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Dean’s eyes narrowed and his mouth tightened, then not able to keep a rein on his temper anymore he finally turned back to face Cas, whose expression shouted all kind of miserable.
‘’Who cares what Jack said? We don't know what happened! But I swear, if he did something to her, if she is—‘’ Dean broke off not able to say it out loud what his gut was already telling him. Eyeing Cas intently, his expression grew dark, his jaw clenched hard until a muscle in his face jumped. ‘’Then you're dead to me.’’ He declared blunt and harsh.
Cas’ face paled, and he looked like Dean just kicked him in the gut. His face cracked, just for an instant, and behind the sudden widened eyes, Dean could see the hurt shock before Cas schooled his feature. Dean could have sworn that in that second Cas’ whole body jolted backwards in pain. But Dean was too fucking fed up with Cas’ secrets and cryptic manner, too fucking frustrated and too fucking terrified for his mum's life to care.
Sam made a sound— a gasp of shock. Then a deep, scolding voice of his name.
‘’Dean,’’
But Dean refused to acknowledge the guilt that was already crowding his throat. So he pushed it back and instead pinned Cas with a hard glare and shouted, his voice growing louder and louder. ‘’No. He knew. He knew something was wrong with the kid. He knew it, and he didn't tell us! He didn't even tell us!’’
Then he turned away again, because no matter the rage cursing through his vein, he couldn’t bear the desperate, destroyed look on Cas’ face. And he feared... He feared, that if he kept looking, like a cracked glass, he'd break into pieces.
‘’I was scared.’’ Cas’ voice, utterly broken, utterly pained came from behind Dean’s back. ‘’I believed in Jack for so long. I believed that he was... He was good. I— I knew that he would be good for the world. And he was good for us. My faith in him, it—‘’ Cas broke off and took a deep, shuttering breath before he continued. ’’It never wavered. And then I— I saw what he did. It wasn't malice. It wasn't evil.‘’ He said like he was trying to convince Dean, convince Sam… convince even himself. ‘’It was like Jack saw a problem, and in his mind, he just solved it with that snake.’’
Swirling back to shoot Cas a disbelieving look, ‘’The snake?!’’ Dean cut in, rolling his eyes, his voice curling with meanness.
‘’What he did wasn't bad.’’ Cas shot back with conviction, his expression almost defiant, his gaze steadily holding Dean’s, daring him to deny what he believed for the truth.
But his big blue eyes were wide with anguish, and Dean didn’t miss the way his whole body had collapsed in on himself.
And it bothered Dean. Cas in pain has never sit with him well...
He's seen that posture before, every time Cas thought…
And damn it, as every time, it had kicked Dean’s conscience, and he would’ve done anything not to have Cas looking at him like that. And he had to turn his back on Cas again and take a few breath, because as always, he was shit scarred he was gonna lose it.
And it annoyed him to Hell. All the thing he was willing to forgive...
‘’It was the absence of good.’’ Cas went on quiet and cautious. ‘’And I saw that in him. But we were a family, and I didn't want to lose that, so I thought I could fix it on my own. Felt like it was my responsibility... So I left... And I didn't tell you. If I could go back and just— just talk to him right then and there, I would.‘’ His voice dipped on an anguished breath before he said. ‘’But I can't, Dean.’’
Cas’ voice trembled around his name, and Dean suddenly found himself having to blink rapidly to keep his vision clear. He felt that all familiar feeling to protect, to make Cas feel better already stirring inside him, but he pushed it aside because being angry and putting the blame on Cas was easier than… It was just easier.
So, when Cas said, voice deeply coated with frustration and soul cutting regret, ‘’I failed you. And I failed Jack. And I failed—‘’ Somehow it made Dean’s anger worse. Somehow it made Cas’ silence about all of this like a damned, bloody betrayal and after all these years... a fucking proof of the lack of his faith and trust.
His mouth fell into a hard, unrelenting line, his face carved into stone as something cold surged through Dean’s veins in a wild, furious rush. And before he realized what he was doing, he was storming toward Cas, ready to punch him in his face, shouting through clenched teeth.
‘’Don't even say it. Don't even say her name.’’
But of course, Sam, the ethernal peacemaker between them, jumped there in front of Cas as if to protect him from Dean’s wrath.
From the look of his face, Sam was just as astonished but not as restrained as Cas.
‘’Dean,’’ he snapped his name again, his tone carrying heaviness, shooting him a warning, reproachful look.
Cas remained still, his eyes solemn and sad, and Dean’s gaze never strayed from Cas’ face as he gave Sam a short, reassuring nod.
