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The first thing Cas notices is that Empty isn't as empty as it was the last time he was here.
It's bright, for one. None of the gaping nothingness or the flat abyss of an angel's afterlife. It smells like coffee, for another — coffee, pancakes, and bacon.
He sits up from where he'd apparently fallen asleep on the kitchen island, arms crossed as a makeshift pillow, face hidden behind his forearms. A stack of pancakes sits in front of him, and beside it, a plate of bacon and a mug of fresh coffee. A greasy pan and a spatula sit in the sink, unwashed. The coffeemaker is still on.
"This is cruel," he mutters to the empty kitchen. Nobody answers.
He rises, leaving behind the mockery of an early morning at the bunker.
His shoes hit the worn carpet of Bobby’s house, the floorboards underneath creaking slightly under his weight. He blinks, taking in the sight of the threadbare couch, the corkboard stacked with pinned notes, the messy shelves. Once upon a time, Castiel’s mind easily held the history of creation. In the last few years of his life, forgetfulness peppered bullet holes into his memory; it’s been a while since he’s seen Singer Salvage Yard. Been a while since it had been around to be seen.
There’s a jacket folded over one of the armrests (a muddy army green, likely Sam’s), an opened can of beer left on a desk, one of Bobby’s fraying books cracked open to its middle right beside it. No low murmurs of conversation drift from the other rooms of the house, no clatter of metal indicating someone fixing up a car in the back. The whole place is silent.
Is the Empty trying to placate him from somehow breaking out by putting him in familiar places? Maybe; he wouldn’t put that past it, especially when it was determined enough to storm through Heaven just to get to him. It’s likely covering all its bases, just in case Castiel gets that itch of rebellion that marked him flawed compared to the rest of his brethren. Just in case Castiel gets any ideas.
Not that there’s anything he can do at this point. It would be better if the Empty just put him to sleep. This is all a waste of time.
He settles on the couch, surrendering all his weight against it and folding his hands on his lap as he closes his eyes. The world outside is silent, unnaturally so, and with the absence of familiar space to look at, he can pretend that he’s floating in an expanse of nothingness; at last, at rest; at last, unable to drag everything down into whatever trouble he gets himself into.
He stays there, for a minute, for an hour, for a day — several, then more, until it must be months or a year or a decade. He doesn’t know. Nothing changes, not the light coming in through the curtains or the utter absence of noise around him. Despite the window dressing, the Empty is still empty.
When his borrowed bones and stolen flesh (sorry, Jimmy — and Cas can only hope that the man’s heaven has been left untouched throughout all these years of strife, throughout Metatron and the angels falling and the lights flickering badly enough that what remained of the Host had to rely on Lucifer, of all people) have nearly merged with the couch he’s sitting on, the perpetually-cold can of beer on the desk clinks.
Castiel opens his eyes (slowly, it’s been forever), to see his own face irritably glaring at the beer can, tongue clicking before the drink is knocked back and drained in one go.
The Empty crushes the aluminum can in its fist. When it uncurls its fingers, its palm holds nothing.
“I haven’t done anything this time,” Cas says.
“I know,” the Empty snipes. “For once, you’re being agreeable. But you’re also the only worthless wretch in here I can talk to, and I’m not keen on waking someone else up just so I can aggrieve them.”
“Hm.” He braces his elbow on the couch’s armrest, resting his cheek on his palm. “And why do you need to aggrieve me?”
The Empty bares its teeth, exhale hissing through, though its glare is aimed at the wall. “Your son,” it spits out, “Is irritating me. Again. It’s annoying, and while I hold no fondness for your father, his grandchild is proving to be more of an insufferable gnat.”
Cas’ eyebrows raise. Jack — he can easily guess what the boy is trying to do, of course, given that he’s done this before. “He’s young,” he says, softly, pleadingly. The Empty is a vindictive creature, and Jack has been through enough. “Don’t hurt him.”
The Empty barks out a laugh. “Hah! As if I can do anything to the little maggot now.” It grabs for the space where the beer can used to be on the table, and when it pulls its hand back, there’s a can in its grasp, still with the same beads of condensation on its metal surface. It takes a sip. “He defeated your father, you know?”
Cas pauses. “Did he?”
“Didn’t kill him. He’s wandering around here and there.” The Empty waves its free hand. “But he subsumed his power. He’s God now.”
Cas’ brows furrow, eyes lowering to the carpet. Jack has always been powerful, but he’s never been too comfortable with that power, no matter if he was born with it. “He’s young,” he repeats.
