"How long?"
It was a sensible question, really. They needed to know how long Castiel would need the cast, how long he'd need to keep off of it before possibly hunting again. It wasn't like Dean asked because his chest was constricting in panic, like he was waiting, hoping to hear anything other than two months. Because that timeline wasn't going to happen. He'd made sure of that three years ago.
And yet. And yet. Whatever choices you make, whatever details you alter, we will always end up—here.
"His talus—the place where his foot connects to his leg—has a fracture, but it hasn't gone all the way through. He's lucky for that, but it's still going to be a while before he can put any weight on it. Eight to twelve weeks would be my estimate." The doctor's words were crisp, businesslike. Dean excused himself so he could go be sick.
Nonononononono…
oOo
Sam came back from his supply run, his eyes just slightly worn and his breath puffing too noticeably. He hadn't even been jogging. "Man, these prescriptions they wrote up for him… heavy duty stuff," he said, plunking the pill containers on their map table. "Better than what I have. Think he'll notice if I steal a few?"
Dean lifted his head to look at him, his expression hopeless, and Sam did some rapid backtracking. He had the problem diagnosed within seconds. "Wait… you don't think… no. Dean, he's not going to go off the deep end because of a foot injury. He's tougher than that."
"Zechariah… he said this was gonna happen if I said no to Michael. That future, Sam…" He shook his head. "You were gone, too. Does this mean I'm, what if I lose—"
"Things are different than they were then," Sam interrupted fiercely. "Lucifer is locked up, and I'm not going anywhere. Give us a little credit, here."
So Dean did. And Sam was right, because Castiel didn't start popping pills like his future version had.
He didn't take them at all.
Several tense days later, and Sam was urging him to confront him about it. He has to be feeling the pain, Sam said. You talk to him, Dean begged. Sam had only looked at him with the patented Are-you-a-complete-idiot-Dean? expression, the one that made his face look like a prune, and Dean found himself trudging to the weight room.
Normal people, you see, when injured will mooch around and watch television, read books, take bubble-baths, do any combination of relaxing activities. Not Castiel. His convalescence consisted of bench pressing, pull ups, and working out his one good leg. It consisted of not eating, not sleeping and then crying when he did sleep, so that Dean just ended up pulling a chair by his bed to use as his new permanent sleep station, so that he could poke him awake when things looked to be getting bad. It consisted of only talking in monosyllables, so that extracting a Good morning from him was enough to drain him of speech for the entire day, all the way up until Good Night.
It was frustrating for all of them, had Dean crawling the walls and Sam PMS-ing all over the place. It was toxic. But that didn't mean Dean wanted to talk to him about it. Sam was more cut out for that sort of thing.
Nonetheless…
"Hey, Cas," he said cautiously, stepping into a quiet room. Castiel didn't believe in working out to music. It was the bench press today, he noticed, and Castiel had been at it long enough to have soaked Dean's ratty tee with sweat, to be breathing harshly, his face contorted in pain. Dean did a double take when he saw just how much weight he'd put on it. Holy shit.
"Shouldn't you have a spotter?" he said. As per usual, the former angel didn't respond, but he allowed Dean to help maneuver the bar back into its slot, let him help him sit up to make room for Dean on the bench.
Dean allowed himself to bask in the silence for a minute, wishing he could procrastinate having this conversation a little longer. But he couldn't. "Why aren't you taking the meds, Cas," he sighed.
Castiel squeezed his eyes shut, quiet for long enough that Dean was seriously wondering if he was going to force him to ask again.
"Cas."
"Because I'm weak, Dean." It was a sudden declaration, and so unexpected that it floored Dean. What? He'd thought a lot of things about Castiel, (and plenty of it wasn't exactly flattering) but he'd neverthought that. Saying Castiel was weak, was like saying the sun wasn't bright, like saying cars didn't drive and Justin Bieber produced music fit for listening to. Just, completely wrong.
In an eloquent expression of these thoughts, Dean said, "…What?"
"I'm weak," Castiel repeated, with too much conviction. The force of his gaze still had the power to pin Dean down, a butterfly on a board. "I'm fragile, and I don't… I don't want to be. I don't want to need things," he gestured at his cast. "Like this. And the medication. It's so. It's human."
Dean took a moment to digest this. He was floundering for words now, lost in a sea of something that begged utterance, but he couldn't. Words were traitors. He could only pinwheel his arms, kick his legs and hope to tread water. "Well, that's what you are," he said bluntly. "Human. But, Cas. It's not all pain, it doesn't have to be. We have some good things." And damn, when he said it he almost believed it himself.
Apparently Castiel did too, because he fixed Dean with a weighty stare. "…I know." I just wish I didn't have to rely on that.
oOo
Heroism was not all it was cracked up to be. Crowley had avidly read the Winchester Gospels, but it was still unpleasant when he made the discovery that most people were just plain ungrateful after being rescued.
He posed as a janitor to kill his first ghost. It was literally painful to ditch the Armani suit, but he did, and even though he saved everyone by burning the thing's bones, his conduct at the workplace was deemed "unacceptable," and he was laid off soon after. Crowley figured it wasn't really going against his new Moral Code to curse his former bosses into losing all of their pubic hair. They needed to learn to appreciate what they had.
As for Kevin, he proved more difficult to track than Crowley had originally anticipated. Apparently, even without the shelter of Hunters, when Kevin Tran was free from the incompetence of his mother he was blessedly good at hiding. But track him Crowley did, all up and down the continent, and then even going as far as Chile. It was there, in its Mediterranean center, where Crowley finally caught up.
Abaddon did, too.
