spnfic: map of the world, 11/11

Title: Map of the World, 11/11
Author: Seperis
Codes: Dean/Castiel
Rating: R
Summary: The world's already over and they're already dead. All they're doing now is marking time until the end.
Author Notes: Thanks to nrrrdy_grrrl for beta above and beyond. For two years, even. Set after the events in 5.4 The End.
Spoilers: Seasons 5, 6, and 7
Warnings: Please see end of fic for warnings.

Links:
AO3 - All, Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10, Chapter 11
DW - Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4, Chapter 5, Chapter 6, Chapter 7, Chapter 8, Chapter 9, Chapter 10



--Interlude--

It gets much weirder when Lucifer shows up.

Dean tries to refresh the wards again, but for some reason, it's just not working, and he can't figure out why. It feels like he's been standing here for decades, surrounded in fading grass under the grey light of a sun forever dying behind so many layers of clouds it may never find its way out again. His right arm aches, tightly swollen skin crisscrossed with angry red lines that continue to leak fluid even after they stop bleeding. He's got to finish this, but no matter how often he cuts his arm for fresh blood, the sigils vanish almost as soon as he finishes writing them.

Eventually, he figures he'll feel dizzy from blood loss--at this point he thinks he should maybe be dead or something--but mostly, he's thinking that Lucifer's interruption is not helping him concentrate. That goddamn stare is annoying.

Tipping his head back, he glares into Lucifer's smug face. "You want something?"

Lucifer smirks down at him from his seat at the top of the wall as the last sigil vanishes before Dean's bloody fingers even finish drawing it. Frustrated, he wonders if Lucifer thinks wearing Sam's body is supposed to make this harder. They don't look alike at all.

"All I want is everything," Lucifer tells him, like he thinks he cares or something. "I think I've waited long enough."

"We had it first," Dean tells him impatiently, slicing a new line along his forearm until he hits the elbow. Slicking his fingers through the fresh blood, he doggedly tries again. "What the hell gives you the right, anyway?"

"Spoils of war," Lucifer answers, tapping each point against the top of the wall. "Possession is nine-tenths of the law. What is ours, we keep."

"It's not yours."

"What you give up, you never get back." Lucifer's eyes flicker to the symbol vanishing even as Dean draws it. Frustrated, he pulls out his other knife with a jarring shriek of metal on metal and blinks down at it, startled. It's familiar: sharp and dull, stained with old blood that still drips fresh and new, rotting flesh clinging to the edges and around the hilt, agonized screaming written so deeply into the metal that he can almost hear it now. "It was a lie, you know. You never left."

Hand shaking, he shoves the knife back into its sheathe and gets the first one out again. Watching the well of blood and pus, his entire arm throbbing in time with the fast beat of his heart, he bloods his fingers and turns back to the wall. The sigil's absorbed like its being written into a sponge, gone almost before he starts.

Stepping back, he stares at the key, wondering what he's missing. "Why the hell isn't this working?"

"Blood is very powerful," Lucifer observes, dropping to the ground. "Wards to keep out the supernatural generally require it be human. Maybe yours just isn't human enough."

Dean ignores him, making another cut and dipping his fingers into the still-bleeding wound as an image begins to form in his mind. It's familiar, too, but in a different way; he draws it from memory, easy, and this time, it doesn't vanish.

When he steps back, he recognizes the whorls that form Cas's true name. "Oh."

"I offered him a place in Hell," Lucifer says in annoyance as he looks at it, like he's continuing a conversation that hey, they aren't having. "I offered him all the kingdoms of the world. I offered him all that he should want. He still refused."

"And he told you to fuck yourself." Lucifer scowls, crossing his arms, and Dean's really seeing the resemblance to a spoilt kid. "It's killing you, isn't it? You have no idea what he wants."

Lucifer gives him a dark look. "That he should even understand what it is to want anything is obscene. The Host certainly failed at discipline. When I was among their number, he would have been executed for his disobedience."

"Kids these days," Dean agrees absently, his attention riveted on Cas's name. Something's definitely happening now; thin lines of light emerge, absorbing the blood before spreading over the wall like living vines, and with a sense of growing anticipation, Dean watches them crawl toward the key.

He's not disappointed; at the moment of contact, there's an almost audible click, the key flashing into brilliant life, alight with the Grace of the last angel on earth.

Fascinated, Dean turns in a slow circle, following the edge of light as the sigils that protect the camp began to light up one by one across the length of the wall. It's fast, like watching summer lightning flash across a clear sky, glittering lines of gold zigzagging over the surface of the wall and back toward them, aiming right for the key and meeting it with a second flash of light.

Abruptly, the grey day is consumed with light so bright it's almost blinding, joyous welcome he can feel all the way to his bones. Swallowing, Dean touches the key with one bloody finger and--

"Wait," he says, startled. "You hear that?"

"I should have killed him when I killed Dean," Lucifer mutters sulkily, apropos of fucking nothing. It's like he doesn't even notice he's standing in a bowl of light. Like he can't even see it. "What was I thinking?"

"Archangels tried; remember how that went? The whole Host tried, and he still came back." He grins at Lucifer's scowl while surreptitiously scanning for where it's coming from. "He refused you, and you just let him walk away. Dude's like the Terminator. Worried he'd just come back again?"

"My Father," Lucifer grinds out, "isn't here to care."

"Think he'd tell you if he was?"

Lucifer rolls his eyes, skin washed to a sickly yellow in the light of walls, each sigil gleaming gold and bright enough to light up the whole world. "Maybe I don't want to kill him. Maybe I just want him to give up."

"On his dad, or on himself?"

"On you." Dean stiffens, rubbing his arms restlessly, looking around again; it has to be pretty close. "Humans are always such a disappointment, he should know that by now. What makes you any different?"

That, he reflects, is a very good question.

Looking away, he blinks at the wall behind Lucifer; the light is moving again, the suggestion of a rectangle like a door forming before his eyes. Wiping the sweat from his eyes--when did it get so hot?--he tries to work out how to get Lucifer to leave; he's pretty sure he shouldn't see that.

"Fuck off, would you?" he says, concentrating on the shape of the door; so that's where it's coming from. "No, wait, you're doing that now. Having problems with your army? Where is it, by the way?"

"What do you think you're doing?" Lucifer asks softly, brown eyes boring into his. "You can't fight me. You don't even know where to start."

He really wishes Lucifer would shut up already.

"You already lost, Dean. Humanity lost before you were even born."

Conquest is much easier when the other side of the war can't even step on the field and fight.

"You can't win," Lucifer says confidently, no room for argument; he says it like water's wet and the end of the world's already done, like prophecy foretold since the beginning of time. Dean really hates prophecy, and it says something that Lucifer's the only thing he likes less. "It's over, Dean. Surely you can see that."

You assume you'd lose before there's even a battle to be fought.

"I haven't even stepped on the field." Behind Lucifer, the door yawns open, spilling warm yellow light over them both and yeah, it's definitely coming from there. Fuck Lucifer. Shoving him aside, Dean starts toward it. "It's not over yet."

---

"…isn't responding, why isn't he responding, this doesn't even make sense!"

Someone, Dean reflects dazedly, is pretty pissed right now.

"Then we should try something else." That's Cas; no one monotones like that.

"Yeah, why didn't I think of that?" the first voice answers tiredly--a woman, he thinks, but he can't get his eyes open long enough to be sure. His first attempt to move sends a bolt of pain shooting up his arm and he almost blacks out. Desperate, he clings to the sound of her voice to keep conscious. "Okay, let me think, it's been a while."

"What are your options?"

"Not a lot, the infirmary doesn't have….I need--" She laughs a little hysterically. "A hospital would be nice."

"We can do that."

There's a long pause. "Yeah, right, okay. Uh, we need--Jesus, everything--"

"Make a list," Cas says calmly. "Be specific, be thorough, and I'll order a search of every major city in the state."

"Okay, that'll work. I also need some--" her voice cracks. "Reference books, the library in Kansas City's still standing. Jesus, I searched it for Dean once, where were the fucking medical--I should go--"

"You can't go."

"I know," she answers impatiently. "Send Alicia, she's an EMT, she knows what to look for. She might think of something I wouldn't."

"How long do you need?"

"Um." There's a pause. "Thirty minutes, I need to check with Chuck on inventory first."

"I'll stay with Dean. Send Joseph and Alicia here before you see Chuck. They'll coordinate the teams' efforts so they'll be ready when you finish your list. Go."

"Got it."

Her footsteps fade rapidly into the distance and he thinks he hears the sound of beads. Dean makes a massive effort and manages to get his eyes open; Christ, it's like a furnace in here.

"What's going on?" he wants to say; he has no idea if he managed to get it all out, but it must have been something, because abruptly, Cas is beside him. "Cas?"

"How are you feeling?" Dean struggles for an answer for a few seconds before Cas shakes his head sharply, blue eyes dark. "Never mind, I can guess. You should rest."

Dean tries to look a question, even though he has no idea what to ask. He's getting the idea that maybe something's wrong.

"You're currently running a rather high fever," Cas states, and somewhere, that's being written on a goddamn stone tablet or something. Sitting down on the edge of the bed, he touches Dean's forehead, then something amazingly cool and wet makes an appearance, draped so gently against the sensitive skin of his forehead it almost doesn't make the headache worse, though it's doing shit for the nausea rolling through him in sickening waves. Two more somethings are tucked under his arms, chilly against his skin; the relief from the heat is almost painful. "You'll be fine, but you might try to keep a minimal number of undamaged neurons to avoid brain damage. Your current temperature is making that somewhat of a challenge. A tub may be involved at some point, provided we can find one. And an industrial icemaker, I suppose."

Dean wonders if you can convey 'you're such a fucking dick' by staring really, really hard. Cas's mouth twitches, which he takes as yeah, you can. The more you know.

"I suppose that means you'll try." To Dean's shock, Cas's fingers, surprisingly cool, brush against his hot cheek, lingering long enough for him to realize he kind of doesn't want them to move anytime soon. "Get some rest. I'll take care of everything."

Dean nods, licking his dry, cracked lips frantically before saying, "I know."

---

Before he can get a good look around, the door closes with a finality that makes him stumble off balance, hitting the floor with a muffled curse and a shock of pain up his arm. Scrambling to his knees, he swallows the nausea back with an effort, staring at the faded red carpet for a long moment before sitting back on his heels and looking around curiously.

Dark wood walls set with stained glass surround him: a church, he guesses, confirmed by the sight of worn, lovingly polished pews, air redolent with the smells of incense and wood oil and lemon. Faintly, he hears the sound of bells, but looking at the altar, there's no priest beginning mass, no parishioners in the pews.

Standing up, he takes a few wary steps up the aisle, lined with clean, threadbare red carpet, and tries to work out where it's coming from; it's supposed to be here, that much he's sure of, but it would really help to know what the hell that is and hey, why he's looking for it.

Looking down at himself, he sighs: not to mention why the fuck he's wet.

Patches of dampness are growing on his faded flannel shirt, trails of water dripping down equally damp jeans to streak across his bare feet and soak into the carpet around him. Where are his shoes, another question, equally pointless: apparently, this isn't a day for answers.

Halfway up the aisle, a sound behind him jerks him around to scan the back of the church, surprised to realize he's not alone. A woman is sitting on the back of one of the last pews, a stick with some kind of hook--he thinks he should know what that is--held loosely in one hand. She's wearing a loose, sleeveless wool dress over some kind of leggings, belted with a knotted sash, and a white band just behind her hairline holds long, thick dreadlocks back from a round, dark face with sharp brown eyes.

She tilts her head, looking him over critically, and he's hideously aware he's not only getting wetter, but his sleeve's also becoming soaked with blood.

"Hey," he says, trying for casual and probably coming off creepy as well as wet and bloody, which come to think, isn't nearly as uncommon as it should be when he meets hot women. A step toward her ends in an audible squelching sound in the soaked carpet, and he closes his eyes in sheer horror. This isn't happening to him.

For some reason, that makes her grin.

"Hello, Dean Winchester," she says in a warm contralto. "You have no idea how long I've been waiting to meet you." Standing up, sandaled feet cross the seat of the pew before she jumps over the edge, landing on the carpeted floor without a sound. Setting her--pike?--against a nearby pew, she walks toward him, pausing a foot away before extending a hand. "This is how you do it now, right?"