The Empty says nothing. There’s a crush of aluminum, a shift of weight on foam, then silence. When Cas looks up, the Empty is staring at him, frowning slightly, but with none of the manic fury it always seems to wear on its mimicked forms. It just stares, unblinking, with James Novak’s vibrant blue eyes. Cas could almost imagine it’s his vessel looking at him.
The sensation of wanting to crawl out of one’s skin is a human one. Even dead, Castiel is learning.
“He is,” the Empty says, jaw working, still keeping its gaze on him. “How old was he again?”
“Three, when I…” Cas trails off. “I don’t know how long it’s been since.”
The Empty hums, nodding. “A child for a God. Hmph.”
“I imagine their options were limited. Sam and Dean wouldn’t have let him do so otherwise.”
At the mention of the Winchesters, the Empty’s expression sours even more. The room disappears for a second, coming back in faded, before stabilizing. Castiel pads a hand over the armrest he’s got his elbow on, checking its solidity.
“I have never hated boundaries more,” it says, shoulders drawing up in such a human gesture of anger that Castiel wonders where and when it learned that. Then it exhales, fixing its attention back on Cas. “But I suppose that’s why I sought you out — a reminder of what happens when rebellion doesn’t stay an idea.”
Cas’ hand curls, nails digging lightly into the foam of the armrest. He knows damn well what rebellion costs, doesn’t need to be reminded of it. He knows the brightness and the warmth of it, the sharp edges of its consequences. The realness of what comes from it. The freedom.
The love.
Before he can say anything, run his mouth and piss the Empty off, the opposite couch vacates. He doesn’t see the Empty move, doesn’t see or hear it stand. It’s just gone.
He leans back in his seat, thinking of Falling, of faith, of family.
When the Empty returns, Bobby’s house has been replaced by the evening, a long stretch of highway lined by streetlamps, and a lone Gas n’ Sip. Cas stands on the curb, watching the gas station, just as void of people as all the other places of his afterlife have been. But even just looking at it, he can hear the whirr and ding of the register, the squeak and shuffle of shoes on tiles perpetually in need of mopping, the creak of the entrance as customers come and go. He can recall the arguments when people dropped by two minutes to closing, the exhausted groans and irritated looks his co-workers aimed at the latecomers.
Humanity has taught Castiel a lot of things. Tactile sensation, pop culture references, customer service.
“Did you enjoy your time here?” the Empty asks, crossing its arms as it stands beside Cas. It wasn’t there before. “As Steve, I mean.”
“It was…enlightening,” Castiel says. “It wasn’t always pleasant, but it was relaxing at times.”
In the corner of his eye, the Empty scoffs. “Retail? Relaxing?”
“It was something so much smaller in scale than what I’d lived through prior.”
He looks down at his hand, watching the stretch of his vessel’s skin and muscle. Castiel had been alive for a very, very long time, and for majority of it, he’d kept in mind the complex tangle of cords that was the Plan. From Noah to Abraham to Jacob to Peter to Paul to John of Patmos. From Cain and Abel, to Sam and Dean — and everything that came after his rebellion.
At the Gas n’ Sip, there was setting up the store, opening, dealing with customers, cleaning up, then closing. Rinse and repeat. Nothing to do with sacred vessel bloodlines that had to be maintained, nothing to do with fate or destiny. Just the mundane and monotonous grind of employment.
The Empty snorts. “That’s so fucking sad.”
“It was nice.”
“That’s even sadder.”
“It could have been worse.” He pauses. It has been, once or twice. At least being employed gave him the means to take care of himself.
The Empty’s lip curls. “And you still deemed that pathetic bundle of daddy issues worthy of your affection?”
Castiel sighs, turning to it, too tired to even be annoyed. “He’s not pathetic.”
“Nothing to say about the daddy issues?” it asks. When he doesn’t answer, its brows lift, then it laughs. “Yeah, alright. Would have been a pot, kettle moment.”
It uncoils its arms to stuff its hands into its coat’s pockets, eyeing the convenience store like it’s searching for something. What it’s looking for, Castiel has no idea. They stand in silence for a while.
“Didn’t you hate him? Just a little bit?” it speaks first, an eternity later. “For the disrespect, for treating you like a tool, sometimes; for the abandonment?”
Castiel looks up. There are no stars in this false mirage of the world, just an expanse of emptiness. Of course.
