Feel free to ignore my clashing obsessions. Portal belongs to Valve.


Even Angels Get Hurt


Dean barreled around a corner, swearing up a storm, only to have his progress halted by a hand grabbing the back of his jumpsuit jacket and yanking him backwards. He tripped over the braces that forced him to stand on his toes and fell into Sam. Both brothers ended up sprawled on the floor with a new collection of bruises.

"Sammy, what the hell!" Dean barked, untangling himself from his brother.

"Thermal Discouragement Beam." Sam gasped, trying to get his breath back as he pointed a hand. Dean looked around and saw that if he had kept turning the corner, he would have had some wonderfully nasty burns on his legs from the glowing red light darting across the hall.

"It's a fucking laser." He grunted because he didn't have anything else to say.

Sam huffed in response, putting on one of his best bitchfaces. There had been a lot of those lately.

Dean didn't know how long he had Sam had been stuck in this place or how they had even gotten here. It could have been any number of things; a ploy by Zachariah to get them to do what he wanted, a trick from Gabriel to knock them off their high horses, or even a witch of some kind or other supernatural creature the brothers had no knowledge about. All he knew was that they were looking into some strange disappearances in Michigan and things had suddenly gone upside down. It had been in a field where all the disappearances had taken place. There had been nothing for miles except for wheat and sky and then, quite suddenly, a gut-wrenching sensation as though they had taken a step forward and their insides had tried to stay behind.

Then there had been a shed and curiosity and suspicion and guns at the ready. The door had been half-cracked open and they had pried it even further, creeping inside to find a strangely high tech elevator shaft. And an elevator. Which promptly took them down, down, down, down, down, and so far down that Dean thought they might reach Hell at the rate they were going.

They might as well have.

It was blurry after that, only a sickly sweet smell that both brothers had realized was trouble but being stuck in a small, cylindrical elevator only left only so much space to run. They'd blacked out. Coming too had not been a party. Gone were their jeans and T-shirts, replaced instead with jumpsuits that Dean immediately announced as gay but that might have been because his was bright orange and Sam's was blue. And their sawed-offs and pistols had been replaced with…

Sam scooped up the white and black device and shoved it back into Dean's hands, shouldering his own as he did so, "Keep a hold of that. It's our only way out of here, jerk."

"Bitch." Dean threw back but a little less hotly than he intended.

"If you are done stalling, there is still a lot of testing to do." Said Her voice from everywhere at once. Neither brother knew what or who She was but there was something chillingly robotic and frighteningly powerful about the way She spoke that said absolute control belonged to Her, "Of course, there's no rush. Take your time. We have a lot of it. Well, I do anyway."

"Son of a bitch." Dean growled, bare feet cool against the tiles of the floor. He really hated the way these stupid leg braces forced him to stand on his toes like a girl but, as Sam pointed out, they did prevent them from breaking their legs after long falls. To which Dean had replied that they suited Sam just fine since he was a girl anyway.

"Come on," Sam nudged his brother in the back, "If we keep moving, maybe we can find a way out of here."

"You've been saying that for the last…" Dean paused, "How long have we been in here?"

Sam blinked, a frown crossing his features as he stepped carefully over the Thermal Discouragement Beam and looked around for what to do next, "I'm…not really sure." He glanced at his brother, "I can't tell."

"Damn it." Dean muttered and turned his face towards the ceiling, "Cas, if you can hear us, getting your feathery ass down here would be a great help."


Sam tossed the Cube off the platform to Dean, who caught it with a grunt, dragged it over to the button, and dropped it. The line of dots across the floor went from blue to yellow and the door across the room spun open. Sam jumped down from the platform and the two brothers trotted across the room.

"Excellent job, Blue." She said as they stepped through the tingling fizzler, "Orange, that was…adequate."

Dean bristled at the comment but did not respond. Sam shot his brother a worried look but said nothing as they both stepped into the elevator. The door hissed closed around them and began to descend, farther and farther down and farther and farther from the surface.

"Cas," Dean murmured, looking up again, a pleading glint in his green eyes, "Where are you? Come on, we need you. I need you."

Sam pretended not to hear.


Room after room after room after room after room.

Lasers, cubes, buttons, spring loaded plates, portals, turrets.

Jump, dodge, roll, run, run, run.

And at the end of every chamber, Dean would send a prayer out to Castiel in hopes that he would appear.

The Winchesters were becoming exhausted and stressed. They began to snap at one another, arguing in the middle of test chambers which earned them passive aggressive insults and unhidden suggestions of deadly neurotoxin from Her.

Hungry, tired, and running short on nerves, what they saw at the end of the latest chamber, slumped against one of the walls, brightened their moods considerably.