"Yeah, sure." He reaches out and fights not to wince at her strong grip, callused fingers closing over his hand enthusiastically. Gritting his teeth, he takes it like a man and doesn't even clutch his hand afterward, which he feels definitely should get him some points here. "Nice to meet you," he says politely, carefully not looking down, because there's definitely a puddle forming around his feet. "And you are…?"

"We'll get there," she answers, eyes darting down to the puddle with a smirk before looking up at him, head cocked. "Yeah, no mistake here. You could burn the world alive or light it against the darkness for a thousand years. Your choice."

Should've seen this coming. "Crazy, hallucination, dream, or psychic?" His life, in other words.

"Maybe," she says firmly, and that damn head-tilt, who…. "The stars are right, the moon's in the right quarter, make a wish and spread your bread upon the water. It comes back, Dean. It always comes back."

Maybe all of 'em: again, his life. "You're doing this on purpose, aren't you?"

She makes a see-saw gesture, which he takes as yeah, she is. "You're only getting half the conversation. The fever's the only reason that you can hear it at all, though, so pay attention."

Reaching for his not-bleeding arm, she pulls him helplessly toward the doors, grabbing her--staff?--on the way, and they emerge into an impossible summer day, all bright sunlight in a clear blue sky scattered with fluffy white clouds and rolling fields dotted with fluffy white--

He stops short. Sheep. Everywhere.

"You ever count them?" she asks. "I never did, because one was enough for me." She gazes on the expanding flock with an expression he can't quite read. "There's so many, Dean."

He starts to answer that--though with what, he has no idea, they're sheep--but then remembers what she said earlier. "Fever?"

Looking down at himself, he takes inventory: soaking wet and getting cold enough to feel himself start to shiver, and while his arm's not bleeding anymore, it doesn't look good either, swollen round as a sausage and stretching the fabric of the shirt. Rolling the bloody sleeve up, he sees black ribbons running under the tightly swollen skin, stiches torn loose from the angry red rips of still-open wounds that ooze nauseating yellow-pink pus, and neat punctures he recognizes as drainage cuts.

Fuck his life again: he knows what happened. "It got infected after all." And Cas is never gonna let him forget it, either.

"You're dying," she says, wincing sympathetically at his expression. "Sorry about that. The seizures aren't helping either; maybe stop with those? You're causing a lot of stress to a couple of very tired people, not to mention the rest of the camp. They're practically sleeping on the porch."

"Our porch isn't big enough." Yeah, that's the important part here, but it's just not. "I think some of the boards are rotten--"

"Dean," she interrupts sternly. "No one wants anyone to collapse all their veins, you get me?"

"Did I say I wanted them to?"

"Well, let's say it's gonna be a close thing if you keep this up." Reaching out, she touches his forehead before he can pull away, making a face. "Yeah, that's not good. Bring that down a little, okay? That's your brain you're cooking right now."

"I'll get right on it." Annoyed, he takes in the pleasant pastoral scene around them, sheep baaa-ing, the sun shining, the grass--being grass, he guesses, it's green, anyway--and comes to a really unpleasant conclusion. "You're dreamwalking me. Coma-walking me, whatever."

"Kind of. Not an angel, promise: I just learned the tricks from one." Patting his shoulder, she gathers her skirt and sits down on the stone steps, looking up expectantly. "Have a seat."

It's not like he's got any better ideas, and the sun-heated wood of the porch looks warm. Settling down beside her, he shivers as a breeze cutting through his wet shirt and wishes to God someone would get his body a blanket or something, wherever it is. "So you're….?"

"An unintended consequence," she answers promptly, and yeah, straight answer, who needs 'em? He does, but no one's asking him what he wants. "I was born, and when I was seventeen years old, I was supposed to die. I didn't, because when I called, I got an answer. And when I was asked, I said yes. No one says no, Dean, not if they're worthy of the question. You--" She shakes her head, smirking at him. "You'd know. You never said no in your life."

He nods; going with it seems like a pretty good idea.

"Forward and back," she says, demonstrating with her hand in a left to right motion. "All that was, is, and will be, but they can't see could and should and almost, and no one living can see maybe, not yet."

"Whatever you say." He tries not to grin at her sigh. "Come on, cut me some slack, I'm dying--somewhere."

"Slack is the one thing you don't have. You got a thousand miles to go before you sleep." She frowns at him hopefully. "Did I get that quote right? English isn't my first language."

Dean looks at her solemn face and realizes something that should have been pretty goddamn obvious. "You're really enjoying this."

"Oh yeah," she agrees cheerfully. "My teacher had a weird sense of humor. God knows it took him long enough to get one, so not really a surprise."

When she reaches up to push a long lock back from her face, he stares at the small, strong hand, the thick calluses on fingers and palm, the narrow wrist, following the thin lines of old scars up her bare arms, some rising in thick ridges darker than her skin, others so old they're barely even visible, twining between random patches of shiny, too-smooth flesh. Focusing on her shoulder, half-hidden by the unbleached wool of her dress, he traces the lines of her tattoo; it's as familiar as if it was the one he wears on his own skin. Tucked against her elbow is a shepherd's crook--got it, sheep--but the sash she wears holds a long knife as well, riding with easy familiarity against one hip, and the stoppered earthen bottle hanging beside it sloshes interestingly, the symbol burned into the smooth clay indicating it's not just any kind of water in there.

And the sheep--the sheep spread out in front of them aren't sheep at all.

He waves at a tall, middle-aged couple who note his attention and wave back with dignified expressions that indicate he's being weird before they go back to their conversation with an older woman, unbound hair braided with leather and faceted beads that catch the summer sunshine in sparks like contained fire, hands and arms decorated with intricate tattoos that he almost recognizes from the oldest of Bobby's manuscripts and books. Three among many: now that he knows what he's looking at, he gets what she meant about counting, a stretch of smiling faces and murmuring voices and bright laughter all the way to the horizon.

"Yours?" he asks, glancing at her; the dark eyes are fixed on the growing crowd, bright with unshed tears. "Not bad."

"I didn't know." Wiping her eyes impatiently, she grins at him. "How about you?"

"I never counted, either. One--" He swallows hard as a white-clad kid runs from restraining parental hands, shrieking laughter. "Yeah, one was enough."

"Hunter to hunter: never trust a pixie. Fae are bad enough, but at least they don't bite." She leans her head on one hand. "Forward and back, Dean, and they didn't see us. You're impossible, which helped a lot, because that's what hid us from them. We weren't important to them, so we could make ourselves from the start. We had a choice." Before Dean can ask who she's talking about, her smile fades. "It took all time and space to make you, and they thought that meant you didn't get one."

That's who she's talking about. "I said no when they asked me."

"It's not a choice if there's only one answer you're allowed to give; it's even less when there's only one possible answer." She shrugs at his expression. "Knowing the rules helps, but it works better when everyone's following more than just the letter. You, though…."

Dean waits, and waits (and shivers: fuck the breeze), and waits, then gives up. "Me what?"

Reaching out, she takes his hand, lacing their fingers together, and the breeze changes, warm and smelling of sunshine and baked earth, the first days of summer in every breath, chasing away the bone-deep cold.

"Better?" she asks, then tugs his hand until he's leaning against her shoulder. "You got a thousand miles to go before you sleep, Dean. It's gonna be uphill both ways, but you can rest here for a little while."

"I'm dying," Dean protests half-heartedly, the soft wool smooth and warm against his cheek; his eyes are closing before he can stop them. "Remember?"

"Yeah about that." She wraps her arm around his shoulders, and he's falling into a welcoming woolen lap. For the first time in what feels like forever, he starts to relax, muscles loosening under his skin. Maybe he can rest here for a while before he starts looking again; he's safe in the lap of a fellow hunter and under the eyes of an entire world of happy sheep. One was enough, that made it worth it; this is so much more. "You should stop doing that pretty soon."

Reluctantly, Dean turns his head to squint up at her; it may be his imagination, but he thinks she just might be glowing. "You have any suggestions?"

"I have faith," she answers thoughtfully, petting him like she might a dense pet who did a trick badly. "What's happening right now is a miracle in progress. Try," and she frowns at him, "not to make it too hard to pull it off, okay?"

He nods obediently; it's not like he wants to die. "Tell me your name, at least."

"My name is Amieyl," she answers, smiling down with him, and his eyes are falling closed even as she adds, "Get some rest. I'll keep it warm."

---

It's fucking freezing.

"What…."

His entire body feels like it's made of liquid, words slurring into incomprehensibility between his tongue and freezing air. Hands on his shoulders push him down before he can protest: it's like he's not even moving; no matter how hard he struggles, he gets absolutely nowhere. He's got to find Sam. Castiel promised, and a contract is a contract, even with a god.

"Sam. Tell me--" He chokes on a mouthful of frozen air, coughing desperately until he can breathe again, speak again, remember how to form words. "Tell me….where he is."

"Stop fighting me," Castiel says from somewhere behind him, and he's pushed down again, buried to the chest in clinging, roiling heat, fire burning through every nerve. Every muscle locks up in shock, and he feels himself sinking, helpless, but as his chin touches something liquid, he's pulled back up again. "Dean, listen to me--"

"Cas, you need help?" Another voice, female, and Dean vaguely wonders who the fuck calls a crazy god Cas. "I can--"

"Get out." The command is unmistakable and inarguable. After a moment, he adds, "Rest while you can. I can handle this."

Dean swallows, head falling back helplessly against something solid with a thump he can feel in his teeth and pounds through his head, scattering his thoughts like sheep before a wolf's sharp teeth. Even Sam keeps flickering in and out, a motel TV with shitty reception, static fucking up the signal.

"You said--"

"Dean…" Abruptly, the solid surface behind him moves; blinking, Dean tries to focus, but all he can see are blue eyes drilling into his. "Dean," he says more quietly. "Do you understand what I'm saying?"

Dean nods slow and languorous; it's like moving through honey.

"Listen to me. You have to stop fighting me. Despite what you may think, this is to your benefit."

That's never not been a lie, and he can't believe Castiel thinks he'd buy it now, after everything.

"Try."

Frowning, Castiel rests a hand on his forehead, then eases it around to gently cup the back of his head, a warm buffer between him and an edge like a dull knife he didn't even notice cutting into his neck. Despite himself, he relaxes back into the firm hold with an audible sigh of relief, closing his eyes; even holding up his head these few seconds feels like too much effort.

"You can't give up, Dean, not now." It takes a long time for him to identify the voice as Castiel's, soft and rough and something else, something he's never heard before. I can't--" His voice breaks off for an uneven breath, and distantly, Dean wonders if he's okay. "If you do, I'll be forced to take measures that will make you very unhappy once you're cognizant again, and I won't care at all. I've done worse for far less. Do you understand me?"

"Yeah." Slitting open his eyes, Castiel's face comes into abrupt, almost painful focus; going by his expression, he's pissed about something. Making an effort, he tries to think what he missed. "Am I supposed to build an altar or--"

"For the sake of what remains of my sanity," Castiel interrupts flatly, "don't finish that sentence."

Startled, he takes in the deep circles under Castiel's eyes and what looks like a couple of days beyond his normal level of stubble, wondering if he should be surprised that even as a god, Castiel still doesn't get the perks include not looking like shit. Converting the masses and executing the unbelievers must be exhausting.

Lonely, too, he thinks with an unwelcome flicker of pity. Gods don't have friends to tell them to eat their goddamn spamburger and beans--All of it, Cas. Don't look at me like that--and go to bed already--I'm not kidding here. Bed. Now.--the goddamn reports will wait for tomorrow.

"You realize that even if this was a real contract, it's not actually valid until it's confirmed by both parties--" Castiel's voice cuts off. "What am I saying? I need to get you out now, so please be still."

"I have to kiss you?" Dean asks curiously and is rewarded with an expression he's never seen on Castiel's face before. "What? Gods don't do that?" Not like there's a handbook for this kind of shit, and really, why isn't there? Maybe they should write one. Knowing the rules would help, even if the only thing anyone ever follows is the letter.

"Hell can't be worse than this," Castiel mutters, hand slipping away with a brief trail of fingers over his cheek before he shifts into a crouch and settles both hands on Dean's shoulders. "Don't attempt to help me. You're not very good at it."