“I did threaten to throw him back into the Pit,” he says, bringing his gaze back down to the ground. “And punched him.”
“Hm. So why did you start acting like a leashed dog after?”
He frowns. “I didn’t.”
The Empty laughs dryly. “You’re dead, Castiel, and the only person around here is me,” it says. “And all of you is part of me. There’s no need for you to lie.”
Castiel lifts his head, meets the Empty’s gaze. “Then why bother asking me?”
It smiles. “Honestly? Because everything that led up to this —” The Empty motions at him from head to toe. “— all the rebellion and self-sacrifice and flagellation and the bare minimum?” That manic look is back in its eyes again, its copied irises almost electric. For a moment, Castiel looks at a mirror of himself that once held power. “It pisses me the fuck off. So fucking bad.”
“Hm,” he says. “It’s not really any of your business.”
“Ohhh, but it is, isn’t it? You and me, we used to be on the same side of things. We used to fit the same box, fulfill the same function; you, a keeper of Heaven, and I, a keeper of the nothing. Heaven used to be intact. All those precious little human souls that you claim to care about so much used to have somewhere safe to go to.” Its smile widens. “So why—” it spits. “—did you end up here, Castiel?”
Castiel says nothing, just stares. Not out of sheer will, simply because there’s nothing he can say to that.
He could say it was his father’s will, the plot twists and heightened stakes he thought his creative project should have. He could say he was being strung along like a puppet, pulled back and forth to be an archetype, a storytelling device, Chekhov’s holy and well-meaning gun.
Except, well, his father said it to his face. Out of all the versions of him that have ever been created, he was the only one with a crack in his chassis, the only one that came off the assembly line wrong and decided to change the lines of his script. Even the Winchesters were still subject to his father’s favoritism, to contrivance and convenience, because Chuck wanted them to survive, wanted to play with them a little longer. Castiel, perhaps, is the only being shaped by his father’s hand that was ever truly free.
With freedom comes responsibility. Actions beget consequences.
He wanders down the highway until it turns into the familiar route that leads to the bunker, then to the silver corridors of Heaven, until it settles on the garden he used to frequent when he was an angel. Unlike in Heaven, the man to whom this memory belongs to is absent, nowhere to be seen flying his kite or basking in the pleasant weather, the vivid colors around him.
Castiel takes a seat at his usual bench, breathing in nonexistent air and sighing it out in mist. Even without his usual companion here, this slice of Heaven is still a wonderful place to sit and think: greenery as far as the eye can see, dotted with splashes of vibrant flowers. It’s not too overcast, but not eye-searingly sunny either.
“I can see why you like this memory so much,” the Empty says, sitting right beside him with its arms crossed. It seems to do that a lot. Maybe it doesn’t know any emotion other than anger.
“It’s peaceful,” Castiel says. “It helps me sort out my thoughts.”
“And is there any in particular you were hoping to sort out?”
The corners of his lips lift. He ducks his head — the Empty would probably find his amusement offensive. “Why do you ask?”
It pauses. Tilts its head in an eerie mirror of his own habits, but given that they’ve supposedly amalgamated, it’s not really a surprise. “I’m curious.”
Castiel settles himself as comfortably as he can on the bench, resting his hands on his lap. After a moment: “I’ve lived…a very long life,” he starts. “I know I’m much younger than you are, but I’m sure you can imagine just how long it’s been.”
“…quite,” it says. “I’ve always been here. Before you, before Light, before Darkness.” A pause. “Before even thought.”
He hums. Interesting. “What have you done in all that time?”
“My job.”
Castiel tries not to wince at the obvious jab. The Empty snorts.
“That was most of what my life was too,” Cas says. “Eleven years sounds so…miniscule when weighed against millennia.” He looks up into the horizon, watches the clouds lazily drift by, picking apart and putting together what to say next. “And yet…”
“And yet?” the Empty prompts when he doesn’t continue.
“So much happened in those eleven years,” Castiel says. “The Plan Heaven cared for and catered so carefully ripped to shreds. My brethren dying left and right, the most bloodshed we’ve seen since the Fall — perhaps even more…” A pause as he considers this. At least Lucifer’s rebellion only led to a third of the Host being cast down. “Heaven falling to pieces, the lights going out. Betrayal. Desperation.”
His right hand curls into a loose fist.
“So much tragedy.”
He heaves in another heavy breath. Out.
