Granted, he's not entirely sure now, but they love him – he's sure of that. Otherwise they wouldn't be arguing with him, and they wouldn't come every time he called, first time – both of them. They wouldn't be willing to sate his needs and his thirst for power. "Please, Cas…Gabriel, I'm trusting you with my life and my soul, here," he says, feeling a little embarrassed to say it, but the look in Castiel's eyes makes it worth it. "Own me."

Castiel's kiss is fierce – Dean hadn't expected such wildness and intensity to the contact – it's electric, sending nervous skitters up his spine. He mewls, falling back against the end of the bed and Castiel, the persistent bastard, follows him, holds Dean close like he's finally got him and he doesn't have the slightest intention of letting him go, now that he's got his prize, his kill. The touches have possession in their heat and Dean shivers, leaning his head back, letting Castiel kneel and loom over him, dominating and controlling the kiss with a hand cupping Dean's jaw, just pressing into his neck with his thumb, the other on Dean's marked shoulder. The demon inside of Dean jerks in response to it, not used to such power from the lesser Angel, and the surprise of it, the feral kind of thrill, is making the hairs on the back of Dean's neck stand on end, and makes him moan and part his lips, letting in Castiel's surprisingly skilled tongue.

The Seraph seats himself on Dean's thighs, cradling his head in his hands, one palm flattened over Gabriel's mark on his neck, and it terrifies Dean how the darkness snarls at that foreign Grace at that mark. He finds himself baring his teeth and biting back at Castiel without being able to help it. His hands try to come up, try to force Castiel away, to warn him, but then Gabriel's there.

The Archangel's presence is, in a word, terrifying. Gabriel is absolute, all-consuming, raw fire along the edges of Dean's ragged soul, and the Hunter cries out when he feels Gabriel next to him, laying hands on him that are no less possessive, no less claiming and commanding than Castiel's, and he mewls, and whines, and sobs, because he's so afraid. These creatures, these things, are so much more powerful than him. They could rip him to shreds with hardly a thought, but Castiel's hands are gentle. Gabriel is restraining. They're not hurting him. Not really.

"Come to me, Dean," Castiel whispers, drawing away from their kiss with panting breaths and wet mouths, and whispers the words into Dean's left ear, still holding onto Dean's neck. "Follow me here. Come."

The Hunter, the part of him that is still human, and still Dean, whines, and turns towards the Seraph, unable to do anything else. He can't go anywhere without dragging that darkness along behind him, though – he lets out a whimper of distress.

"I can't," he moans, like a dying animal, opening eyes that are a horrifying mix of green and black, shining with tears and wide with terror and ignorance. Castiel's there, petting through his hair, soothing him with kind words and gentle touches – keeping him anchored in reality when their forms are being ripped apart.

"Yes, Dean, you can. You will." Power threads through Castiel's voice – a whine on the tail-end. It's agonizing to resist, so Dean picks up the weight of that dark presence and crawls towards the Angel, his Angel, towards the light of him. Castiel welcomes him with open arms.

"Now, you, to me." Gabriel's voice jolts Dean out of whatever measure of peace he may or may not have experienced, in the split second where Castiel's wings wrapped around him and there was no pain. The darkness snarls and roils inside of Dean, rabid for its master, clearly picking out Gabriel as the dominant. The Archangel's not discouraging it – he's goading the hound onward, coaxing it forward, and dragging Dean along with it. Dean fights back, pulls his darker half in and wraps reins around it, snarling and baring his teeth in the struggle. "Come, now, to me."

No. "I can't."

"Trust us, Dean. We will not let you fall."

The soldered edge where the two halves of Dean Winchester join together suddenly snap. It's vicious and it tears at Dean, leaving ragged, fresh wounds, and he clutches at himself as though they were physical. Then the two sides rush away from each other. The darkness rolls over at Gabriel's feet and Dean rushes into Castiel's arms, sobbing out his broken relief at not having that weight on him again.

Castiel's hand in warm on his head, his arms strong, wrapped around Dean's body. Gabriel, too, is embracing him. The two Angels begin to chant.

Pain, white-hot and all-consuming surrounds Dean. He shies away and tries to escape it but Castiel holds him fast, surrounding him on all sides in his wings and his Grace. He mewls as sharp edges dig in and make him bleed. "Cas," he whispers, terrified beyond belief, unable to process what's happening to him. Distantly, he can feel the dark side of him be branded the same way by the Archangel – he can hear its agonized screams across his psyche. He wants to run to it, unbelievably, because there was strength in their numbers and the thing had power. Dean can't defend himself like this – he is completely at the mercy of Castiel. Of Gabriel.