Dean tries a smirk for the fit. "And fuck you very much."

For some reason, this requires more personal attention and less mojo'ing; as his feet touch a solid surface that he hazily identifies as the floor, he belatedly realizes he's soaking wet. His t-shirt clings to his skin, boxers rucked up in wet, uncomfortable bunches against his thighs, water sliding down his bare legs and dripping onto the floor with almost audible plops and puddling around his feet.

Cas takes his entire weight before his legs have a chance to crumple underneath him, and even so, it's an effort not to just collapse. Lifting his head, he tries to get some idea of where he is, but even with the room shifting nauseatingly in and out of focus, it's pretty clear it's in the same place he was earlier. He's never thought Castiel was a palace and marble floors kind of guy--angel--whatever--but he'd have thought he'd go for something a little more upscale than the budget motel aesthetic: bare, dingy walls, the only light from a bare lightbulb clinging to the ceiling, and what looks like furniture a few decades from new.

Glancing down, he catches a glimpse of--a tub--the smooth, dark surface broken by--water, ice, what the fuck--and stops short, trying to make some kind of sense of what he's looking at.

"Cas--" he starts, trying to hold onto the thought--water, that's what's forming a puddle around his feet, melting ice--but a pull on his arm drags his gaze down to a familiar tube snaking down from his elbow and taped into place. Turning to follow it knocks his other arm into Castiel with an explosion of pain that makes him double over, black dots dancing in front of his eyes from the agony when his weight drops abruptly onto his own feet. "Fuck."

He won't pass out. He won't. He won't.

"…I told you to be still," Castiel is saying, sounding pissed, which makes Dean wonder if Castiel actually thought that obedience thing would really work. Swallowing back the taste of bile and blood, his attention's caught by the bulky, misshapen bandaging loosely wrapped around his right forearm, gauze stained with red-brown streaks beneath a thin layer of plastic. Trying to flex his fingers without success, he realizes in dim horror it's because he can't feel them.

Effortlessly, Castiel rights him again, slinging Dean's arm carefully over his shoulder to dangle uselessly against his back. As they start to move away from the tub--an industrial icemaker, I suppose--things start to click into place: ankle, you get you ran yourself into a hairline fracture, right?, the bandage, infection rate is seventy percent, his head is killing him, why isn't he responding?, he's almost got it….

You're dying.

Castiel stops short, looking at him. This close, Dean can see his eyes are red-rimmed as well as bloodshot, the iris a thin rim of electric blue around swallowing black. "What did you say?"

Dean licks his cracked lips and tastes dried blood. "Am I dying?"

"No," Cas answers fiercely, fingers digging into his hip hard enough to almost clear his head. I have faith. "You're not going to die."

"Why--" Can't I think? He tries to hold onto the thought, desperate, but it's trying to get away, slipping frantically out his grasp. "What happened?"

"You were attacked on patrol by a colony of brownies and the wounds became infected," Cas answers, searching his face. "The infection is proving extremely persistent, but we still have many options available for treatment."

That sounds about right. "If. If you can't. Find one--"

"We will," Cas interrupts. "The problem is, we need time to find the right one, and your fever is dangerously high, which is causing complications in treating you. Do you understand?"

It's almost gone, goddamn it. "Time." A thousand miles to go before he sleeps. It feels like forever. "You need time."

"Yes." Cas closes his eyes for a second. "I need time."

Dean tries to hold onto it--the jeep, the cabin, a woman wrapping up his arm, Cas saying--Cas saying.…

"Did you see them when you died? The first time?"

"Dean?"

"I didn't get a chance to count them. Did you?" The ghosts of invisible sheep start to circle them, echoes of non-existent baaing filling his ears. Sheep in Kansas: something's wrong with that. Turning his head, he takes them in and belatedly remembers they're not actually sheep; a couple of them give him glares, shaking their heads frantically, and worse, they don't even stay still, so he can't get a count. "Stop moving…."

Fingers bite into his arms and he blinks up at Castiel, trying to remember what they were talking about. Then he does: Sam. He almost forgot Sam. He has to--do something to get Sam back. All at once, it dawns on him: contract.

"I forgot." Somehow, he finds the strength to move, half stumbling until Castiel catches him with a muttered curse, which would normally be hilarious, but it takes all of Dean's concentration to stay upright long enough to get this over with. Leaning forward, Dean just manages to aim for Castiel's mouth and kiss him.

He's not sure how long it lasts--he's not sure how long it's supposed to, he's only done this with demons, maybe it's different with gods?--but Castiel's the one that jerks back first. Dean only realizes he closed his eyes when he opens them, licking his lips and wondering at the lingering taste; it's nothing like demons, a thick, rotting sweetness, sour like curdled milk, that he'll taste with every mouthful of food, every drink of water, every goddamn breath for days. This is nothing like that. It's almost like--

"Why did you do that?" Castiel whispers.

I wish I'd done it before, Dean thinks hopelessly. When you were still the person who made me want to try. It wasn't supposed to be like this.

"Sealed the contract," he says hoarsely. "Love, loyalty, obedience, the whole nine yards. It's done."

Castiel doesn't answer for what feels like forever. "You believe that, don't you?"

Before Dean can work out what the hell that's supposed to mean, he's abruptly lying down, completely dry--mojo, fucking finally--and there are pills--this part's familiar, though he still has no idea what that's about--before Castiel does something with his arm. A point of chill begins to spread a cloudy warmth through his whole body, and all at once, he relaxes into the mattress.

Lazily, he glances down, but Castiel catches him, easing his head up before he can see what's going on down there, and honestly, it feels way too good to really care.

"No, you already pulled it out twice. You should be asleep within the next few minutes." Dean nods as best he can with Castiel's hand on his jaw, blue eyes meeting his. "You said I should find other options. I'm taking your advice."

"Maybe," Dean whispers, and wonders what he's even saying: a miracle in progress. "What advice?"

"It's not done," Castiel states. "The contract. I didn't agree to the terms."

"Bullshit." Frantic, Dean tries to sit up, but the hand on his shoulder effortlessly pins him to the mattress. "It's--"

"A contract requires the consent of both parties, and I haven't consented."

This is a nightmare, has to be. "What--" he swallows, mouth dry. "What else do you want?"

"Proof," Castiel answers. "Your obedience is questionable. You need to prove to me that you can be."

Dean manages to nod again; he supposes making a contract with someone who actually knows him is probably a bad idea when it comes to terms. Around the bed, the sheep gather closer, and now they're glaring at him in unison. "What do I have to do?"

"Just one thing," Castiel answers, never looking away. "I need more time, Dean. You can give it to me by doing one simple thing: you won't die. Do you understand me?"

Despite the fact his eyes want to shut like, yesterday, he can't make them do it, not with Castiel looking at him like that.

"Verbal acknowledgement is mandatory." Castiel's hand tightens, getting his full attention. "Say it."

"I won't die," Dean says obediently, though he's got to wonder why Castiel needs his help with that. The entire god package is beginning to look a lot shittier than he thought, and not just because it made his best friend crazy. "Did you know what it would do to you?"

Castiel freezes, staring down at him, then looks away, reaching for a blanket and tucking it around him. "You should sleep."

"So should you." He sold his soul to Hell, and Castiel sold his to godhood; both of them went into it knowing the consequences, but that didn't make having to live with them any easier. "I never wanted…wanted you to do this. Not for me."

He wonders if it's his imagination that Castiel's hands are shaking. "I understand why now."

"You just had to do it," Dean says bitterly. "I gotta live with knowing it was me that made you."

"Dean…." He pauses, then reaches for another blanket, smoothing it over him. "I'm currently debating whether to ever tell you about this. It would be entertaining to observe your reaction, but then I'd have to actually talk about it."

Dean slits his eyes open. "Huh?"

"It's not an easy decision." Castiel rests a hand on Dean's forehead again, soothing. "I need you here so I can make it."

Dean nods, relaxing at the slow, rhythmic stroking, gentle even though he can feel how badly Castiel's hand's shaking. It's almost hypnotic--scratch that, maybe it's actually hypnotic, but he's surprisingly okay with that. A series of vaguely encouraging 'baa's' punctuate the entire surreal experience. Try not to make it too hard to pull it off, okay?

"I'll be here," he says at last; no one, even fucked-up almost-gods, should feel like Castiel looks right now. "I promise."

Castiel nods. "I'll hold you to it."

---

He's half-finished with his vivisection when he finally gets tired of the talking.

"Dean--" it gurgles through a ruined throat. "Listen to me--"

It cuts off when he shoves a knife through their throat.

"Alistair," he says patiently. Again. "It's Alistair now. What you give up, you don't get back."

"No," the guy says through a severed throat, staring at him with irritated, bloodshot blue eyes before he abruptly pulls out the knife and sits up, organs spilling out into his lap. "That's not your name, and this isn't what you are."

"How are you doing that?" Alistair asks curiously; only demons get up from the rack.

The guy gives him a surly glare. "You aren't this."

"It's exactly what I am; I carry it everywhere, always. Why don't you get that?" Gesturing at the intestines dripping toward the floor, he adds, "You're making a mess, by the way."

"Please don't elaborate," the guy says. "I really don't want to know what you're doing right now."

"I deserved to be here. Did you think I ever left?" He reaches for another knife, balancing it in his hand before stepping back toward the rack. It's his favorite one, sharp and dull, a million agonized screams written into every inch of the blood-soaked metal; he always carries it wherever he goes. "I didn't. Now lie the fuck down."

The blue eyes narrow. "Make me."

Before he can move, the gloom near the rack starts to thicken, curls of darkness forming lines and edges that resolve into the uncertain shape of a door. A door that immediately begins to shake, like a whole bunch of tiny, frantic hooves are hitting it all at once.

He frowns. "Do you hear that?"

"Hear what?" the guy asks irritably. "They say the first step is to admit you have a problem. Why, I have no idea, but let's try that. Do you want to know what yours is?"

"Shut up." Alistair stops halfway toward the shuddering door, wondering when he started toward it in the first place, and turns around to see the guy inexplicably swinging his legs over the side of the rack. "You…can't do that."

"You'd be surprised how many times I've heard that." Tentatively, he sets his feet on the floor and collapses, one bloody arm stretched over the rack.

"Never mind," Alistair says softly, starting to smile. An angel on his knees in Hell: who gets that? "You look good on your knees."

"I've heard that, too. Get some new material." Fingers digging into the rack, the guy spits out a mouthful of blood, glaring up at him. "I kneel for no one and nothing, not anymore. And neither do you. You stood up."

Alistair swallows. "What?"

"You said yes, Dean--"

"That's not my name!"

"--and you stood up." Gripping the rack, he gathers what remains of his legs beneath him, pushing himself up until he's standing unsteadily in a pool of his own blood. Looking up, he meets Alistair's eyes, the blue incandescent. "And you taught me to do it, too."

Alistair licks his lips, trying to speak, but no words emerge.

"We have to ask, even here. I asked, Dean. You said yes. No one says no, not if they're worthy of the question."

"Shut up!" He starts back toward the guy, but the door starts to crack, light shivering along each sharp edge and burning away the gloom, and somehow, he's reaching for the doorknob.

"All you have to do," Cas says softly, "is remember how to stand up."

---

A frantic beeping fills the room, almost drown out by a woman saying, "Breathe, Dean, goddamn you! Come on! Breathe!"

---

He stumbles when the knife is jerked out of his hand, and a slap to his ass with something hard does the rest; he hits the church floor hard enough to rattle his teeth. Rolling over on the worn carpet, he looks up to see Amieyl standing in front of the half-open doors, then follows her appalled gaze across the bloody footsteps staining the gleaming wood to himself.

He's covered in blood, scraps of flesh and entrails clinging to his too-tight shirt, trapped under his fingernails, screaming filling his ears, Jesus, he can taste….

"Alistair," he whispers in horror. Of course. Of course.

"Oh no you don't," she snarls, dropping to her knees and planting a palm in the middle of the gore on his chest. "No, he's not you, not now and never again. That's past; you carry it, no help for it, but you don't wear it as your skin. It's not yours anymore; it's too small now, it doesn't fit." She throws the knife toward the doors, the sharp blade burying itself to the hilt. To his horror, he sees her clean wool dress is splattered with blood, dripping with it. "Take it off!"