“I understand that a portion of it was influenced by my father wanting to see where things go. What Sam and Dean would do. Sam used to tell me about these experiments — these animals in electric ages — and I…I think it’s comparable.” Another pause to gather himself. “But when you asked me how I ended up here…”
“Hm.” The Empty sniffs. “Always were too much for your electric cage, were you?”
“Millions of years in one, and I spent the last eleven gnawing on the bars.” Cas chuckles mirthlessly. “And it was equal parts awful and wonderful.”
“I still don’t see it.”
“Have you ever tried?” Castiel turns to the Empty. “Or just once even considered it? Taking a moment to just step away and reach out to something beyond what you’re supposed to do? I know you…mostly don’t care, and even if you did, Father kept you away from creation — but haven’t you ever thought to, for a moment, just experience the Something?”
The Empty returns his attention, sneering. “Still trying to entice others into the same spiral you went on, even in death?”
“I’m not enticing you. I’m simply asking,” Castiel says. “If anything, I find your position more favorable than mine was. You’re a guardian. I was a weapon.”
He half expects the Empty to snap at him again, but it just clenches its jaw shut.
“You don’t have to look at the blood on your hands and wonder if everything you’re doing really is for the greater good,” Castiel says.
“To whom much is given, much is required,” the Empty finally shoots back. “I carry the weight of nearly all of Heaven, thanks to your audacity.”
“I’m not asking you to leave it. I understand responsibility, despite what you might think,” Castiel says. “Besides, my father’s not around to keep you out anymore, is he? You’re not bound to follow his rules anymore. None of us are.”
The Empty flinches.
Castiel blinks. When he turns back to it, it’s gone.
He’s at Stull cemetery when it returns, a strange venue for his afterlife given his memories of the place are rather unpleasant and painful, but he’s not familiar enough with the Empty to be able to pick apart its thought processes. So far, it’s been haughty and forceful, condescending and disciplined, temperamental and vindictive, strict and curious. He has no idea what facet of it would make it shape Stull around him; the part that’s always pissed off at him, maybe. He did get blown into bloody chunks here.
This time, it doesn’t appear right next to him while he’s idly strolling past the graves, taking note of every painstaking detail carved into this mimicry of the real cemetery. He can see names he never got the chance to notice back when he was alive, birth and death dates that have survived the slow erosion of time. If it wants, Castiel thinks the Empty might be able to reconstruct Earth in its imagination, and Cas wouldn’t know the difference between the living world and this one.
“We never finished our conversation,” the Empty starts, several feet away from the headstone Castiel’s studying. It’s standing right where the ground opened up to swallow Sam and Michael, glaring at the dirt. “Have you finished sorting out your thoughts?”
Cas checks, retreats back into his own mind for a second. “Yes, I think I have.”
“What was it, then?” it asks. “Your answer for how you ended up dead, with me?”
Another second of hesitation, before Castiel steps forward, rounds the curves and dips of Stull’s terrain to stand beside the Empty. “The same call the apple had for Eve, I imagine.”
The Empty scoffs. “Eve was tempted, yes?”
“Hm.” Castiel nods, lets out a breath. “Was it any different from how I was convinced?”
In the corner of his eye, the Empty turns, giving him its full attention.
“Lucifer told Eve about knowledge, but he didn’t press the apple to her mouth. The desire to know was there — and she wanted that knowledge, she wanted to know, she wanted something more than Eden,” he says. “In the same way, I…I wanted to be more than just Heaven’s spear, Heaven’s sword, Heaven’s errand boy. I wanted…”
“What humanity had?” the Empty fills in. “The choice to shape themselves into something other than what is supposedly categorically good and categorically evil?”
“Yes,” Castiel says. “And all the messiness that comes with it. All the hurt, all the flaws, all the…disappointments and the betrayal and the arguments.” His next inhale comes in shaky. “As an angel, I was immovable, untouchable. I was order and structure, and so long as I kept to that, I was safe, but I was — I suppose the best word I have for it is confined. Perfect, powerful, but limited. Eve, in the Garden, never to know.
“But to live, to be free — there are no safety nets. Every choice is a freefall, and you can only hope there’s someone below to catch you. To be alive is to have your heart broken, over and over,” he says. “But the fact that it costs something, the fact that you had to fight for it, the fact that it’s yours makes it all the more worth it.”
He turns to face the Empty, who for once looks deep in thought at it listens.
“Choosing James Novak was me following Heaven’s orders,” Castiel says. “Searching for Claire was mine. A soldier of Heaven would have either eliminated Jack or taken him to be used by Heaven, raising him was my prerogative.”