"Cas!" Dean let out a joyous cry, dropped the cube he'd been carrying, and ran across the room to throw his arms around the angel, his Portal Gun thudding against Cas' back, "We've been calling you for ages! What gives!"

"You had entered another dimension." The angel answered, sounding tired and little bit relieved, "It was extremely difficult to pin point your location."

"Wait, we're in another dimension?" Sam asked, letting his own Portal Gun swing down to his side as he approached.

"Yes." Castiel answered, one hand still on Dean's shoulder as he turned to Sam, "Space and time become thin in some spots and people can accidently cross. It has happened before."

"Like the Bermuda Triangle?" Dean questioned.

"I see you have managed to smuggle in a friend." Her voice interrupted, "I'm afraid this won't make much of a difference, given your current record." A pause, "And in case you didn't get that, I meant that you have been failing miserably." Cas' head snapped up to look at the ceiling and Dean ground his teeth together. Sam warily lifted up his Portal gun and looked around, "On the other hand, this is the Cooperative Testing Initiative. It was designed for two, not three." Dean tensed and lifted his own Portal Gun, "And your friend is not wearing the regulation jumpsuit which, by the way, does make you look fat. I guess one of you will just have to leave."

There was a click and the noise of panels moving. Then a red dot appeared on Castiel's chest.

"Target aquired."

"Cas!" Sam shouted but Dean was already moving.

The oldest Winchester slammed into Castiel, pushing him aside as the turret fired. There was a sudden cascade of light and color, a sound like shattering glass, and then the warbling scream of a dying turret. Dean cracked his eyes open and the first thing he saw was Sam beating a turret with his Portal Gun. Then he saw Castiel curled on the floor, shaking, eyes closed and arms wrapped around himself.

"Cas! Cas, talk to me!" Dean crouched beside the angel, "Castiel, what—!"

"My wings…"

And then Dean finally noticed it. The colorful wings had become muted and smoky and it looked as though cracks were spider webbed across the feathers. Dean reached out a tentative hand and brushed his fingers across them. Cas let out a pained cry and curled tighter around himself.

"Dean," Sam called, "We gotta move!"

"Cas is hurt!" Dean grabbed the angel's arm and hauled it over his shoulders. Cas whimpered as his damaged wings were moved but Dean hooked an arm around his waist, keeping a firm grip on the Portal Gun, and started dragging him towards the door.

"No, this way!" Sam gestured and they ducked into the open panel where the turret had been.

"Where do you think you're going?" Her voice was everywhere and Dean felt an angry chill because She was probably still watching them and She had hurt Cas and God help Her if he found out where She was, "You're not even going the right way."

The Winchesters ignored her, running as best they could down the metal catwalks, past boxed up rooms, past swinging panels, past twisted tubes carrying turrets and cubes. Castiel moaned and whimpered every time his wings were jostled and Dean felt terrible for him but they had to keep moving.

"You're just going in circles." She taunted them, "You know what's even worse? That was your final test. You could have been done. If you turn around and go back right now, I might let you finish it."

"God, does She ever shut up!" Sam snapped between gasps of breath.

"Sam, where the hell are we even going!" Dean tightened his grip on Cas' arm. The Portal Gun was starting to slip in his sweaty hand and he was running low on energy. He didn't know how much longer he could keep this up. Or how much more Castiel could take.

"I don't—this way!" Sam suddenly turned sharply and Dean hurried after him. As he turned the corner, his green eyes flashed over a wall. Someone had scribbled a series of black arrows pointing in the direction they were now going. Dean generally didn't trust things on first pass but these were undeniably human markings and that, for whatever small manner of comfort and trust it provided, was worth something.

They kept following the arrows. She kept taunting them. Castiel's moans became weaker.

Eventually, they ran out of catwalk.

"Shit." Sam cursed, looking at the drop below them.

"I told you." She said mildly from everywhere, "If you keep going, you're just going to get hurt. Turn back and I'll let you finish testing. In peace. Without anymore distractions."

"Jump, Sammy." Dean growled and when his brother looked at him in wondering shock, "I'm not going back there and Cas is fallin' apart. Just jump!"

Sam obeyed. He took a step back and then dropped off the broken edge of the catwalk. There was a thud from below and then he shouted, "Drop Cas down, I'll catch him! Hurry up, Dean!"

"You're going the wrong way."

Dean sidled up to the edge and peered over. He could just make out Sam's blue jumpsuit and the white flash of the Portal Gun from the shadows below.

"Seriously, you're just going to get hurt down there."

Dean unhooked Cas' arm from his shoulders. The angel was terribly still. Dean hefted him up in his arms and leaned carefully over the edge. Those usually warm light-feathers were stiff and cold, "Watch his wings!"

"You don't know what you're doing."