The collar of his shirt tightens, strangling the words filling his mouth, chest tight and aching for air it can't get. "I'm--"

"Past tense, Dean Winchester, and I don't have time for this." Reaching down, she pulls him upright, grabbing his shirt collar, stiff with blood, intestines and slivers of liver sliding obscenely wetly between her fingers, and rips down the front, buttons flying everywhere. "Got a thousand miles to go and your heart just stopped. Stop fucking with me and get this done!"

Numb, he reaches down, wincing at the slick feeling of shredded organs against the pads of his fingers, bone shrapnel sharp as a new blade tearing at his skin as strips of fresh skin litter the floor around them, still dripping blood, and he remembers familiar blue eyes with a start of horror.

"Cas. That was Cas." He put his best friend on the rack; you don't come back from that. He never left. "Stop, no, I'm--"

"Shut up! Could I get some help here?" she asks desperately, voice shaking as she grabs for his head before he can pull away, fingers sticky as they press into his cheeks like she wants to leave fingerprints behind. "I'll help you, any way I can," she whispers, staring into his eyes. "But first, you gotta want to save yourself. If you can't believe in yourself, believe in me, and I can believe enough for us both. Now help me. Take. It. Off."

Slowly, he reaches to pull off his shirt; it's like being skinned alive, peeling away with a sickening tearing he can feel in every nerve. To his surprise, another pair of hands join in, ripping away the remains of the overshirt in bloody strips and tossing them aside before going for the t-shirt, manicured nails scraping into his chest as she rips it from collar to hem with a shock like being slammed headfirst into the floor.

He gasps a breath, a burst of heat crackling along the surface of his skin, and the tightness in his chest eases by increments as he finally shrugs out of the scraps that she gathers in delicate, olive-skinned hands before tossing away. He only has a moment to take her in--black hair coiled away from her face and held with jeweled clips, olive skin flushed, full mouth a tight, thin line, dark robes and glittering rings splattered with blood…and surveying him with the most skeptical look he's ever seen on anyone's face in his life.

"I thought," she says before reaching for his belt and ripping it through all the belt loops in a single effortless tug, "that he'd be taller."

Before he can process that--or stop her--sharp nails scrape against his stomach as she grasps the waist of his jeans and takes them, boxers, socks, and shoes in a single go, throwing the entire blood- and gore-soaked mess on the floor behind him before subjecting him to a critical survey, head to foot.

Belatedly, he realizes that he's naked. In front of her and Amieyl. In a church.

"Uh." Clothes would be good here. Knowing where to get them would be great. "Maybe if I stand up?"

"Maybe," she answers dubiously, looking over his shoulder. Twisting around, he watches incredulously as Amieyl beats the pile of ruined clothes with her crook as if they personally insulted her and all her friends. It seems to be working; when she steps back with a viciously satisfied look, there's nothing left but a faint stain on the wooden floor and even that's vanishing into nothing.

Returning, she stops at his hip and stares down at him resentfully, as if he's doing this on purpose to make her (after?) life more difficult.

"Standing up helps, yeah." Amieyl extends him a hand, not bothered by the entire naked thing at all, and God, he wishes that was true for him. "On your feet, soldier. You just got a fuck of a hit; the beat's regular again. Good job."

"I didn't…." He stares up at her, dress once again pristine, then at the place where the clothes were piled, the peaceful church around them, and puts it all together. "You're kidding. You're dreamwalking me again?"

"You keep creating your own hell," she answers irritably. "Can't fight when you're trying to torture yourself to death every time you close your eyes." She snaps her fingers, making him jump and look worriedly for that goddamn crook. "Stand up, Dean Winchester. You kneel to no one and nothing. That was your right from the moment of your birth, and you took it back. All of it."

Licking his lips--no blood this time--he tentatively reaches for her hand, startled to see his skin is perfectly clean, a worn, comfortable flannel overshirt hugging his arm. She jerks him up, looking briefly satisfied at his stumble before pulling him into a hug that squeezes all the breath out of him.

"Don't," she whispers in his ear, voice shaking, "make it so hard, okay?"

"Sorry," he whispers back, squeezing her before she lets him go, wiping her eyes impatiently. "I'll do better."

"It's like you think miracles are easy," she mutters before her eyes flicker to the other woman, and something in her expression tells him she's more than just surprised. "Thanks, Lia."

Lia doesn't move, clean, manicured hands resting neatly in her lap. Wide, thick-lashed brown eyes shift from Amieyl to him, and he can feel it like a touch, cool and impersonal, almost hostile but not quite. "You called for help. I answered."

"Yeah, I did." Amieyl crosses the space between them and extends her hand, mouth curving in a small smile. "Thank you."

"He is better standing," Lia says reluctantly after spearing Dean with another long look. Gathering up her skirts, she accepts Amieyl's assistance, straightening her immaculate dress meticulously around her once she's standing. "You're welcome, of course."

"Yeah, thanks," Dean tells her belatedly at the pointedness of her response. This feels like the wrong time to ask what the hell is going on. "Uh--"

"It's not as if I had anything better to do," she continues, ignoring him. "I've been in the grove for a very long time."

Amieyl's eyes widen, and Dean blinks as the ghosts of trees closing around them, a suggestion of grass beneath their feet. Looking up, he studies the night sky superimposed over the ceiling between outlines of branches and hints of leaves, then looks at Lia again.

"I keep watching him die," she says, staring at some spot over his shoulder. "It doesn't change, no matter how much I want it to. I've never been that strong."

Turning around, Dean sees a dark-haired man kneeling in a nearby clearing, a torn, filthy toga draped over a plain tunic, a knife clutched in one hand. Faintly, he hears the echoing sound of voices, lots of them, and while they don't sound friendly--context says they're really, really not--they never seem to get any closer.

"We can't do anything," Amieyl murmurs, coming up beside him, fingers twining reassuringly through his. "This was, is, and will always be. All we can do is bear witness."

Another man emerges from among the trunks like he just materialized, crossing to kneel beside the first man. Slighter, with long black hair and brown eyes, he waits for the first man to lift his head. Dean blinks, frowning at the incongruity; his tunic is impossibly pristine, the white hyperreal in the gloom.

"How long until they find me?" the first man asks roughly.

"They won't, not until it's over. Take all the time you need."

The first man's head jerks up in surprise, searching the second guy's expressionless face suspiciously before his eyes widen. "You aren't…who are you?"

"This grove is sacred to the Furies," Lia says with the man, voice echoing eerily. Dean feels the hairs on the back of his neck rising at the quality of the sound, not quite something he can just hear. "We have privileges here. Diana of the Grove heard your supplication in her temple, and I carry her answer. The punishment you requested is just; it will be done. She will fall, but what you imagined she could be will endure forever. It has begun, and it cannot, will not be stopped. All it needs is time."

The first man licks his lips. "You're certain?"

"I have seen it," Lia and the man answer tonelessly. "Does that bring you peace, Gaius?"

"Justice is rarely peaceful; it simply is," he whispers, sitting back on his heels in the thick grass, exhaustion written into every line of his body. "Thank you for your message."

A familiar expression crosses the second man's face, and Dean bites his lip against a surprised grin; glancing at Amieyl, he sees her mouth twitch as well. Interesting. "You are welcome."

"How long have you been watching this?" Dean asks Lia.

"Always." Lia swallows, unhealed grief twisting her features into a caricature of ugliness, hatred and loss so strong even Dean can feel it. "Forever. This is all I ever see."

Still kneeling in the grass, Gaius studies the other man for a long moment. "I can't imagine Diana employing you to carry out her will, much less you deigning to obey her." The other man blinks slowly, and Dean didn't realize how much progress he made by the time they met if right now this is his best interpretation of 'startled'. "You think my mother was so lax in my education that I wouldn't recognize a Messenger when one stoops to manifest before me?"

From the corner of his eye, he sees Lia flinch. Oh.

He hesitates. "As I've met her, it shouldn't."

Gaius' eyes soften. "You know my mother?" The second man nods shortly. "Why are you truly here, Messenger?"

"My superior assigned me to assist the Pantheon in this matter," he answers obliquely. "My orders were to help them in any way they deemed necessary."

Gaius raises a skeptical eyebrow, and Dean can see an echo of Lia in his expression. "Really."

"She believes--humanity is an idea," he says slowly, almost as if he's testing an idea he doesn't entirely understand. "It's not static, however; it changes as it defines itself. It is easy to forget our service is to all that it is and will ever be, not to what we--believe--it should always be."

Dean raises an eyebrow. "His superior was playing a hell of a long game."

"You know her?" Amieyl murmurs close to his ear.

"Yeah, I did." He glances at Amieyl, feeling his cheeks flushing at her knowing look. "She was…like that."

"A lesson," Gaius says in satisfaction, beginning to smile, and Dean thinks he may get why this guy is getting this kind of personal attention. Despite the tension, suffering drawing sharp lines on a handsome face, easy humor is reflected in the curve of his mouth, the warmth in the wide brown eyes, and even in the darkened grove, he's bright right now. He could light the world if he wanted to. "You don't believe it, do you?"

Not surprisingly, the question is ignored, though Dean suspects it's because he's not sure how to answer.

"How do you know my mother?" Gaius asks finally.

"She summoned me by name this night and instructed me in my first duty--"

"That's something she'd do," Gaius murmurs ruefully, pride and affection softening his expression further. "Surprised you, did she?"

The other man hesitates, looking at Gaius directly with a heart-stopping tilt of his head. "After meeting her, not at all."

Gaius's smile fades into uncertainty. "My mother: after this, will she…."

"Her journey is longer than yours," he answers, almost gently. "She will endure, and at her death her name will define the word for generations to come."

Gaius nods shortly, and Dean watches his eyes flicker in the direction of those distant voices.

"That is the worst of us," he breathes, expression hardening into determination. Turning to face the man beside him, he lifts his chin. "Qafsiel Kaziel, Cassiel, Messenger, by whatever name, with whatever rite, in whatever appearance it is right to invoke thee, I entreat you to grant me a single request."

"If it is within my power to grant--" Gaius abruptly reaches out, grasping his wrist, and he stills, eyes widening incrementally at the determined clasp. "What would you ask of me?"

"What you will see tonight is the worst of us," Gaius says urgently, brown eyes boring into the other man's. "Promise me you will never believe that's all that we are. We're so much more."

Rising to his feet, Gaius turns toward the sound of the voices. The other man follows him, but his eyes never leave Gaius, and Dean's mouth goes dry at the sudden sweep of darkness behind him, an impression of something vast stretching through the grove. Almost tentatively, he rests a hand on Gaius' shoulder, and Gaius looks at him in surprise.

"You are unique," he says slowly. "What you are will never be again."

"What I am is what we all are," Gaius answers firmly. "The worst of us can be the best; we all deserve the chance to discover that, even if we fall short."

"What I see tonight is the best of you."

"There will be better," Gaius says. "If you doubt me, it's easy to rectify; grant my request and you'll see it for yourself."

"And if you're wrong?"

Gaius grins at him, and that feeling of brightness is nearly overwhelming; it's like he's standing in the sun. "I'm not."

The other man studies him for a long time, head tilt and everything. "Your request is granted," he says finally, and not entirely reluctantly. Dean sends a quiet, profound thank-you to wherever his superior is these days. "I won't forget."

Gaius lets out a breath, shoulders loosening; it's not just anyone who in the moments before his own death is worrying about how an angel sees the entire human race. "Thank you, Messenger."

"Castiel." Gaius's eyes widen at the offered name. "My true name is Castiel."

"Thank you, Castiel." Turning back to the sound of voices, he takes a deep breath. "It's time to end this."

Cas follows Gaius's gaze, and abruptly, the muffled voices grow louder, more raucous, screams of terror interspersed with satisfied shouts, the sound of metal screaming on metal. The worst of humanity, Dean thinks sickly, but Gaius straightens, mouth curving in an unexpected smile, brown eyes lit from within with something brighter than mere light. Abruptly, the shadows of wings sweep through the grove again, striping the trees in something between light and darkness and controlled chaos before closing around Gaius, protective and comforting.