He thinks, on a dim, distant level, that that's probably the point.

"Trust us."

"Obey us."

"Yes."

Yes.

Suddenly the pain recedes. A small part of Castiel has threaded itself into Dean, and the Hunter's soul is tied to Castiel. Across the expanse that is, at once, ten feet and a thousand miles, the darkness is coiled inside of Gabriel's Grace as well. They are pulled and then threaded together, wrapped up in their Angels, serving both, and there's no pain in it. There's no white-hot flash of forcibly joining, of violation. It's simple and it's effective and it's…

God, it's actually happening.

Dean never wanted to be a slave. That was what the whole 'Suck it, Michael' thing was. He didn't want to be an 'Angel condom', but Cas and Gabe…they're not using him. Hell, they'd tried to stop him. They're the good guys. The presence inside of him purrs its agreement, sliding perfectly along Dean's entrapped essence, wrapped in Castiel's shining Grace, and then Dean feels it start to slumber like a great beast.

When he opens his eyes, the Angels are leaning on him, heavy weights made heavier by the wings sprouting from their backs. He coughs, realizing his throat is hoarse and doesn't want to think about how that happened. Castiel's still sitting on him, breathing heavily against his neck. All three of them are sweaty, and Dean feels…relaxed. He feels like he could let go of the reins and not have the whole team run away with him.

He moves his shaking hands, settling one on Castiel's hip, the other on Gabriel's thigh.

"Thank you," he whispers, speaking into Castiel's hair but Gabriel shifts a little and he knows they're both listening. "Whatever you did, thank you."

Gabriel lifts his head, and he's smiling indulgently, like he's looking at Dean in a completely different way, as though what he sees, he cares about. A lot. He rests his forehead against Dean's and lets their lips brush, just a little, because the human side of Dean doesn't belong to him – he belongs to Castiel, and that's okay. The bindings surrounding Dean's soul shift a little and stretch, as though testing the elasticity, but the bindings hold strong and Dean's hand shifts from Gabriel's thigh to the back of his head, and he presses forward, tentatively, letting their lips meet in a much more gentle way than perhaps the situation calls for – he wants Gabriel to know that the Archangel's not just a method of restraint. Dean does care, despite everything.

It's strange – with two sets of desires rolling in his head, he's not quite sure which thoughts are his and which are its. But it doesn't matter. Castiel's forehead is resting against Dean's neck, and the Angel's running a hand up and down Dean's side, curving along his back, and Dean allows himself to relax.

Castiel's purring his happiness at that, pressing his lips against Gabriel's mark on Dean's neck, and the Hunter shivers at the lance of pleasure-pain, the darkness roiling inside of his mind but being held steady by Gabriel's own touch.

"It's always gonna be like this, isn't it?" he whispers when Gabriel pulls away with a final parting nip to his bottom lip, and he pulls away to look at Castiel, then Gabriel again. His eyes are bright green, but his pupils are just a little larger and, if Castiel and Gabriel look closer, they can see where the pupil actually ends, and the black ring becomes the darkness. It just looks like there's low light or Dean's stoned or turned on. It's a negligible side effect, a blessing out of what could have been disaster.

"Always going to be like what, Dean?"

"This," the Hunter repeats, gesturing between the three of them. "Dependency. Torn." His voice is low and raspy and he feels like he needs to cough, so he swallows and wets his throat. "I feel like I…" He winces, pressing the hand that had been on Castiel to his chest, but leaning closer to that Angel to compensate.

"We will try and make this as easy as possible, but yes," Gabriel replies, smiling a little in the way that he would as the Trickster. Strangely, it puts Dean at ease, because if Gabriel's in the mood for jokes, then that means things can't be all that bad.

The darkness in him stirs a little at the sound of Gabriel's voice and the Archangel's eyes close, and Dean shivers when he can feel the creature caressing over his bound soul, the part that belongs to Gabriel.

"Sleep now, Dean. We will finish this in the morning," Castiel whispers, and Dean has just enough time to think 'Finish?' before there's two fingers pressed to his forehead and he's lost to dreams that are devoid of nightmares, and full of peace and warm feathers.