Dean gently let Cas slip from his fingers, watching fearfully as Sam stretched his arms out. There was a soft whump and Castiel let out a pained cry that was nearly a scream. It wrenched at Dean's heart. He took a step back, preparing to jump.

"I knew a couple of other idiots like you. A moron and a monster. They nearly destroyed the facility. Do you know what I did to them?"

Dean took a running leap off the edge into the gloom below.

"I got rid of them."


Dean let Sam carry Cas down the broken and crooked halls, mostly because he knew he didn't have the strength to do it anymore. Her voice didn't seem to reach down here and all that surrounded them were shadows and the hum of machinery they couldn't see.

They finally reached a small room with grungy tiles that was lit by a pulsing, orangish glow seeping in through the cracked panels overhead. The floor was littered in debris, tin cans, a dead radio, several boxes, and a rotten blanket that fell apart in Dean's hands when he picked it up. He cleared a space on the floor and Sam stretched Cas out, carefully avoiding the wings as Dean directed him. The pulsing orange glow lit the tormented scribbles painted across the walls, reaching hands, a mass of faceless people, boxes of pink and black, a girl in an orange jumpsuit and a round silver and blue thing beside her dodging amongst turrets, and a sea of meaningless words.

EXILE

doN'T even trY

taKes your MIND

unSEEn

SHE'S alwAys WATcHinG

"Castiel." Dean pressed a hand lightly to the angel's cheek, "Cas, look at me. Open your eyes, dude. Look at me and tell me you're going to be okay." A sliver of dull blue cracked open and peered blearily at Dean. Sam hung back in the shadows, hovering in a corner, anxious to help but unsure what to do.

"Dean," Cas breathed, "You are alive. That is good. My wings protected you."

"Yeah, yeah, they did. Now tell me how to fix them."

"Grace…" Castiel said tiredly, "My Grace is drained…"

"I know, I know, it was too much work for you to get through dimensions to find us. Now tell me how to fix your wings."

"Dean…"

"Cas, I'm right here. Don't you close your eyes! Don't close your eyes! Don't you dare try and leave us here, Cas, I'd never forgive you! You hear me! If you left me, I would never, ever forgive you!"

Blue snapped wide open, hurt and shocked, staring at Dean. The oldest Winchester's fingers were clenched tightly around the front of Castiel's stupid old trench coat and he wasn't going to let go. He was aware of Sam's gaze on him but he didn't care. Now was not the time.

"You would never forgive me?"

"Not ever." Dean grunted.

"Then I…will make an effort not to go anywhere."

"Good. Now tell me how to fix you."

"Share your Grace with me."

"Cas, you're delirious. I'm human, I don't have any Grace."

Castiel made a pained noise and tilted his head back so that his neck was exposed. His wings trembled like a chalky smoke against the ground, "You have my Grace inside you, Dean."

Dean pressed a hand automatically to his shoulder and felt the mark swollen against his skin. Then, without hesitation, he stripped off the jacket of his jumpsuit so that it hung around his waist and leaned in close to Castiel. Sam made a small noise and shuffled around on the spot presumably so that he couldn't see his brother and the angel. Dean gently took Castiel's hand and pressed it against the brand on his shoulder, the angel's fingers unusually cold. Then, slowly, gently, he pressed his lips to Castiel's

Light exploded around them, coating the orangeish room in every color in and out of existence. When it faded, everything seemed dull and black and white but Castiel was smothered in Dean's arms, pressing his lips against the mark on Dean's shoulder, smothering it in kisses as Dean replicated the movement on Cas' neck.

Sam let this go on for a minute before he cleared his throat, "Guys, not to interrupt or anything, but we're kind on stuck in another dimension with an omnipotent voice that I'm pretty sure is trying to kill us. Just FYI."

"Yes, of course, Sam." Castiel nodded and pulled away from Dean who made a regretful noise and glared at his brother, "I think my Grace has been sufficiently restored to return you to your true dimension."

"What about this place?" Dean asked, hand lingering close to Castiel's, "It's kind of really fucking dangerous. Kind of a death trap. Don't you think we should, you know, take it out?"

Castiel looked around the room, impossibly blue eyes lingering on the markings on the walls, and then said, "It has been dealt with. This dimension already has someone. It does not need you."

"Someone what?" Sam asked but Cas had already touched his fingertips to their foreheads and whisked them away.

Left behind in the empty room, a stack of boxes, no doubt disturbed by the sudden displacement of air, toppled sideways to scatter across the floor. On the other side was a shattered panel through which blinked a wavering red beam.

"There once was a man who would be king." Said a small, lilting voice, "He gained much and lost all. The souls are not the answer."

There was silence for a long moment and then,

"They will rise from the deep. And everything will be covered in black."