"It is my privilege to be with you," Cas says, and Dean feels himself matching Gaius's smile. Turning his head toward the growing roar, the dark eyes narrow, vengeance peppered with righteousness, before turning back to Gaius. "Are you ready?"

"Let them come," Gaius murmurs as he raises the dagger, the point rests against his chest as he faces Castiel. "I'm ready now."

Cas hesitates, then steps closer and reaches up, two fingers a breath from his forehead, and abruptly, his eyes are the blue of the ocean, infinite. "Only men die, Gaius," he says suddenly, looking surprised at himself. "You made yourself an idea, and that will never die, not as long as men exist. It will spread farther than you can imagine now."

"You looked?" Gaius's smile widens at Cas's jerky nod, a faint hint of smugness playing along the edges. "Not wrong yet."

"Apparently not." Slowly, almost hesitantly, Cas smiles back, small and awkward, but there. "Don't be afraid. I'll be with you."

Gaius is still smiling as he slides the blade into his heart, as Cas's fingers touch his forehead. "I'm not."

The grove fades back into the walls of the church, the two men slowly vanishing before their eyes, along with that sense of brightness and warmth and exultation.

"I taught him that," Lia whispers, a ripple of bitterness echoing through her voice. "Don't forget in the worst of humanity that there is also the best of it, and all that exists between. He believed that even then."

"That was what he was. He couldn't be less than that." Amieyl takes a hesitant step toward her. "He built his life around it."

"They killed him for it, like his brother before him," she whispers. "Hunted him like a dog for what he was. How could something so bright end as easily as gutting a candle? Tell me how I was supposed to believe in anything after that? Crawling on the surface of the world like maggots, petty, brutish, small, worthless…what value could there be in them when they took so much from me? How could I stand to be one of them?"

Dean stills as the brown eyes turn on him, frozen vastness, a coldness that goes on forever. It's all he can do not to shiver faced with it; Castiel looked a little like that when he told him to kneel. Love and worship, all for his greater glory, but he never hated them for it, not like she does.

"They made offerings in my name; I took them," she continues, revulsion filling her voice. "Their supplication, I heard it; their worship, I accepted it. I endured, to see them destroyed, until nothing of them was left but a memory. My burnt offering was all that I was; it was nothing."

"It wasn't," Dean breathes, mouth dry. "It was everything."

She raises her chin. "I don't remember."

"You wouldn't watch that if you didn't," Amieyl says, and Lia turns on her. "You remember enough to know what you gave up wasn't worth what you lost."

"I remember grief," Lia says savagely. "I remember rage, for what they did to my sons, their bodies defiled, their work destroyed, their names disgraced. You tell me--"

"Starts at birth, ends in death, always does," Amieyl answers. "But in between a life was lived, and they were bright, Lia. They changed the world."

"You think that means something?" Lia demands. "That it makes it worth it?"

"Do you think that the grove was all there was?" Amieyl demands, moving toward her, and to his surprise, Lia takes a step back. "There was more, Lia; you were more. You lived a lifetime before and after, but you made this," she points at the place Gaius died, "all you are and would ever be. And for what? Revenge? It wasn't yours to give!"

"You don't understand--"

"Do you even remember how much you loved them?"

Lia sucks in a breath, color draining from her face.

"That's what you gave up," Amieyl says. "Your burnt offering was everything."

"I don't remember anymore," Lia whispers, and this time, there's pain in it. "You don't get that back."

"No, you don't. You gotta take it," Dean answers her, and she looks at him in surprise. "So do it. Try again, see if this time, you can get it right." He thinks he knows how to do this. "A war's going on, in case you didn't notice."

"I noticed," she says reluctantly.

All right, then. "You know the stakes."

"You don't even know the stakes, Dean Winchester." There's a brief flare of something dark in her eyes, like she's watching humanity burn and wants to pour more gasoline on the fire. "You're going to lose."

Yeah, just what he needs to hear right now. "We haven't lost yet."

"You will," she starts, the darkness deepening. "What does humanity think it is, to--"

"Crawling, maggots, worthless, I heard you the first time," he drones impatiently. "Like your son?"

"You dare--" She starts toward him, the church floor cracking under each dainty step as she starts to grow; by the time she reaches him, her head's almost brushing the bare beams of the ceiling. Her voice echoes through the church. "Kneel."

Dean stares up at her incredulously. "You gotta be kidding me."

"Dean," Amieyl says, sounding worried. "You should know--"

"Not now," he interrupts before she can tell him how shitty an idea it is to fuck with a god. "Kneel in worship or die: I've heard it before. Cas was right; you all need to get some new material. The answer's always gonna be no."

Lia looks down at him, brown eyes vast, but infinity doesn't scare him. Infinity sleeps thirty feet away from him, wakes up with spectacular bedhead, and drinks half a fucking pot of coffee before Dean's even awake these days. Infinity has a drinking and a drug problem, won't let him drive, can't cook, eats under protest, doesn't like to sleep, and hates his entire goddamn life. Infinity still gets up every goddamn morning to keep living it, and he still can't figure out why.

"So kill me, get with the program, or get the fuck out of my way," he tells her. "I got a war to fight, a world to save, and an ex-angel to teach about chocolate and how life can be fun because he got the shit deal when it comes to mortality. You became a god because you couldn't hack being human when you were born to it; he didn't even get to do that, and he's still trying. What the fuck is your excuse?"

Infinity, he reflects uncomfortably, is also gonna be pissed if he gets himself killed taunting a god.

Lia hesitates, confusion and curiosity surrounding him. Before he can start to wonder what that means, everything goes still; it's impossible to move, even to think, as images of his life flicker past in disjoined, too-fast images, and he can't stop it or even remember how.

"Oh hell no." Dean draws in a startled breath, head clearing almost immediately, and Amieyl's standing in front of him, looking pissed. Reaching out, she pulls her crook out of nowhere, and Lia starts to shrink, folding up into person-size before their eyes. "Consent's not just a word, not anymore. Try that again, I bust your ass straight to Limbo."

Lia stumbles back, projecting startled rage. "You can't--"

"Try me."

"Amieyl," he hisses, trying to get between her and Lia and failing; it's like the floor's moving or something. "What are you doing?"

"Freely given with whole heart and mind in full knowledge: those are the requirements of consent. We will accept nothing less." Shoving her crook into the floor, the wood cracks open with a muted grunt, dull grey not-light rising sluggishly out of it, thick and heavy like fog, seeking tendrils slowly crawling across the floor and curling around Amieyl's feet like a cat wanting to be pet. Lia draws back, eyes wide with shocked horror. "The rules are ours to enforce, and our decision is final."

"'We?'" Dean echoes incredulously as he slides helplessly back again; the floor really needs to stay still already. Lia may be smaller now, but gods are tricky like that. "You and what army?"

"I am an army. Anyway, it's just a figure of speech," Amieyl murmurs, gesturing vaguely at him with her free hand. "Sort of. Just go with it."

"Who are you to pass judgment on me?" Lia demands, but her eyes never leave those dead-grey ribbons curving around Amieyl.

"We are the scales and the weight and that which weighs all things," Amieyl answers. "What you want must be asked for, and his consent given in full. Or I, singular, will enforce the penalty here and now. Got it?"

"Ask what?" Dean says into the ensuing silence. "Catch me up here: what does she want?"

Lia licks her lips, tearing her eyes away from Amieyl and those grey ribbons to look at him. "I want to know why."

"Why what?"

"Why did he do it?" she asks in a rush. "What made it worth it?"

He swallows; he asks himself that question every morning. "I don't know."

She hesitates, looking at Amieyl warily, then at him, bleak and endless, an empty stretch of eternity. It must be lonely to exist with nothing but what's in that grove, he thinks: grief and rage and loss forever in repeat, never ending. She forgot everything else. "Anything you would ask of us we will give you, if you will--"

"You have nothing I want," Dean interrupts, and Lia visibly flinches. "What do you want, Lia?"

She searches his face. "I don't remember what I was. I want to see what it is that I forgot."

Startled, he frowns; that's easy. He's done it before, though right now, he can't quite remember when. "Go for it. Uh--freely given and everything." He glances at Amieyl, who nods encouragingly, smiling bright enough to light the whole church. Facing a startled Lia, he closes his eyes. "You want to know what makes it worth it? Check it out."

Deliberately, he forms his life for her: a picture of Sam as a baby, a toddler stumbling after him, a thousand different motel rooms, on the edge of an endless ocean, warm and inviting them in to play, infusing the memories with everything he ever felt for his brother. Annoyance and irritation and frustration, admiration and amusement and pleasure, the horrific loss that shattered him when he died, grief and rage and the stupid shit you do when you can't think of anything else. They're all part of the one thing, the only thing, the thing he never wants to give up again: how much he loved his brother, how loving him was worth all of it. Nothing was worth losing that.

Oh. Lia closes her eyes. That's how it felt.

He gives her everything of his life: Mom and her death, the heat of the fire as he held Sam and the screaming that never stopped; Dad and the vengeance that ruled his life and created the foundation of his and Sam's; Bobby's gruff warmth and kindness, Jo and Ellen, the hunters he met and worked with and watched die; Cassie and Lisa and Ben, friendship and love, blighted hope almost before it had a chance to take root, shriveling before his eyes; he wasn't enough.

Castiel and Anna, Zachariah and Lucifer, the Host; the room where he challenged Cas for his brothers' life and the decision Cas made that day; being shoved up against an alley wall by a Falling angel who didn't know how to give up even when Dean almost did; the war that wasn't fought, that they won, paid in full, bitter measure with Sam's life and soul; and the one here that they haven't lost, not yet, and all it took was Dean trading one life for another.

They got a shitty deal, no argument there: save the world, as if. He never measured up to what anyone needed him to be--Dad, Sam, Cassie, Ellen and Jo, Bobby, Lisa and Ben, Cas--even by accident he never got it right. Every time he's tested, he's failed.

Lia draws back: Then why…

That doesn't mean he's ever gonna stop trying; when he loses, it won't be because he didn't step on the goddamn field.

It's not quite a memory, but something else pushes through, dragged up from somewhere impossibly deep: a place so dark it never knew light, screams and blood and nothing but horror until even horror was mundane, cut with a shock of light, and the moment he was given a choice, in a place where he forgot the meaning of the word. Where he remembered just enough to say…

"You said yes," Lia whispers, snapping them both back into the church. "You stood up."

"Yeah," he agrees, startled: how'd he forget that? "I did."

He starts to move and almost staggers, catching himself before he tumbles to the floor in front of them and adds that to public nudity and being a demon in his lexicon of embarrassment today. "So what's it gonna be? You in or what?"

Lia looks surprised\. "Here, at the end of all things?"

"It's not over yet," Dean says, meeting her eyes. "It hasn't even started. We got a war to fight, Lia, so come home and help us fight it. What, you got something better to do?"

"No," she says slowly. "I don't."

"Then let's get this done," he says impatiently. "What are you waiting for?"

"What you did…." She swallows. "I've never been that strong."

Amieyl grins. "Yeah, you are. You just don't know it yet." Tossing her crook toward one of the pews, she reaches out a hand, palm up. "You can have my strength until you do."

"Mine, too," Dean offers uncertainly; his heart's beating, after all. Lia looks at him, eyes wild and afraid. "I didn't think I was, either. I had help until I realized I was wrong."

Lia looks between them before she takes Amieyl's hand, letting herself be drawn down onto the threadbare red carpet covering the hardwood floor, skirts settling haphazardly around her. Joining them, Dean reaches for her other hand as her head snaps back, spine stiffening as a sickly glow surrounds her; long red streaks cut across her cheeks as if the bones beneath are trying to split them apart, and the soft robes seem to become tighter with a flare of sullen light that burns out before their eyes.

With a gasp, she slumps over, panting, and only belatedly is Dean aware of the tight grip of her fingers, nails cutting into his skin. All you need, Dean thinks in determination, tightening his own grip so they sink in further, blood welling up in sparks of pain, chest tightening sympathetically: all I got, everything, you can have it. You can do this.

"I--" She jerks again, skin beginning to tighten over bone and muscle. Clinging to his hand, she gasps through it before looking at him again, terrified. "Does it always hurt like this?"

"Always," he says helplessly, because he can't lie--possibly literally--and it's only gonna get worse from here on out. "You can do it."