“And how do you know that wasn’t just your father writing your actions for you?”
“Be that as it may, he has no control over me anymore, and I love them, still.” Castiel lifts his hand, taps his fingertips slowly over where his heart should be. Nothing beats behind his ribcage. “My love for those children stays with me. My care for Sam remains despite our story having ended. My loyalty to Dean has withstood my father’s fall. This is real — throughout every horrible and wonderful thing that makes up my life, this is mine.
And because I loved them, because I cared for them, because I was loyal to them — I fought for them until the very end. I chose that over everything else. That’s why I’m here.” Castiel smiles, briefly, before laughing. “And honestly? I don’t think it was too bad, dying with a choice I truly and wholly made.”
The Empty turns, looks ahead at the horizon. Curiously, the sun is setting ahead of them. This version of Stull is intricately detailed.
“A world where we’re truly, unequivocally free, huh,” it says — murmurs, really, with how softly it seems to say to itself. “No author to please, no audience of one to entertain.”
Both of them watch the setting sun for a while, the silence between them more contemplative than awkward. The cemetery lights up in gold under the dying sunlight, bouncing off blades of yellow grass underneath their feet.
The Empty steps back, slipping from Castiel’s periphery as it moves. He makes to turn, but a hand presses against his back, and he instinctively freezes. “No more lengths of rope, then, I suppose.”
The Empty shoves — and Castiel falls into a gaping maw in the ground that wasn’t previously there.
When he comes to, he’s lying on his back, staring into a darkness that his eyes gradually adjust to, making way for the dim sight of a far-away roof. Busted lamps hang from wooden scaffolding above, a flash of lightning peers through a sizeable hole. The air smells of petrichor, must, and hay. Flaking sigils line the walls around him.
He’s been here before. The memory fights to breach the surface of his consciousness, rests itself at the tip of his tongue, but he can’t quite get to it. He sits up, looking around carefully in an attempt to pinpoint what the Empty has formed this part of his afterlife after, this time.
Bright lights streaming through the gaps in the walls’ wooden planks make him turn to the closed doors. An engine roars, tires screech, followed by — “CAS!”
Jack’s the first to storm in, the barn doors nearly flying off their hinges just from his sheer excitement. Cas scarcely has any time to pick himself off the ground before he’s being tackled back onto it, his son desperately wrapping his arms around him and holding on like he’s about to disappear again. Knowing the Empty, he very well could. Castiel returns the hug just as fiercely.
“Thank you,” Jack whispers, but it’s clearly not addressed to him. “Thank you — Cas —”
Jack’s shoulders shake. Hot tears stain Cas’ collar; the broken lights overhead swing. Thunder rumbles in the distance. Jack has gone from dying to fighting Chuck to losing Cas to becoming God in such a short period of time; he’s barely had chance to process what’s happened or grieve. And despite how much power he holds in his veins, he’s still just a child.
Cas cradles the back of his head, holding the boy close. “I’m here, Jack, I’m here.”
Jack nods, as best as he can with his face tucked under his father’s chin.
Heavy footsteps race up the barn doors next, and then Sam is crossing the threshold, eyes worryingly searching for Jack before softening as he finds him on the ground, hunched over and curled up in Cas’ arms. Sam sighs, lips twitching up to a smile as his posture relaxes, his eyes shining with unshed tears of relief. He approaches, crouches down to place a hand on Cas’ shoulder, before winding his arms around them both.
“Good to have you back, man,” he says, voice nasally. He sniffs; turns away and reaches up to wipe his eyes with the back of his hand.
“I’m…glad to be back,” Castiel admits, softly, glancing up at Sam, down at Jack, before bringing his attention to the doorway.
In the storm of Jack’s turmoil, the doors swing lightly with the breeze. Dean enters the darkened barn slowly, carefully, stepping out from the shadows with such deliberate cautiousness it’s like he’s crossing No Man’s Land. The closer he gets, the more clearly Castiel can make out his face: lined, gaunt, exhausted — and staring at him with the same wide-eyed heartbreak he’d left him with.
“Cas,” he says. No more than a whisper, but with the same ragged, brutal hope as every prayer he’s ever said. Cas, like it’s a lifeline. Cas, like he’ll die if there’s no answer.
Castiel smiles. “Hello, Dean.”