If anything, the tension between him and Cas had gotten so worse, the room was on the edge of exploding with it. But as always, Cas didn’t shirk from Dean’s furious stare. The two of them just stood there, facing off each other, as had happened too many damned times to count before. And at last, it was Dean who broke their staring match— as had also happened too many damned times to count before.
Turning away from Cas’ intent, soulful gaze, Dean swiped a hand over his face. Taking in small, deep breathes against the adrenaline still firing through his body, he was just in the process to calm down himself when Rowena’s call screeched through the heavy silence.
He went completely still while he listened to what Rowena was saying, and it wasn’t until she lowered her voice and whispered in a faint, deeply sympathetic tone, ‘’I can tell you with certainty Mary Winchester is no longer on this Earth,’’ that he realized his whole body was shaking with dread.
His heart dropped like a stone. The air was knocked out of his lungs with a hard jolt. He couldn’t breathe. And when in that devastating moment his cold, accusing gaze flicked to Cas’ face— whiter than bone, expression slacked with grief— despite everything, Dean felt an altogether different kind of jolt.
He turned around again, but when Sam asked in a choked, broken grind of sound, ‘’So, what do we do?’’ Dean's control broke by terror and grief, his vision flared red as his rage came back. His fists clenched against his tights as something was building inside him. Something terrifying, that even he didn’t recognize. Like a dam bursting, in a wild, frenzied flood, passing through the barriers, unstoppable and dangerous, carrying everything on that first, destructive wave.
And when Cas asked, in regard to his answer, ‘’How? We don't even know where your mother is.’’ It took Dean everything he got to reign in the storm of emotions surging inside him, and not to throw Cas around.
His eyes were hard and unforgiving as he pinned them on Cas and snapped, too harsh, too loud. ‘’Then go to heaven and find her!’’
……………………………………..
When they returned to the bunker, after they burned the empty shell what was left of their mother, his head aching, his eyes tearing, Dean set himself straight away in the direction of his room. It was so hard to focus, hard to force himself to set one foot in front of the other.
He didn’t remember entering his room, but there he was, in the middle of it. Shredding his dirty, smoked clothes, defeated, terribly lost, terribly tired, with a big, gaping hole in his chest, he crawled into his bed.
His mother was dead.
There were so many dead.
On that thought the memory of another burning body came rushing back to him in a crashing blow.
A chill ran down his spine, as all at once the realization, that he didn’t hear Cas entering the bunker, struck him cold.
His heart began to beat in a wild, frantic race.
What if Cas wasn’t coming back? What if he had finally decided that he wasn’t putting anymore up with Dean’s abusive, aggressive shit?
Dean tried to quickly push the thought away. It couldn’t be.
It was Cas.
But, ah hell. Now that he thought about it, he couldn’t stop thinking about it. What if Cas went back to Heaven and he was never to see him again?
The pain of loss crashed into Dean's chest like a train on full speed. It hit him so hard, so powerful, so intense that his body hunched on itself in pain and he couldn’t fucking breathe. Dread churned like a portent of doom in his gut. He choked out a dry, whizzing noise as Cas’ face- broken and desperate- flashed through his mind, at Dean's bloody, fucked up, stupid words. ‘’You are dead to me.’’
It took Dean a while to catch his breath, for his lungs to properly function again, filling in and then letting out a long needed air.
Congratulations, Dean Winchester, he told bitterly to himself. You finally, fucking succeeded to drive Cas away.
And the thought, just the thought of that possibility alone made his heart flipping like a wild, frightened bird in his chest, managing to steal his breath away again, leaving him to start the whole fucking breathing process all over.
God, Cas.
Cas, who’s just came back from dead, and was alive now. Cas, the dumbest, most loyal, selfless, compassionate motherfucker Dean’s ever encountered, who just stood there, wide eyed and hurt, without fighting back. Cas, he took it all in without a ficking wince, all Dean's verbal blows, offering himself as Dean’s living punching bag.
Because of course, for all his trouble and sacrifice to sticking by Dean's side, in the end, that’s all he gets, from Dean fucking Winchester.
And it doesn’t matter that any anger or resentment he might have felt toward Cas was quickly doused, right the moment Cas stumbled out of the door after Dean, like the fucking ass he was, demanded off him to look for his mother in Heaven. And later, Sam’s tongue lashing was just another brick on the growing big pile of Dean's guilt; for the suffering and heartache he knew, he’s caused to Cas.