She shudders again, fingers closing brutally over his hand again, and he winces at the crack of bone, her skin thinning before his eyes and beginning to strain against what it can't hope to hold. Remembering how it felt to get those goddamn clothes off, he tries to give her more. She'll have to take it all off, down to her bones; it's too small to hold all of what she's taking back, and it's gonna hurt like hell to get it off.

"You can," Amieyl confirms, bracing Lia with her own body at the next convulsive shudder, the sickening sound of bones splintering under the thin skin, ignoring the nauseating rip of muscle and flesh under her hands to hold Lia tighter. "You can do it, Lia. Don't be afraid."

Lia opens her eyes, blood trickling like tears down the splitting skin of her cheek. Reaching out, Dean wipes them away, hand shaking so hard he almost pokes her in the eye. Licking her cracking lips, she smiles at them both, long fingers squeezing his. "I'm not."

---

"Shit, shit, shit…." A woman, Dean thinks distantly; his chest feels like it's made of stone, and for some reason, he can't open his eyes. Something is beeping loudly enough to almost drown out her voice and he wishes they'd turn that shit off. "Oh Jesus, Dean, don't do this again….Cas! Cas!"

---

This time, the church isn't silent.

The memory of screaming is soaked into everything, thickening the air until he can barely breathe. Getting to his feet, he stares in horror at the people nailed to walls splashed with drying blood, some still groaning, heads dipping limply toward the floor, others painfully silent. None of them are dead, not yet; this is so much worse.

Disbelieving, he takes in the wrecked, splintered pews, hacked apart as several indistinct figures move among the wreckage, making piles. A figure in the blood-soaked vestments of a priest stands in the middle of the church, gloating over the group of kids gathered inside a rough circle carved into the one-flawless floor, carpet skinned back in strips on either side of it. When he turns around, Dean's not surprised at all when unseeing, ink-black eyes stare back.

"What--"

A hand grabs his arm before he gets a step toward them. "You can't do anything like this," Amieyl says quietly, breath warm against his ear. "We're only mostly here." When he looks at her, he sees her expression flicker. "Dean…."

"I'm dead."

"No," she answers, but on a guess, he's pretty fucking close. "Not yet."

Go with it, he reminds himself firmly. "Fine, whatever. What the hell is going on?" Looking around in sheer frustration, he realizes what's he's missing--that sound. "And why do I keep coming back to this church?"

"I don't know," she answers, sounding as frustrated as he is. "It's like--"

A faint, agonized scream cut her off, and they both turn, trying to find the source. Some of those hanging on the walls begin to shift, moving weakly in response and setting off new trails of fresh blood, but the priest only smiles, turning around to gaze toward the front of the church. It's too dark to make out what he's looking at from here, but Dean's pretty sure it's the altar.

"Come on." Amieyl's fingers slide through his as she tugs him toward the right, hugging the wall as they circle around the nightmare in the middle of the church before crossing before the remains of the front pews. Looking up, Amieyl comes to a sudden stop, looking up in horror. "Oh God."

Following her gaze, he catches his breath; a girl in the remains of a postulant's robes is nailed to the wall above the altar--Jesus Christ, they did it over the cross itself. Her wimple's long gone; short, thick black hair surrounds a painfully young face, dark skin slick with sweat and blood, lips bitten bloody as she twists helplessly, panting for breath. The bloodshot brown eyes are fixed on those kids in the middle of that circle, horrified and enraged and determined, like if she can just get down, she can get to them, save them from whatever this is.

Before he can step forward--get her down, Jesus, what are they waiting for?--Amieyl's fingers tighten brutally on his, impossible to escape no matter how hard he tries.

"Don't," she whispers, her eyes on the girl. "I told you; we're only mostly here. We can't do anything."

"Then why are we here? To watch demons kill a lot of people?" he asks incredulously. "Amieyl--"

"I don't know." She licks her lips, eyes narrowing. "But I think it's her."

"I think so, too," Lia agrees, coming up on his other side. He blinks, distracted by how different she looks now, even if the face she wears hasn't changed at all. "Question is, why here and now?"

"God, I wish this was a hallucination. At least that'd make sense." When even the goddamn figments aren't sure what the hell is going on, though, he's pretty sure they've left plausible deniability behind. "What--" He stops, listening, and almost sighs in relief. "There it is."

"What?" Amieyl asks, frowning at him.

"You can't hear it?" It's getting louder; how the hell can anyone miss it? "That."

"Hear what?"

The church doors slam open behind them, shaking the church. Turning around, Dean goes still at the figure standing in the open doorway, and beside him, Amieyl stiffens.

"When was this?" he whispers hoarsely.

"He just Fell," Amieyl answers, shock flattening her voice. "This is after."

After. Dean remembers the bedroom, the new wood of the doorways, the windows, what Cas can't remember, what Chuck didn't know about what Bobby and Dean were doing, how Cas survived. He still doesn't know what they did, but looking at Cas, he thinks he knows why they did it.

"That," Dean says, numb with horror, "isn't living."

Cas is skeletal, jacket huge over bony shoulders, t-shirt and jeans looking like they'll slough off like shed skin as he starts up the aisle in jagged strides, hands roughly bandaged and smeared with drying black and tacky red. Every bone is pushing brutally against livid, tissue-thin skin pulled impossibly tight, cheekbones like razors above hollowed-out cheeks, blue eyes sunk in rotting black holes like he's never slept, not once, not ever. The short brown hair is as brittle as straw around his face, bloodless lips bitten to unhealed wounds.

The wrongness is so profound it makes Dean's skin crawl just looking at him. Nothing living can look like that, two days rotting in the grave and still breathing, still dying without hope of death, still living, still having to.

He gets it now, what Cas meant about Grace and what it hid; humans sense it, he said. Stripped away like a cheap varnish, no distraction of wings and power, he's an unsheathed sword, a gun without a safety, chaos incarnate on earth.

One of the less intelligent demons starts toward him, lips stretched in a greedy smile, and Cas reaches out without looking, hand closing around his neck and slamming him to the floor before ripping his throat out. Pulling Ruby's knife in a blur of speed, he guts the still-twitching body with a burst of sullen light before stepping over him, leaving a trail of bloody footprints in his wake.

The priest stares at Cas in unblinking shock; even the horrors of the Pit in all its cruelty and corruption pales before the angel that once walked through Hell in a forty-year slaughter and stands before them wearing a living corpse as his skin, watching him with blank blue eyes, still like a thin skin over something that shouldn't ever get out.

"Something's wrong." It's only Amieyl's grip on his hand that keeps him from crossing the circle: fuck the demons, he'll rip them apart with his bare hands whether he's really here or not, something's wrong with Cas. "Let me go! I need to--"

"You can't save him," Amieyl says rigidly. "He can't even save himself. And he doesn't care."

Coming to a rigid stop, Cas's eyes flicker over the circle, the walls, then the front of the church and pause there for a moment, bone-thin fingers flexing around the hilt of the knife. The back of his right hand appears between strips of filthy gauze, a blood-streak map of still-open slices and broken, unhealed knuckles, as he focuses on the demon priest, face like a blank sheet of paper.

"That is new," Cas rasps into the silence, voice like gravel dragged through cemetery dirt, serrated edges and shattered glass and broken screams, jagged stretches of ice stretching to eternity, glaciers floating in an infinite ocean. "What are you doing here?"

The priest takes a step toward him, trying not to look terrified; it's not working, and from the way Cas tilts his head, he's enjoying it as much as Dean is.

"An angel kicked out of heaven and stripped of Grace," the demon priest says with an embarrassing attempt at laugher. "Am I supposed to be afraid?"

"Since you are, that's an incredibly stupid question to ask," Cas answers, putting away the knife with jerky movements, like he can't quite control his hands. "Don't concern yourself with us; we aren't here for you."

"What--"

Another scream cuts off the priest's response, and turning, Dean starts toward the front of the church--Jesus, they have to be able to do something, Cas can do something--but Amieyl and Lia abruptly jerk him sideways into the splintered remains of the pews. Above the altar, the girl goes utterly still, gaze fixed on Cas in surprise, bloodshot eyes widening.

"We are here," Cas says softly, "to bear witness."

Her lips move soundlessly, but even from here, Dean recognizes the shape of the word; he knows it like he knows his own name, the taste lingering on his lips more mornings than he can count, nightmares banished in a single exhaled breath.

"She called," Amieyl says unsteadily as the temperature of the room plunges abruptly into a bone-chilling cold. "She got her answer."

Pulling her closer, he reaches for a shivering Lia as the church tilts nauseatingly. The floor beneath/beside/above them begins to tremble as something sweeps through the room, through them, and it's not cold, no, not that, the word hasn't been invented for this: the airless vacuum between infinite stars unfolding itself in the physical confines of finite space; something this vast can't be defined in the corporeal world. If he were really here, the knowledge alone would kill him; good thing it's only mostly.

He can't quite articulate what he sees twining around the girl's body; not darkness and not light, but something that's both and neither, curling up her legs and waist, looping tenderly around her in protective ribbons, cradling her away from her pain. She smiles weakly, looking at something without form in unconcealed relief, mouth shaping a word, but he doesn't need to hear it to know what she just said. No one worthy of the question would say anything but yes.

It's only a moment, a flash-burn of flowers and summer and music peppered with protective rage, before the world plunges into silence, tranquil like the center of an infinite storm.

Above the altar, the girl effortlessly rips her hands and feet free from the wall with the sickening sound of breaking bone and tearing flesh, dropping to the floor in front of the altar in a boneless crouch that shakes the entire church, fresh blood fanning out around her in vivid-red splashes. After a moment, she lifts her head, and he almost steps back when he sees her face, brown eyes reflecting a vastness beyond comprehension. Lia at the apex of her divinity, before she began to Fall, was like a spark from a campfire; this is a universe burned and burning alive for all of time.

"What the hell," Dean breathes, "did she call?"

Straightening, she starts down the aisle, the ragged hem of her habit flaring around her blood-streaked legs as the wounds on her hands and feet vanish into nothing. Reaching into thin air, she pulls out a knife, blade a foot long, double edged and gleaming, sharper and brighter than anything made of metal.

Coming to a stop a few feet from the circle opposite of Cas, she regards each petrified demon with the indifferent interest of marked prey to be slaughtered at her leisure, then looks at Cas with something else entirely, and all Dean can think is that he's glad no one's ever looked at him like that.

"Castiel," she says, her voice echoing through the church like a warning of a coming storm, one that could tear the world apart without even noticing or caring if it did.

Cas smiles. "Welcome back," he says, blue eyes meeting hers, and Dean sees the stillness starting to crack around the edges and begin to spread. "It's been a very long time since you last hunted on this world."

And he realizes what it is he's been hearing; it's screaming.

---

"…son of a bitch!" a woman says hoarsely, sounding terrified. "I can't get a rhythm, it's been ten minutes…" She trails off, and distantly, he feels the pressure on his chest vanish. "Cas," and everything in that word kills him: regret and rage and grief, resignation. "Cas. I'm sorry."

---

"Dean," is breathed against his ear, enough to nearly drown out the screaming that's pounding through his head. Blinking hazily into a night-dark sky, stars hidden by clouds, Dean tries to orient himself to where he is this time. "Dean, talk to me."

Turning his head, Amieyl comes into view, looking worried. "I think I'm really dead now."

"Not yet," Amieyl answers cryptically, but before he can tell her how wrong she is, she pulls him upright, staring into his eyes. "Deep breath, okay? Just relax."

"Relax? Are you kidding?" Pulling back, he looks her over critically. "You okay?"

"Yeah, it's all good," she says, smiling at him. "Breathe, Dean. We don't have a lot of time here."

"I'll get right on that. Wait, where's--" Twisting around, he tries to find Lia. "Lia? You okay?"

"I'm fine." She drops beside him, careless of the crumpled folds of her skirts, expression unhappy. "If I'd waited a little longer, I could have…." She trails off, looking away guiltily.

"Could have what?" He remembers her ripping at his clothing in the church, then reaches under his shirt, feeling the memory of her fingernails across his chest and belly, the burst of heat, the way the tightness loosened. "When my heart stopped. You fixed it. That's what you were doing."

"I just gave you a little help," she corrects him, trying to smile. "I can't this time. You gave me too much, Dean. I shouldn't have--"

"Not your fault," he answers automatically. "I'm not even supposed to be here."

