Chapter 26

Dean woke up to a spinning head and a dimly lit room. He immediately recognized it as the upstairs room at Harvelle's Pet Shop and for a moment he thought he was hallucinating as well as drugged. Dean shot up in bed and grabbed his head with his hand steadying himself before he can focus on one thing. His first thought was that the fight was still going on and he went into a slight fight mode, but his second thought cancelled the first and he wondered simply how he'd gotten away much less when. Dean's stomach churned and he ran out of bed and to the toilet where he proceeded to throw up violently. His fingers gripped the sides of the porcelain bowl and his throat burned from the bile and the acid coming up and into the water below. His eyes were blurred with tears and he coughed and sputtered when nothing else would come up during the dry heaving stage. His whole body ached. His wings ached too and finally they felt like they were splitting open. He felt so sick and so weak and so vulnerable. And all he could think to do was laugh.

He laughed and his whole body shook and he hoped to cover up the tremors of pain with joy even it if was fake. His laugh was manic, not real. It was pained, not heartfelt. And Castiel couldn't have thought of a sadder sound when he entered through the bedroom doorway and into the bathroom where Dean was kneeling and reeling with stressful laughter. The world as Dean knew it wasn't the same anymore. He was forever scarred and broken from his time in the mill short as it had been and he knew Castiel could tell. The way the Omega was moving around him was different from before. Before they had been well on their way to becoming mates and now it was like they were strangers meeting in a cage again only this time Dean was the sick one and Castiel was the sane one and it all just felt so God damn wrong.

"Dean," Castiel said in a voice that wasn't his own. Dean knew that because Castiel didn't used to sound so robotic, but then again it could've been Dean's hearing and perception that had changed. Everything had been monotone and ordered to him in the mill and he feared for a split second that was the way that he was going to hear things from now on. "You have to get back in bed."

"Yessir," Dean responded automatically and it all slurred together from weariness and pure mental exhaustion. "You got it."

Dean got up and lumbered over to the bed where he flopped down and waited for Castiel to lay down next to him, but the Omega never did. He sat in a chair nearby and observed Dean like he was on display at some angelic zoo. Dean didn't like it, but he didn't vocalize his feelings. Something else he'd gotten good at during his time at the mill. Feelings made an Alpha weak. That was what had been engrained into him since his arrival. God he wondered if his mind would automatically think things just as his ears heard them. The thought terrified him even further than the previous one before it.

"Castiel will suffice," Castiel replied to the Alpha who was now avidly paying attention. Castiel's teacher like attitude and tone was worrying Dean. His wings immediately drooped as though he'd done something wrong. Castiel's heart ached for a moment before he remembered the ultimatum he was going to lay down. "You're lucky we got you out of that mill alive. You killed another angel in that fight and when he looked up at me with all that blood dripping down your mouth, blood I had to clean myself mind you, I didn't even know you anymore."

Those words hit Dean harder than any others ever have. He feels them sink deep into his being and his bones actually physically hurt because of them. If Dean could've felt any worse at any time than he did before it was now. His gaze softened and he stared Castiel in the eyes like he was his dying breath and Dean wasn't ready to let go.

"Cas I—" Dean started but didn't finish his sentence for Castiel cut him off.

"I don't need to hear it," Castiel replied, serious as ever and Dean's wings were tucked into his back after that. "I don't want to hear it yet. I don't need to hear that you had to fuck that Omega, but at least you had the courtesy to refrain from knotting with her. I don't need to hear about the fact that your moral compass is now gone due to what you had to do to stay alive. You made choices and I saw them all. So don't think that I'll be quick to forgive."

"C-Cas..." Dean's voice cracked and he felt his body shake again, but this time it wasn't sickness that plagued it. It was fear.

"You're going to have to earn the right to even try to be my mate again," Castiel laid down the law though it hurt him awfully on the inside. "Damn you're gonna have to try hard. Because quite frankly right now Dean Winchester I don't think I can ever see that docile and gentle angel that took care of me when we were babies for a long time. I see a killer now and it sickens me. What you've done sickens me and I need time to work through what I feel. So stay out of my way until I allow you to block it."

Castiel stood up and walked out of the bedroom door and suddenly the tears flowed freely from Dean's eyes. He let out a gut wrenching sob and his whole body shook with sadness. Dean hadn't felt that sad since he was in the damn cage that he'd called home for the short time he'd infiltrated the mill and hallucinated seeing his mother. His entire body hurt now and he felt paralyzed by Castiel's words. He wrapped his wings around himself protectively and sobbed, not caring who heard him. Castiel wiped away a few stray tears of his own before departing for the downstairs of the pet shop.

-8-8-8-8-8-8-8-8-

Castiel bypassed the group of heroes, as they called themselves now, including Ron and Kevin who'd both been granted a full police pardon for helping catch Charon and Crowley and shut down the mill. Jody had yet to hear back from the force about if they'd found Crowley and his getaway companion Ruby yet, but she was on call at all times until they did. The other angels were busy resting up in the back except for Sam who was currently unaccounted for and Gabriel who was sitting outside alone on the front steps. Castiel joined his big brother.

"It's like one big landslide brother," Gabriel spoke up just as Castiel took a seat and copied Gabriel's gazing up at the sky. "It's all coming to a close and tumbling down on us."

"You mean Dean or Sam?" Castiel inquired.

"Both," Gabriel sighed, thinking of his last and not so nice words to Sam. Gabriel couldn't have helped them though, Sam had been sleeping with the enemy and that was worth what Gabriel had spewed at him and worse. So Gabriel couldn't understand why he felt so guilty. "They're essentially both in the Alpha dog house."

"Dean can be forgiven," Castiel admitted. "It's just hard to think that he consciously knew he was changing before our very eyes and he still did the things he did. I don't find it possible that it was simply all because he had to, but when I've muddled through my emotions I suppose I'll ask him."

"Sammy's not trash," Gabriel said, it almost came out like a whisper. "Damn it! Fuck! I can't believe it called him that! I'm such an idiot..."

Gabriel recalled the events of the night before and it felt like his body was falling through his feet. He remembered Sam's hurt look and the sadness evident in the Alpha's eyes when they'd drove home in the truck bed. He'd tried not to cry, but Gabriel had heard him that night practically weeping in his room. The next morning he'd come out silently and acted like nothing had ever broke him even though Gabriel could see an unhealed heart behind his hazel eyes. Gabriel felt horrible, shallow, and wrong. His guilt had eaten him alive and he'd hoped to escape it for even a moment by sitting outside, but it hadn't gone away since he'd laid eyes on broken hearted Sam the day after the name calling and that was enough to help the guilt settle in forever it seemed. Gabriel felt like he was throwing away something that hadn't even come close to being his and that missed chance was haunting him like a ghost of the past.

"Talk to him," Castiel suggested. "Set down an ultimatum like I did with Dean. Tell him how it is. He's an Alpha he won't break."

Castiel stood up and walked back into the shop, leaving Gabriel on the front steps alone once again and Gabriel sighed as he thought about Castiel's words.

Sam wasn't just any Alpha. He'd break faster than paper ripped apart by a toddler and that was what Gabriel was most afraid of.

Reviews are appreciated!

Will the boys resolve their issues?

More to come soon.