Apparently, the first thing Jack did as soon as everything had settled down was go to the Empty, ask for Castiel back, and in the process, piss it off. Severely. Enough that it threw a fit and they had to deal with the angels Jack had newly resurrected getting pulled back into it, threatening the stability of Heaven in a months-long game of tug-of-war. While Jack was more powerful than the Empty, it was fast, it was ruthless, and it was mad.
“We had to convince Gabriel to help,” Sam says, hours and hours and hours later, when they’re back in the bunker and sitting down on proper chairs instead of on the barn floor. The man’s hands wringing and eyes bloodshot as he explains. “We had Michael and Raphael on board, but even they were having trouble with it.”
Castiel’s not surprised. Even without the grisly details, he can already imagine all the ways the Empty could have fought back — possessing those it reached, drowning Heaven’s physical space with its seemingly never-ending expanse, threatening souls. And as far as he knows, it’s not something that can be killed; even if it can, its place in reality assured that taking it down would make the universe come crumbling down. It must have essentially come down to a war of attrition between it and Jack.
“It wasn’t just you it was mad about, it was mad about the idea of resurrecting angels entirely,” Jack says, chair pressed flush to Cas’ so he can lean on his father’s shoulder and hold onto the sleeve of his trenchcoat. “I tried to convince it that it went without them for years anyway. Everyone being alive again wouldn’t have made a difference. It was mad, but it didn’t do anything when I started bringing everyone back. When I asked for you, specifically…”
“It’s fickle,” Castiel says. “But I’m glad you managed to convince it, eventually.”
“I didn’t.” Jack looks up at him. “It just showed up a few hours ago and told me it’d leave us alone as long as we never bothered it again. Then told us where to find you.”
Cas’ brows lift.
“Hm,” he settles on, because that’s…interesting. Fickle, just as he’d said. “It spoke with me.”
“About?” Dean’s the one to ask this time. He’s been quiet since the barn, not speaking a word the whole drive and instead only shooting glances at Cas on the dashboard mirror. The ride home had been filled with Jack recalling the last few months, which is how Cas even knows about his newfound rivalry with the Empty.
Dean’s voice sounds just as tired as he looks, but even the exhaustion doesn’t take away the edge of worry to it.
“It had questions,” Castiel says. “Mostly about my decisions in the last few years.”
Dean’s chin dips at that, attention finding somewhere else to rest on. Castiel recognizes the expression; Dean has always been so quick to assign guilt to himself.
“I said that I did it because I cared for you,” Castiel says, carefully. “All of you. I have always cared for humanity, and when that care was tested, I chose it. Over and over. No matter the cost.”
Jack holds onto his sleeve tighter.
“What happened after?” Sam prompts this time.
“It seemed to be satisfied with my answer, since I woke up at that barn,” Cas says. “I imagine that was when it told you where to find me.”
“It didn’t ask for anything?” Dean asks.
Castiel waits for him to look up, meets his gaze again. “No.”
The man nods, shoulders slowly easing, though the tension doesn’t fully leave.
It’s Jack’s turn to hum thoughtfully this time, fiddling with the button on Cas’ sleeve. “There are still a lot of angels I need to resurrect from it. Again. But…”
“Be nice,” Castiel says.
“I will.”
“It would be lovely if this new world could start without cosmic powers at each other’s necks.”
Jack ducks his head. Sam snorts, offering: “Well, Rowena’s got a tight leash on Hell, though demon deals are still allowed as business.”
“The Empty is rude, sometimes,” Jack defends. Though Cas can’t see his face, the pout is evident in his voice. “A lot of times, actually.”
“It’s old,” Castiel says, then immediately feels a twinge on his spine. Warning noted. “And it wants to sleep, it’s had its peace disrupted long enough.”
“I’ll leave it alone after I have all the angels I need,” Jack says, turning behind him, damn well aware the Empty is watching.
Everyone retreats to their rooms, after that, though Jack insists on staying with Castiel, curling up beside him and holding onto his arm despite not needing sleep. Then again, he never has, but he’s made a habit of it, anyway.
“I’m glad you’re back,” Jack says softly; he sounds his age, like this. Cas has never forgotten that his son is so, so painfully young, but when there’s fear in his voice, Cas’ heart just squeezes.
“I’m sorry you had to deal with all of that.”
“S’okay.” Jack yawns, words already slurring as he shuts his body down for rest. “S’what we do for family, right?”