"No, you're not," she agrees, reaching to lay a hand on his knee, squeezing gently. "You're impossible, and this is maybe. It wasn't enough. I'm sorry."

Maybe again. Patting her hand absently, he twists around to look at the dark shape of the church, doors shut tight, then at the cool, still night around them, trying to figure out what feels so wrong. It's not just the lack of sheep--people--either, or the dead feel of the ground under him, the thin hang of air around him. A few stunted, skeletal trees dot the landscape, reminding him of the pitiful remains of greenery in Kansas City, spindly arms reaching piteously toward the uncaring grey of the sky, clumps of yellow-brown grass sprinkled over the bare, lifeless dirt; it's like staring at a painting, Apocalypse in Suspension, Without Sheep, but creepier, because this isn't a painting.

Tentatively, Dean reaches toward one of those clumps of grass, poking a finger at one scraggly blade, and watches blankly as it doesn't do a goddamn thing. "What the hell--"

"Don't do that," Amieyl says queasily. "I'm trying to ignore it."

"How?" Another try produces the same equally horrifying result; pulling his hand away and fighting the urge to wipe it on the knee of his jeans, he hears it again, like it's trying to get his attention. "Okay, I give up. What the hell is that?"

---

Cas says, "He promised he would be here."

---

Amieyl frowns. "What?"

When Dean turns toward the church, it increases exponentially, almost in relief. "That."

"I don't…." She trails off. "In the church, you asked me if I could hear it. What do you hear?"

"Not sure yet." Before they left the church, he almost had it. Speaking of….. "What happened in there? That was real, right? It actually happened." Even his imagination, rich in horrors beyond human comprehension, couldn't have come up with seeing Cas like that. "Two years ago, after Cas Fell, right?"

"Yeah, that's what's happening," Amieyl answers, drawing her knees to her chest and looping an arm around them. "Happened, will happen, is happening." She makes a face. "You know the drill."

He does. "Cas said no one can travel time anymore. I mean, except Lucifer."

"He's--he will be right," Lia corrects herself with a frown, playing with a fold of her skirt. "Just not yet."

Right, start over. "The grove--"

"Yes," Lia says with a flicker of remembered sorrow; pain, but nothing like the unhealed wound it was then. "I took you there. Then."

"And we're here at the church now--two years ago--and the gods aren't dead yet." Lia nods; okay, he's getting this. "When will they be?"

"Tonight."

He really should have asked Cas more about that. "What?"

"Backward and forward, he could see everything, including us," Lia explains, waving a hand left to right in eerie imitation of Amieyl. "He failed the first time he tried to kill us all, because we could hide anywhere in Time. He couldn't risk what we might do in the past or the future, so he changed the rules. He hunted each of us out of Time until he caught us in a single place and time of his choice, and then and there he killed them, one by one, until all that remained alive were dead."

"Which will be tonight." Dean looks at the church again, then at the world that surrounds them, the unmoving blade of grass. Maybe. "If all the gods die tonight, then you--"

"Not me." Lia's mouth curves in a trembling smile. "I met a man who told me there was a war to fight and showed me why I should fight in it. He was impossible, and he hid me when I pulled out of time to descend. He hides me still, because no one can see the impossible, even Lucifer."

Dean's mouth goes dry. "Me."

"'What I see tonight is the best of you,'" she breathes, smile fading. "I could see you from the grove, Dean; you were so bright, you set all of Time alight. Tonight, all the gods will die, but not me, because when I was called, I answered, and when I was asked, I said yes. You saved me."

"You said--" To his horror, he hears his voice break. Swallowing hard, he tries again. "You said you thought I'd be taller."

Lia tips her head to the side. "You are." He's still trying to work out what to do with that when she adds, "She pulled us out of time. I can keep you here, now, no matter what happens to your body, but that's all I can do; I can't save you, not this time."

So he'll have to do that part himself: fine, he can do that. "Okay, next question: what is it about this church? What keeps bringing me here?"

Just saying it reminds him of the sound still thrumming in the periphery of his mind; it's fainter, like he's hearing only an shattering echo, like it's being filtered through a network of cracks now. Looking at the church seems to both soothe it and make it stronger at the same time, like--

"That's the thing," Amieyl says finally, and something in her voice gets his undivided attention. "You are."

---

"Try again."

---

The grass still isn't crumpling beneath them, not even sound escaping when he shifts in place.

He must have heard that wrong. "What?"

"You keep coming here," Amieyl says quietly. "I thought it was familiar to you at first--"

"I've never been here before in my life!" Dean's eyes are drawn back to the church--that girl, those demons, those kids, Cas dying and not dead yet, and that's what it is; the stillness is starting to crack. If it shatters, nothing and no one will ever be able to put it back together again, that much he's sure of.

You could hear him all the way across the camp.

No one could hear him, though, not really; they didn't understand. He was trapped in there, an infinite being locked up for all eternity in a living corpse rotting around him that wouldn't even die. No matter how much he beat the walls and screamed, no one heard a goddamn thing.

"Except me." He doesn't realize he's gotten to his feet until Amieyl's grip on his arm jerks him to a stop halfway to the church. "I gotta--"

"Dean. Use words."

"I kept missing it," Dean says distractedly, dragging her two more steps before she digs in her heels and brings him to an abrupt stop. Turning to face her, he wonders, incredulous, why she's fighting him. "I kept getting the time wrong--it's not like I know how to do this! Humans can't see multiplying time! I'm lucky I got here at all!"

"Multiplicity of time," Lia murmurs, rolling her eyes at his and Amieyl's glares. "I apologize; being a former god, this is a subject I know something about. Dean, look at me: when did you start hearing it?"

"I don't know…." In his mind, an image forms: Chitaqua in a bowl of light, lit by something brighter than the sun. Meeting Lia's eyes, he sees her nod. "I have to get in the church--"

"Why?" Amieyl asks impatiently. "Words, Dean: use them."

"Why do you think?" Dean demands, almost ready to scream himself in sheer frustration. "He's calling me. I'm answering."

---

Something hot and hideously painful stabs into his chest, screaming through his body like an electric shock, and air floods his lungs in a great, painful burst.

"There we go," a voice says, brutally raspy, like she's been screaming for hours over the endless sound of that goddamn droning that abruptly spikes into semi-regular beats. "Got it. Cas, get the fuck over here and get me that tray. I'll crack his chest if I have to, but it's not ending here, not now. It's not over yet."

---

"Got you," Lia murmurs, arms circling his chest with a feeling of slowly diminishing warmth. "Sorry, it's getting a little dicey here. I'll be more careful."

Staggering upright, Dean warily touches his chest again: that hurt. Even his fingertips are tingling.

"Thanks," he manages to wheeze, trying to look fine and in control, which from Lia's expression isn't working too well. Glancing down, he's perversely reassured by the lack of crumpling grass; that means it's still okay. What he needs here is a plan. "Okay, that goddess--you said she pulled us out of time, right?"

"This is now," Amieyl confirms warily. "It's always now until she's done."

"Done with what? Wait," he adds hastily, thinking of the way she and Cas looked at those demons. "Never mind, I can guess. What happens when she's done?"

Amieyl hesitates. "In here, now, your soul is safe, but once time begins…."

"Right, game over," Dean finishes for her, jerking his head toward the church. "So let's get started."

Lia frowns. "What are we doing?"

"First things first," Dean says. "I gotta get in that church."

---

"Cas, stop," she says, and the shove of air abruptly stops. Distantly, cool air brushes against his lips. "Mark the time. Dean, you got thirty seconds: now breathe."

---

Amieyl both look at him with matching 'wtf' expressions, which isn't helping, thanks.

"You said I'm hiding you," he says impatiently to Lia. "Lucifer is killing gods tonight, and when time starts, he's gonna find whoever's in that church with Cas and take them both out." This'll work, he's pretty sure; Cas is alive in his time, isn't he? Probably sitting by his deathbed with all the drugs in the goddamn world at his fingertips if Dean doesn't keep his promise. He will; just this one time, when someone needs him, he won't fail. "I gotta make her keep us in now until…" Lia raises an eyebrow. "Yeah, I don't know, I'll think of something."

"Dean," Amieyl says, like she's not sure he's sane, which he's not, so whatever, "listen to me…."

"That's why I kept coming to this church: to get here. Now, I mean. Both." Amieyl stills, but she doesn't look surprised. "He's why I'm here."

"Dean, you're only mostly here, you get that, right? You can't do anything like this. So how are you going to…." He looks toward the church and beyond it; following his gaze, she catches her breath, eyes flying back to him, wary. "You remember how to do that."

"I do now," he answers: when Lia saw his life, he saw it too, and what happened after; he remembers everything. Looking down, he sees the knife lying at his feet: sharp and dull, old blood dripping fresh and new, but the screaming's muted now; he's not there anymore, and he doesn't have to listen. "It'll work."

She bites her lip, eyes focused on the blade. "Yeah, it will."

"You carry your past, always, no help for it," he tells her, picking it up and feeling it slide into his hand with a nauseating sense of fitness. "I don't have to wear it to use it."

---

"Come on," she says roughly over the jagged beeps. "That's it, Dean, keep it up. We're almost there, you can do this. All you gotta do is try."

---

"Okay," he says as they climb the stairs to the small porch. As he reaches for the handle of the door, he says, "Now, what--" The cold cuts up his arm and goes all the way down to his feet before he even touches it; jerking back, the world--such as it is--darkens briefly, and then Lia and Amieyl are both holding him up. "What--"

"She's locked it," Lia says grimly, one small hand digging into his side to keep him on his feet. The dark brown eyes change briefly, an echo of eternity in them before it vanishes. "If you could summon her--"

"How?" It should be a terrifying thought, but right now, it's not even on the radar; Cas is screaming and he doesn't have that kind of time. He remembers Gaius in the grove, calling on Castiel: okay, yeah, he's got this. "Right, I need her name. What is it?"

"She doesn't have one."

"You're fucking with me."

"No, I'm not," Lia answers distractedly, staring at the door with an expression he can't read. "You can't call her without one, and she'll only answer to one she recognizes as her own."

"Then how did she--" Stupid question; he knows this one. A thin layer of wood and goddamn divine power away, Cas is shattering into pieces and he's here and can't even get through the goddamn door because he doesn't have her goddamn name. Battering it down: he can do that. He's almost dead anyway: why the fuck not. "Okay, new plan--"

"That might work, though," Lia interrupts, letting him go before he can parse what the hell she's talking about. Amieyl catches him before he falls over, cursing softly under her breath in what's definitely not English but does involve indecency with a sheep. "Dean?"

"What?" Lia extends a hand with an expectant look. "You're kidding, right?"

"I think this is how it's done now," she answers testily, snapping her fingers in eerie imitation of Amieyl. "Now, Dean."

Gingerly, he straightens, vaguely surprised he's able to keep on his feet. Taking Lia's hand, he's almost pulled right off them at her hearty shake; what is with them anyway? "Dean Winchester. Now what--"

"Cornelia," Lia says, and suddenly, the brown eyes are vast, sprinkled with the fading remains of galaxies, stars born and dying in a breath of time, but this time it's warm: humanity smiles back at him, too. "My true name is Cornelia, Dean."

Dean doesn't sigh, but it's hard. "Nice to meet you, Cornelia. Now can we--"

"You know my true name because I gave it freely," she says, holding his eyes, and he wonders if it's just him or if she's getting brighter. "Now say it."

"Cornelia," he says.

She makes a face. "I'm used to a little more formality from petitioners, but--"

"I'm not kneeling."

"You don't even know the meaning of the word," she answers, an unexpected grin lighting up her face before she composes herself into a parody of serious contemplation. "You called. I'm your answer. What would you ask of me, Dean Winchester? Freely given: I ask nothing in return."

Holy shit. "To--get in there before she's--does the time thing." Rocking back on his heels, he squints at her dubiously. "Can you still do that?"

"Oh ye of little faith." Turning to the doors, she tilts her head, and the wood begins to creak rebelliously. "She's not going to be happy, Dean. Just keep that in mind."

No shit. "I'll figure it out."

"I know," Cornelia says cheerfully, an insane grin almost splitting her face in two as the wood begins to crack, gold zig-zagging across the wood. For a moment, he sees it form her true name in golden-white light as the church itself lights up. "There we go, almost there."