Crowley crouched in the bushes, peered in through Kevin's cottage window in possibly the most undignified position he'd ever been in to watch the confrontation. It wasn't like he could go in. There were Devil's Traps all over the place, which prevented him from entering, even if it didn't prevent Abbadon.
The surprising thing was that the Prophet actually seemed to be having a civil conversation with the whore. There was a lot of head nodding, and at one point, when Abbadon reached out her hand, Boy Wonder just gulped and… took it. No fight or anything, and the pair of them disappeared.
Crowley sat back, plopping his newly-suited butt in the dirt and mulled it over. Obviously the Prophet was coerced. Crowley liked to believe he knew the little bugger, and Tran did not, would not deal with an agent of Hell unless he had no other option. There had to be something going on, for the Prophet to go skipping off with one of the First Fallen.
Crowley resolved to find out what that was, and, if possible, rescue the bloody nuisance from Abbadon's clutches. He was already a traitor and a rogue; he might as well embrace the part.
oOo
There are two things you can do, when you've been locked out of your home. The first and easiest is to find a locksmith, but if that locksmith is Michael and currently locked up himself, well, that narrows your options a bit. The second thing you can do is Break In.
Luckily, Harut knew exactly how to do that. There were advantages to being in the thick of Earthly magic circles since the time of Babylon, and with enough angels similarly cast out and desperate to return, she finally had the firepower on Earth she needed to pull it off.
So slowly, slowly she gathered the others around her, and began making preparations to open the Gate. It didn't matter anymore to the angels when one Fell, or why. What mattered was getting back. So it was that Harut, pious, faithful Harut, who was cast out of Heaven before even the last batch of fledglings was born, was able to lead them.
oOo
Every night, Castiel dreamed of death. Not capital-letter D Death, the pale, sarcastic, pizza-eating Death. He dreamed of the death that tore your heart and lungs out, the one that stole the people closest to you.
Sometimes it was his brethren, the angels. He was killing them, during his own little reign of terror. Or they were dying miserably, alone, stranded in an unfriendly world where Castiel lacked the power to help him. He'd try, yes, but every time he came close to one of them; No, Castiel, and they would light up. He'd be forced to shield his eyes then, only able to look back at them when they had become corpses.
Sometimes it was Sam, sucking in a last breath and then gone, the Trials, however incomplete, sucking the life from him. Other times, he was jumping into the Pit, Castiel yelling No, Sam, I can't bring you back this time, don't, but Sam would just smile sadly at him. No, Cas. And leap.
And sometimes it was Dean. It wasn't ever entirely clear, why he was dying. All Castiel knew was that he was powerless to stop it. Tonight was one of those dreams, and Castiel didn't know that he was shaking under the covers. He did feel it, though, when the bed dipped next to him.
"Mmphfunng?" It was good to be woken up. He wondered if it was Dean, telling him to shhh, shhh Cas, again. Because Dean was alive, he wasn't dead right now. He could cry for gratitude.
He felt the covers shift, and a heavy weight settle next to him. "Can't take it, Cas," Dean murmured. "That chair is so uncomfortable. Impossible to sleep on. Hope you don't mind."
"Dnnnmnngph."
"I'll take that as a yes."
Castiel drifted again, and when he woke up, for the first time he could remember, his mind was clear. No nightmare-cobwebs he needed to brush away.
The bed was empty, and Castiel blinked around at his room. Oh. Was that what they called a good dream?
oOo
Sam didn't have all that many nightmares anymore. Flashbacks to his time in the Cage used to be a near-constant occurrence, but since Castiel's intervention at the psych ward, he'd largely forgotten his time there. There were bits and pieces, but he kept these squashed down in the farthest recesses of his brain, where they couldn't bother him. Most of the time, it was enough.
Except tonight was different. Tonight he dreamed of Adam.
The younger man just appeared, springing half-formed out of the corners of Sam's subconscious. Guess who's back, he said, smile feral.
It was the sort of dream where Sam knew it was a dream immediately, but although he focused, tried to change his train of thought and gain control over the dream like all of the manuals told him he could, Adam stayed, and Sam's mouth opened of its own volition.
Adam, Sam said. He paused. I don't understand. You're in the Cage.
I'm out now, no thanks to you. No angels or Reapers to airlift my ass out; I had to do it the hard way.
That's not possible. There's no way.
What, I can't make unlikely comebacks too? That against the rules? Trust me Sam, I'll tell you all about it when you see me again. I'll tell you right before I kill you.
Why would you want to kill me? It was a stupid question, and Sam knew it.
You left me behind, didn't you? To rot in the Cage, forever. You never even tried looking for a way to rescue me.
It's impossible to get out.
You did. I did. Doesn't look very impossible, if you ask me. Just tell me, Sam, what was so important that you couldn't look for me? Am I really so easy to forget? Was it that girl you were with?
How could you…?
I know plenty, Sam. I've actually been out for a while now, but you see, there's this thing, that I really want to do. I lied when I said I wanted to kill you. I want to throw you back in the Cage. Getting ready for that, it took time, preparation. But I'm ready now. And I thought, hey, how about a little fair warning? No good to put you in there with no idea why, right? And I never got the opportunity to hunt while I was alive.
This isn't a dream, is it? How are you doing this?
I'm not an idiot, Sam. You're not going to get a convenient little villain-monologue from me, telling you how I'm doing everything. But this is fun. I think I might do it again. How long do you think you can keep from sleeping?
I've found I can go a pretty long time.
I guess you'll have to conk out at one point though, right? I'll be here then. Loved the conversation, Sam. Now wake up.
Sam woke up retching. Raising a shaky hand to his forehead, he felt it; his fever had spiked, again. Not what I needed, he thought. Not on top of everything.
He flopped out of bed and made the familiar trek to the bathroom. Adam. The other brother he'd failed.