The next day proceeds as Cas remembers most days in the bunker to be: everyone cleans up their rooms, Dean makes breakfast in the kitchen, Sam looks for cases on his laptop. Mealtime is quiet, mostly because even four hours of sleep can’t fix months of being paranoid about a terrifying cosmic force so old there’s zero lore about it, but not unpleasant.
Cas takes his and Jack’s dishes to the sink just as Dean does the same for his. Their shoulders brush, their knuckles bump as they set their empty plates down — Dean tenses.
Cas hazards a glance at him but the man’s keeping his focus on the sink, so he backs away.
While Michael is apparently in charge of Heaven again (with a lot of convincing, because he was loathe to leave Adam — speaking of, the boy’s back in college and has the same amount of protection as a prophet now), Jack hasn’t left all the responsibilities to him, so he’s got work to get to today. There are angels to bring back, negotiations to be done, thanks to be given.
“Do you need any help?” Castiel asks as his son stands, smoothing out his white jacket.
Jack smiles. “I’ve got a lot,” he says. “Bobby’s helping.”
Bobby. Castiel would have loved to see that meeting.
“Don’t worry about me. You should take a break.” Jack pats his arm in reassurance. “That much…quiet…for so long…” The boy’s eyes glaze over, gaze far off — he shakes his head to snap himself out of it, after a moment. “Just — you know.”
“Adjust?” Castiel offers.
“Yeah.” Jack’s hand squeezes onto his arm tighter, brows knitting. Castiel reaches up and pats his fingers. He lets go, posture sagging.
He leaves soon after that. Sam heads to the war room to continue his recent project of setting up a new hunter network, and Dean…slinks out of the kitchen and off to somewhere. Castiel only sees him go because it’s Dean — he’s been tasked with looking after him for so long, both under Heaven’s orders and by a self-imposed vow, that it’s second nature for him to be aware of everything Dean does. From the slightest twitch of his brow to that heavy ache he’s carried around all his life, the one that seems to drag his body down to the ground in an effort to bury him, on his worse days.
He should go after him — any other situation, he would have immediately gone after him. But considering how they’d parted, what Cas had dropped on his lap right before he’d surrendered to his fate…
He seeks Sam out first, catching in him typing away on his laptop while his phone is pinned between his shoulder and his ear. He says something about sending someone back-up as Cas enters the room, looking up in acknowledgement and lifting a hand in a ‘wait’ motion as he wraps up his call.
“What’s up?” he asks.
“Has Dean been…” ‘Alright’ wouldn’t be the right word, so Castiel abandons that option. Licks his lips, rephrases the thought: “How has Dean been?”
Sam’s brows knit, his smile taking on a more melancholic turn.
“He’s….” Sam starts, then has to clear his throat as his voice falters. “He…blames himself,” he says. “He tried to bargain for you back, but Chuck wouldn’t listen. When Jack got his powers, the…first thing he asked was if he could bring you back.”
Cas blinks.
“And Jack tried, he did, but like we said, the Empty wasn’t too happy about that. He managed to get other angels topside, but he said he couldn’t find you for some reason.” Sam looks away briefly at that. “We thought maybe you’d already been brought back. Dean, uh, tried to find anything that might have clued us to where you were. Lightning strikes, strange lights in the sky, massive trees growing overnight — you know, anything vaguely angelic.”
“Oh,” Cas says. That’s why the Empty kept moving him around; it wasn’t to keep him breaking out, it was to keep Jack from breaking in.
“Yeah, he hasn’t been sleeping well these last few months,” Sam says.
Cas has noticed. Dean looks like he could fall over and crumple into himself with a good bump.
“Talk to him,” Sam says; clears his throat and follows up with an argument before Cas can even think to say anything, affirmative or not. “He needs it.”
Cas mulls it over. “Did he tell you, what happened in the basement?”
Sam shakes his head. “No, just that you died trying to save him.”
Of course. Dean’s not one to talk about feelings, not without the whole conversation feeling like pulling teeth. Regardless if Castiel never expected the sentiment to be returned.
“He’s probably in the garage right now, fixing up one of the cars,” Sam offers. “He’s been doing that when he’s restless.”
Cas nods. “Thank you.”
Sure enough, he finds Dean in the garage, feet sticking out from underneath a beige car that hasn’t seen the light of day since the 50’s. A good chunk of its parts are lying all over the floor, and the trunk is popped open — he must have been working on this one for days now, maybe on and off whenever he needed something to do just to stop himself from spiraling.
Cas waits by the doorway as he works. If he startles him, he might hurt himself or just hide under the car for the rest of the day.