"I have faith," Amieyl says confidently, warm, callused fingers sliding reassuringly through his, and something butts against the back of his knees. Looking down, he sees a smiling sheep. He didn't know sheep did that, but when he looks around, they're spread out behind them to the horizon, and all of them are doing just that. Right, because they're not sheep. "You ready?"

Dean squeezes Amieyl's fingers as the doors burst open, spilling searing light around them; it's almost blinding. "Yeah, I am."

---

"Okay, let me….yeah, got it," she whispers hoarsely over the monotonous beeping. "Five minutes normal rhythm, no sign of arrhythmia--respiration normal…. Cas, he's back."

"His fever's dropping," Cas says calmly, like he's reading from a goddamn book. "You were correct; he's responding to your treatment now. He'll recover."

"You can't know that yet…." There's a long stretch of silence. "You know. How?"

"I always know what I create," he answers hoarsely, and Dean thinks he feels the ghost of a touch, warm against his forehead, gentle, but the fingers against his skin are fighting not to shake. There's a short pause, then Cas says, in a completely different voice, one Dean's never heard before, "Thank you."

"Oh. Okay."

There's another sound, like something heavy dropping, and then someone--a couple of someones, he thinks vaguely--are crying.

---

He can't see anyone, but he feels like shit; that probably means….

"Hey, Dean."

Turning his head, wool scratching softly against his cheek, he manages to open his eyes to see Amieyl grinning down at him, framed by a small church porch beneath a sky as blue as a dream of summer. Turning his head, he takes in the bright day, a friendly sun shining down on an entire goddamn world of happy sheep.

"That," he observes raspily, "is a lot of sheep."

"More than you can imagine right now." One callused hand rests on his chest; he can feel his heart beating against her palm. "You can count them later. Much later."

"You okay?" he starts, then almost sits up; the memories are already fading, but he has to be sure. "Cas. Lia. Did they--"

"Everyone's fine," she interrupts, smiling down at him. "You did it."

That's good, he thinks hazily. "I got it right?"

"You couldn't get it wrong if you tried," she answers, laughter in her voice as she gestures toward the clear summer sky. He assumes that's supposed to be an answer, though he'd love to get one for his actual question. "A thousand miles, Dean Winchester, and you walked them all. You can rest now."

That sounds disturbingly like the exact opposite of what he was going for here. "Uh, wait--"

"Only one thing left to do." He blinks at her smirk. "Wake up."

---

--Day 56--

It's like falling off a cliff, slamming into consciousness at terminal velocity, but worse, because he has to survive it.

Sucking in a shocked breath, he tries to orient himself, his entire body screaming in pain for a few agonizing moments before it settles into a mid-grade ache in every muscle: even his bones feel bruised.

Right, so he's alive, and taking stock, he's pretty sure he's actually on a mattress instead of lying at the bottom of a gravelly ravine off the side of a mountain. When he warily opens his eyes, he figures the existence of a blurry ceiling and what appears to be walls confirms that he's in a room somewhere.

Turning his head is an effort, but it gets him a window, and from the slant of weak light against the wall, it's maybe afternoon. Sighing, he stares back up at the ceiling and tries to decide how to deal with this; it would help to know what the fuck this is, but maybe he's just asking for too much or something.

"Huh."

Abruptly, the center of the bed dips, and Dean feels something solid and very warm pressed against his right side. Frowning, he tips his head sideways and blinks at the sight of Cas looking down at him from black-ringed, bloodshot eyes. Opening his mouth, he starts to ask him what the hell is going on--not to mention what the fuck Cas has been fighting and hope it looks worse than he does--but before he can get his tongue to work, Cas uses his speed to cheat and has a hand over his mouth

"Tell me your name," Cas says, voice low and rough, and Dean tries and fails to suppress the thought he could listen to Cas sound like that all goddamn day. Slowly, Cas removes his hand, though it hovers in his line of sight, like he thinks Dean still needs the warning. "Only your name, nothing else."

Dean licks his lips and grimaces: rough, with a residual metal edge, and his mouth tastes like shit. "Dean Winchester. What--"

Immediately, Cas covers his mouth again; Christ, now he's okay with using his speed for totally unfair purposes. "You may only speak when I ask you a question. Nod if you understand me." Dean nods and hopes he actually rolled his eyes and didn't just imagine he did. Looking wary, Cas pulls back again. "Do you know where you are?"

Head starting to clear, he wonders what the hell is with the twenty questions, but there's something in Cas's expression that makes him really want to know the answer Cas wants so he can tell him and get that goddamn look off his face. He's lied through his teeth cheerfully for a hell of a lot less.

"Dean, tell me you know where you are," Cas says, and Dean hopes to God he's imagining the way his voice shakes. "If you say anything else, I'll have to cover your mouth again."

"Uh. Give me--" The hand hovers significantly, and it's annoying enough that Dean tries to swat it away and fails to move his arm any appreciable distance. "Chitaqua." Cas goes still. "Kansas. Earth. Apocalypse. End of the world."

Cas closes his eyes briefly, covering his face with one shaking hand before looking at him again, and all Dean can see is incandescent blue framed in wet lashes, electric, like he flipped the lightswitch for a living star. "It's not over yet."

Dean feels his lips curve in a grin, tiny pricks of pain from the pull of too-dry skin Licking his lips again, the gummy taste of his own mouth sets off a flare of nausea; water would be good right now. He braces himself to sit up, and he must have been really out of it not to notice there was a reason he couldn't lift his arm earlier.

Frowning, he follows the faint pull around the area of his wrists when they move more than a couple of inches. Shifting his right arm experimentally, he feels something like a pressure around his wrist and tilts his head down to stare blankly at--is that velcro?

"Am I--" Dean tries again, tongue thick and sticking to the roof of his mouth; God, he wants a drink of water. "Am I. Tied to the bed?"

"Yes. It was necessary to restrain you for your own safety." A hand rests on his forehead, and it's so familiar that Dean relaxes before he can wonder why. "And ours, for that matter."

Still, though: Dean looks up, waiting until Cas meets his eyes, and smiles at him before saying as seriously as he can, "Cas? I think. I forgot. My safe word."

It's everything he could have hoped for; Cas's eyes widen, staring down at Dean before he starts to laugh. It sounds rusty, rough like his voice, and Dean really has to work on getting Cas to do that more. The guy's finally picked up a sense of humor; no reason not to get some mileage out of it. After he gets some goddamn water.

"How 'bout. 'Thirsty'?"

"I'll get it," someone else says, sounding strangled; Dean tries to see who spoke, but then Cas straightens, laughter trailing off with what looks like a physical effort. "Be right back."

"I think it's safe to remove the restraints now. Hold still." Cool fingers brush his hand as Cas peels open the cuff from his wrist, and Dean tries to flex his hand against the mattress, then move his arm. While his arm throbs at the motion and his fingers feel thick, uncoordinated, like they're wrapped up in layers of plastic, all sensation muted, there's no stiffness in his shoulder. Letting his hand relax, he looks up at Cas speculatively. The more you know: Cas learned the right way to tie someone up.

After freeing his left hand, however, Cas's fingers close around his wrist as he tests it--normal flex, fingers digging weakly into the rough fabric of the blankets, he needs to follow up on that--pinning his arm against the mattress.

"What--?"

"Don't move yet," Cas says quietly, and Dean lets his arm go limp. Turning his head, he focuses on his left arm and sees the tube taped to the crook of his elbow and halfway down his forearm, leading to the inevitable IV bag (bags, plural) hanging from a rack by the bed. It also occurs to him there's been something beeping all this time, but from here, he can't tell where it's coming from or what it is.

Turning his gaze to Cas, he fights down panic, trying to form a question, but he's not sure where to even start.

"You've been very ill," Cas answers quietly, letting go. "You're doing very well, but you still require care, so please don't pull it out again. We're running out of usable veins in easily accessible areas, and while I can be creative, I think you might find my next choice rather inconvenient." He sits back on the bed. "Do you remember what happened?"

Reflexively, he starts to nod before shaking his head. Not even a clue.

"Perhaps--"

"Still up?" Cas looks away in transparent relief, and Dean loses his train of thought when a glass materializes in front of him, held by a dark-skinned hand, fingernails cut brutally short. He follows the hand to a long bare arm and a loose grey t-shirt before he skips up to the tired face that smiles down at him, red-rimmed brown eyes dancing despite the deep circles beneath them and wet lashes. Looks like Cas isn't the only one who needs to sleep.

He tries to smile back; she's really hot. "Hey, Vera."

"Nice to see you too. Think you can sit up for a second?"

He nods: fuck if he knows, but why not?

Gently, Cas slides an arm under his back, easing him semi-upright, and the wave of vertigo sends the world spinning briefly before he's leaning back against something solid (Cas, on a guess).

"Good," Vera says, handing Cas the glass. "Go ahead and see if he can handle it while I get his meds. Slow and easy: this is just a test." Despite that, she watches intently as Cas gives Dean one tiny sip, just enough to tease, before taking it away, glancing up at Vera. She nods in approval, expression lightening. "Just like that. Dean, you tracking? I have some pills you need to take, all right? Give me a minute; I didn't think you'd be awake this soon."

This soon is almost enough to jar Dean away from the pursuit of water, but when he's offered another sip, he forgets everything else. Eventually, Vera returns, and a reward system is established that requires he take a pill for each swallow of water, which is so fucking unfair that if he wasn't so tired, he'd tell them to fuck themselves. Finishing the last pill, however, he stares at the half-full glass and realizes he's really not thirsty anymore: just thinking about drinking more makes him tired. For that matter, looking at the glass is making him tired.

"Good job," Vera says warmly, patting his shoulder when Cas eases him back down, smoothing the blankets over him again. It's weird how lying still and swallowing on command can be so goddamn exhausting. "How's his fever?"

"Ninety-nine point two," Cas answers immediately, which gets Dean's attention. He doesn't remember any thermometers. "It's been dropping the last hour."

"Really good," Vera says, almost as if to herself, then looks down at Dean. He can barely keep his eyes open, but he tries. "Tired?"

He licks his lips, fighting off the exhaustion with sheer can-do, which is destined to fail in probably a minute or less. "A. Little."

"We're in the process of forming a fellowship for that," Cas answers irritably, apparently not aware he's stroking Dean's forehead. Dean has no intention of letting on; it feels way too good. "If you wish to apply for membership--"

"He means, 'join the club'," the woman--Vera--says, sounding amused. "He's just fucking with you to show affection and relief that you're alive and not pledging your soul to everyone you've ever met. Or exorcising them, which I assume was for variety's sake."

"Did I. Make good deals?" Dean asks, eyes falling closed despite himself; the stroking is hypnotizing, and he could really get used to this. Which of course is when it stops, because this is his life. Cracking his eyes open enough to make out Cas, he glares as hard as he can. "Don't stop."

To his surprise, Cas starts back up immediately; he always figured the universe hated him too much for that to actually happen.

"You make terrible deals," Cas says roughly in contrast to the gentle stroking. "If you were a Crossroads demon, your service record would be a disgrace."

Vera snickers softly. "Cas, I need to update his chart; you stay with him for a bit, alright?" Cas gives her a look that says there was no reason to assume he was about to do anything else, which makes her laugh again on her way out the door.

Dean watches her leave before looking at Cas curiously. Chart.

"I think she misses the formalities of hospitals," Cas answers, mouth quirking, and despite himself, Dean's eyes fall closed under that slow, rhythmic touch. Secret angel weapon, maybe; who knew? "Go to sleep. You'll feel better when you wake up."

---

Warnings: Warnings: moderately explicit torture, mental coercion, needles in a medical setting


Author Notes: Thanks to obscureraison and lillian13 for doing an additional read-through on this chapter over the weekend when my pre-posting panic started several days early as well as scynneh for advice on what a nurse in an Apocalypse would do about a fever and about seventy thousand google webpages for emergency medicine at the end of the world.

I'll start posting the next story in this series in late July/early August, due--and I mean this literally--to my state's governor, which is causing a radical change in my work schedule for the next three months. I hate the series name, but I needed something there because Untitled Series bothered me even more, so that will change eventually.

Thanks for reading.