It had taken Sam several hours to get Gabriel to finally crash after all of the Angel's Halo had given him the mass amount of energy. Before Sam and Dean needed to leave, Sam checked on him again and saw that he was still face down in bed, completely dead to the world around him. Sam couldn't help but wonder if a full force earthquake would even have the ability to wake him. He told Castiel to keep an eye on him, since Castiel was up and wandering around.
"Where are you guys going?" He asked curiously, cocking his head as he made himself a cup of coffee. He didn't necessarily need drink it, he was just acquiring a bit of a taste for it since Dean had let him try it a few weeks back.
"We have to go and meet with a friend for a moment, but we should be back soon. You know the rules, don't let anyone in the house without checking in with us first to let us know who it is, understand?" He asked Castiel, going to tell him this every single time that they needed to go out.
"Yes, Dean, I understand." Castiel told him, watching him set up the alarm system on the house as he sipped his coffee. "If anything were to happen, Gabriel and I will get out of the house and call you." He added, to help him feel a bit better.
"Good, we should be back soon." He replied, grabbing his car keys and motioning for Sam to follow him out of the house.
When they got to Pamela's office, she was just unlocking the door. "Morning, guys." She greeted them, motioning them inside and looking around as they headed inside before she locked the door behind them.
"Is everything alright?" She looked back at Sam before nodding.
"Yeah, everything's fine, just go to the backroom and I'll be there in a minute." She replied, motioning them to the backroom. Dean and Sam headed back to the room, wondering if everything really was alright.
Pamela soon entered the backroom before she shut the door behind her. "So this needs to stay between us, alright? Don't talk about this with any one you work with, and I wouldn't mention this to Castiel and Gabriel." She stressed, looking between the Winchester boys to make sure they understood and agreed.
"Okay, we won't. What's going on?" Dean asked, frowning as he leaned forwards and tried to think about what could be so important.
"So those images we've been seeing when I was showing you those memories? I don't think they're really memories." She started as she leaned back in her chair.
"Well, if they aren't memories, then what are they?" He asked, raising his eyebrows.
"Technically, for Castiel and Gabriel, they are sort of memories, but the point of it that they aren't real. The woman screaming, the flashes they get sometimes, they aren't real. Nearly everything else on the other hand was real."
"So...Are they making them up?" Sam asked, trying to understand.
"I don't think they realize that they are making them up. Those 'memories' aren't really connected to anything in their system, unlike the other ones. It could be some sort of malfunction in their processing that's been causing them to glitch and freeze up."
"So if they are really malfunctioning, why can't we bring them in to get them checked out?" Sam asked as he tried to make real sense of what she was trying to get at. He wasn't sure why they couldn't tell anyone if they were malfunctioning. Chuck was really trustworthy, after all, so this didn't make any sense to him.
"Honestly, I think if you were to take them back in and tell them what was going on, they would shut them down." She stated, causing the Winchesters to go completely silent. "It makes sense. They wouldn't want another Eve project to happen." She started before carrying on, seeing the question on their faces. "I'm not going to go into too much detail, but way back before you guys were even thought of, there was a specific line called 'Eve'. The very first one belonged to a higher up in the company, and he loved her and got very close with her. Eventually, he was killed in some accident. I think it was a train crash. Well, his Eve android had began malfunctioning after his death. She began creating memories of him and her that had never happened and she slowly began to become worse until she finally lost a grip on what was real and what was not, and she broke protocols. Several people were killed before they could finally dismantle her and completely reprogram the line before they could release it. So if they even suspect that Castiel and Gabriel are becoming anything like that, they would be shut down right away."
Dean felt his stomach churn at the thought of Castiel suddenly being gone forever. "We'll keep it to ourselves, but is there any way that we can fix them?" He stated quickly, trying to ignore the uneasiness in the pit of his stomach.
"I can keep seeing them and I'll see what I can do. Maybe I can just delete these and see if there is any way that we can fully stop it before it actually becomes a problem. I'd hate to see those two go when they have so much to offer. They're both incredible pieces of machinery." She said softly, crossing one leg over the other as she sat back in her chair.
"How likely would it be to fix them?" Sam asked, leaning forwards and he held his hands together.
"The odds are in your favor. It will be like uninstalling a program." She said honestly.
"But if you're 'uninstalling' their 'memories' wouldn't that do something to them?" Dean asked with a frown, wondering if it would change Castiel's personality in any way.
"I don't think it will, but I'll check before I start doing any of that."
"If it's going to change them, then I don't want to do it. I'd rather have him the way he is, even with his freezing. He wouldn't really be Castiel if it changed his personality." He pointed out. He didn't care if Castiel was perfect because none of them were perfect. Castiel was a prototype, so if the company saw errors in the way he ran, they could just write notes about it and use another android. They didn't need to change Castiel to make a 'better android' because to Dean, Castiel was already perfect. He was learning from everything around him, and he cared about those around him. Wasn't that all that mattered in an android to them anyways?
"I agree with Dean. I wouldn't feel right doing this if it were to completely change them. Unless it really helps them, then I wouldn't want to really risk it either. Is there anything you can do to help with their freezing that doesn't involve uninstalling pieces of them?" Sam asked softly and Pamela shrugged in response.
"I'm not sure, but I'll keep looking around to see what I can come up with. I'll call you when I figure something out, but until then, just keep bringing them to their appointments. I may as well keep track of everything that goes on with them, just in case."
"Just in case of what?" Dean asked, furrowing his eyebrows.
"Well, just in case they do need to be dismantled."
In the Winchester home, Castiel was working on taking care of the dishes from the night before as Gabriel slept through the day. He lost himself in his thoughts, but no matter what he tried to think of it would always come back to being about Dean.