Eventually, he rolls out, wiping sweat from his face with the collar of his shirt, before freezing as he spots Cas.
“Dean,” Cas greets.
“…Cas,” he returns, deer-in-the-headlights stare locked onto the angel.
They stare at each other for a little while, Cas not moving from the doorway, Dean frozen where he is like someone staring down a loaded gun. If not for the car directly behind him and Cas blocking the doorway, he looks ready to run.
Cas supposes there’s no point to working up to a conversation. He might as well get to the point, otherwise Dean will talk his way around things.
“It was my choice to sacrifice myself, Dean,” he says. “You’re not to blame for that.”
Dean’s jaw tightens. “You still did it to save me.”
“I did, but you didn’t make me do it. I wanted to.”
The hand still fisted around his shirt curls in, knuckles blanching. “I know,” he says. “I know, Cas, I don’t —” He stops himself, teeth clenching again, looking away. “I know.”
“And?” Cas prompts.
For a moment, it doesn’t look like he’s going to answer, but his attention flits back to Cas and — all the fight leaves his body. His shoulders sag, his posture limps, his head hangs. He pushes himself up to sit and braces his elbows on his knees, but only to wretchedly hunch over and keep his eyes down. Ashamed. Anguished. Miserable.
“You think…” he starts, “That I’m the — the most selfless man on Earth.” He looks like he wants to laugh, but only ends up clenching his jaw again. “That everything I’ve ever done, I’ve done for love.”
“I know, Dean,” Cas says, taking a step forward. When Dean doesn’t react, he takes another, then another, until he’s standing by his side. “I’ve seen it, time and time again. That’s why I’m here.”
Dean’s shaking hands curl. “Everything I’ve ever done, I’ve done for…” he trails off, but looks up at Cas, finally, eyes shining with tears. “And it got you killed.”
Oh.
Castiel can see it all laid out in his mind’s eye now. Dean has always felt deeply; with most of his life spent with no material things to hold onto, he’s latched onto everything that he did have with a starved kind of hold. His car, his music, his clothes, his people. Emotions, experiences. The good and the bad. The guilt wasn’t just guilt, it carved trenches into his soul. The shame wasn’t just shame, it seeped into every cell in his body. The responsibility placed on his shoulders wrote itself into his spine, became his reason for being, the singular driving force that got him out of bed in the morning when he had nothing else.
And the love — the love was what kept his feet moving, his fingers tapping, his hands grabbing. Onto his mother when he was nothing but a child. Onto Sam when his apartment caught fire as Jess burned. Onto his father when they finally encountered Azazel. Onto Bobby, onto Ellen, onto Jo, onto the hundreds of other people he’s met and treasured over the course of his life.
He loved and was loved, and his mother burned on the ceiling, his father sold his soul, his brother threw himself into the pit with the devil. The same story, the same ending, over and over; a repeated pattern throughout the years until finally: the basement, Castiel, I love you, Dean.
Everything he’s ever done, he’s done for love, and everyone he’s done it for seems to die.
Castiel lowers himself to his knees, an angel reaching down to the Righteous Man. How nostalgic.
“Dean,” he says. “You’re not cursed, if that’s what you’re thinking. You’re not a burden, you’re not something broken that gets everyone he loves killed.” He smiles. “You’re just loved.”
He places a hand on Dean’s shoulder — the same spot where he’d burned a mark on his soul when he dragged him out of hell, then again smearing him with blood when he’d died. Dean stares at him with so much grief in his eyes.
“You would do, and have done it for us, in a heartbeat. You’ve offered to do it for me,” Cas says. “You don’t think you deserve to be loved, Dean Winchester?”
“…why do you?”
Castiel can’t help it — he laughs. “Knowing you changed me,” he says. “And what a fitting thing, for my first true act of rebellion to be falling in love.”
Dean ducks his head, shoulders hiking up, but Cas doesn’t miss the color rushing to his ears. They’re silent for a while, sitting together, Dean leaning back against the car while Cas waits for him to gather himself.
Eventually, Dean lifts his head, turning to Cas’ hand on his shoulder; he reaches up and wraps his fingers around Castiel’s, tentative at first — terrified, judging by their trembling — before tightening.
“Cas?” he whispers.
Castiel leans in to hear him better. “Yes, Dean?”
Another stretch of silence again, before Dean drags in a shaky breath, mutters, “…it’s in just saying it,” and meets his eyes.
He opens his mouth. Speaks — answers, finally.