Sometimes when he thought about Dean, he would feel a dull ache in his chest; Castiel wondered where this pain came from. If he wasn't human, could he still have the ability to have all the emotions that a human had? He adored Dean more than anything in the world, but he wasn't sure if he could really love him like another human could. He wasn't even sure if Dean could love an object, despite how special Castiel's unique programming had made him. He knew that there was something different about himself, and that he and Gabriel were different than the other units that he had met at the company building. He wasn't sure why they were different, but sometimes he wondered if it was a good thing.
Castiel of course realized that perhaps he was may not be entierly as real as a living human, but that perhaps that didn't necessarily mean that he could not feel. He was created to nearly be human, he was programmed to be perfect. Even if he was flawed and broken, did that not mean that he has the ability to choose? If he was to break in the morning and never wake again, he would not change a thing because he still would choose to be with Dean. He may not have as much free will as him or any other human, but he wanted to stay with the Winchesters.
He wondered why they put so much detail into making him if he was not a human. They had put so much pigmentation into his skin to make it look like it was normal and nearly sun-kissed. He wondered why they had sculpted him the way they had, perhaps it was to make him look more appealing? Perhaps it just made him appear more normal and lifelike since they had gone through the trouble to even add the occasional freckle on his chest.Castiel knew that he would never be human, with all the machinery underneath his skin. He could feel the processors in his programming; the blood pumping through his artificial heart. He couldn't help but wonder what things would be like if he was different; if he was human. He winced when a sudden surge of pain coursed through his electric nerves and he lifted his hand from the warm and soapy water. Blood dripped from his fingertip, mixing in with the water below. If he was not human, then why did he bleed? If he was not real, then why did he feel? The blood dripping from the cut was real; the pain was real, so why wasn't he real? Perhaps this is why free will and free thinking was not allowed in most robots. They would begin to question what was and what was not real, and where they stood between the two very different categories.
As the crimson liquid continued to trickle from the cut, Castiel continued to question his existence. Why was he created to feel so much? Why was he designed to be perfect, only to turn out so flawed? He wondered if any other unit felt this way. He would converse with Gabriel about it every now and again, and he knew that he felt the same; only Gabriel didn't like to discuss it. Gabriel figured that if he was flawed and a mistake, then he may as well enjoy himself for as long as he could function. He didn't want to waste his time moping around if anything turned out to be truly wrong with him. He just wanted to keep everyone smiling and having a good time, even if he were to suffer deep down. Castiel agreed with that reasoning completely the more he thought about it. If his time with Dean was truly limited, then he didn't want to waste valuable time with him.
Castiel stared at his bloody finger and he couldn't help but wonder if that was a human way of thinking.
One the ride home, the car had been completely silent. Dean hadn't even bothered to play any of his usual songs to drown out the uncomfortable silence between the two of them. He didn't see the point.
He didn't want to talk about the chance they had of losing Castiel and Gabriel; He didn't even want to think about it. He didn't understand why it would be so wrong if either of them were to be different. Wasn't that why they continued to make androids in the first place? To make them more human and advanced?He hated robots. He hated how human they had made Castiel; how real they had made him feel. He despised how much detail they had put into him. He hated the amount of focus Castiel would have in those bright azure eyes whenever he watched Dean.
His fingers tightened around the steering wheel as he thought about Castiel being taken back to the company and being shut down and taken apart. He deserved better than that. Castiel was different, he was unique. Castiel may have been a
Dean was afraid of losing Castiel; he was afraid of him being shut down once and for all. He had to remind himself that Castiel was just a piece of machinery, a moving doll. He had to remind himself that there was no way he could keep him forever because Castiel wasn't his too keep. He was only a prototype, a testing dummy. As soon as the trial period was over, would Castiel be shut down?
What would the company do to him and Gabriel once they were no longer needed?
Once they got inside, Sam headed into his room to make sure that Gabriel was still alive and Dean headed to the kitchen when he heard the sounds of dishes clinging against each other. He leaned against the doorway, staying quiet as he watched Castiel slowly do the dishes one by one. Castiel was completely focused on the pan, making sure he got every bit off of the pan before he would set it aside and work on the next dish.
Dean had always wondered why Castiel preferred to do it all by hand rather than use the dishwasher. It was certainly faster and just as clean as doing it the manual way. That's when it hit Dean for the first time; Castiel preferred not to simply use other machinery because doing it by hand felt more human to him. Dean pushed aside all thoughts of what Pamela had told him and focused on the things he had noticed instead. This was real; They were real.
He felt his chest tighten and his jaw clench as he went over to Castiel, placing his hands on his shoulder and turning the android to face him. He didn't know what he could say to him that would help him feel better. Dean believed that he wasn't the best with words most of the time when he figured that actions usually spoke much better. He thought about that for a moment and as Castiel opened his mouth to ask Dean what was the matter, Dean took Castiel's face in his hands and pressed their lips together. He could feel the android tense up as he struggled to find a correct response, and that only made Dean kiss him harder.
He didn't want to let Castiel go; he refused to let them take him back. He wanted Castiel for himself and he didn't care if that was selfish. He knew that Castiel was happy here and that was all that mattered. He didn't want to stop holding him, and he hated just how soft and warm he had to be. Castiel was special and that was all that mattered to him. He was going to protect Castiel and make sure that no one could ever shut up down. He slowly pulled away, staring into Castiel's confused eyes and couldn't help but smile a little when he saw some relief in there as well.
"Dean...?" Castiel asked softly, not sure what to say in a situation like this. He was so confused by the kiss, yet he was also so happy to finally receive this sort of affection from one of the humans he felt closest too.
"Don't ever change, Cas." Dean replied, tilting his chin up and kissing him again.