Dean raked his fingers through his hair, not knowing what to do. His chest burned, as if each breath of air he drew into his lungs was heavy with acrid smoke. He didn’t want to hurt Cas. Christ, hurting him was the last thing he wanted to do.
He loved him.
He was in fucking love with him.
A fact, that was earth shattering no more. A discovery, that stopped turning Dean inside-out a long time ago. Hell, maybe he’s been in love since the moment they met in that bloody barn.
God, he needed air, needed to get out as much to chill his blood as to clear his head.
He didn’t know where he was going as he put his clothes back on. But the dense, bone-penetrating mist that had descended his mind needed to clear. As he stepped out of the bunker, the sharp brace of the cold air seeped in, sweeping through his body and head, eventually easing some of the tension that was still coiling in his body like a frenzied, frightened snake.
After standing stocked still for a long time with no particular destination in mind but still too restless to return to his room and attempt to sleep, he started to climb the hill behind the bunker. Though the dark shadow of the hill was lost in the mist, it loomed over the bunker like a vigilant watchdog.
As Dean reached the top, he slopped down on a stone and watched the darkness of night give way to the breaking of dawn. By the time the first glimpse of sunlight appeared to his left, casting a soft orange glow across the bunker below, Dean knew what to do.
‘’Cas, you’ve got your ears on...’’ He started.
......
He was still sitting in the same spot where he ‘d been for hours when he heard the noise of an approaching car, and seconds later he saw Cas’ truck stopping then driving into the bunker’s garage.
He immediately jumped to his feet and on a sudden rush of immense burst of relief, anticipation and hope, like a man possessed, he was running down the hill, stumbling over his feet in his haste.
He was out of breath when he was flying down the bunker’s steps and finally came to a sudden halt in the war room.
The first glimpse of Cas buckled his legs and almost brought him to his knees.
‘’Hello, Dean,’’ Cas said in that beautiful, low but now tired grumble.The very one, Dean has spent the past couple years with the unsuccessful tirade not to get a boner at the most inconvenient time just by listening to it.
His gaze glued itself to Cas’ face. He looked so damned beautiful, it made something soft and achy bloom in Dean’s chest. But at a closer look he noticed the fragility and paleness of Cas’ cheeks, the dark shadows under his eyes-- and it felt like a knife to Dean’s gut, knowing he’d been the one to put them there.
But when his eyes locked with those expressive, blue-blue eyes that were always a window into Cas’— aganst all odds existing, big, forgiving heart and hot, shinning —soul, and the hope, softness and unguarded fondness that radiated in them, made all the fear, all the longing, all the love Dean had for his angel hit him with the force of a fucking thunderbolt.
No one has ever looked at him like Cas. Like Dean was the focus point of the universe. Like he was essential. Like he was everything that was there. Even though Cas has freaking literally been there right from the beginning, witnessing bloody everything.
And Dean has known it too, for a long- long time now, that apart from Sam, there was no other person as important, as essential— like the breath he took, the food he consumed— as Cas.
A hot ball of emotions tightening his throat, eyes never leaving Cas’ face, Dean’s legs were moving forward of their own volition. He came to a halt within an arm reach of Cas, and lifting his hand, slowly, testing, he touched Cas’ shoulder, and when Cas didn’t shrink away from his touch, Dean closed his arms around his angel's back and pulled him into a tight hug.
A long, shattering breath of relief broke from Dean's throat when Cas’ arms finally came up from his sides and wrapped around Dean equally tight.
“I hurt you. I’m sorry. You must know, I didn’t mean it.” Ashamed, Dean pressed his face into Cas’ neck. He smelled like wet earth, the forest after rain, the whisper of thunder just moved away— clean, crispy, seductive. Full of power, promise and secretive, hidden pleasure. Breathing him in deep, Dean's voice came out hoarse and thick. “Not a single word of it.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Cas rumbled, pressing a kiss to the tip of Dean’s head, and Dean would’ve crawled inside him if he could. ”It doesn’t matter now.”
Gathering Cas closer, his arms straying tighter, pressing his face harder into Cas’ skin, Dean let his angel’s wonderful scent wash over him as he clung for his life. There was so much he wanted to say, but the emotions were too thick in his throat, making the words stuck there, refusing them to come out.
“I need you.” He rasped out into Cas’ neck when he felt like he was choking on them. “You must know— Must know, how much you mean to me.” He said before his voice broke again.
A brush of fingertips in his hair, a trail of soft touches over his shoulder and back, the quickening rhythm of Cas' heart as his chest rose and fell in complete synchrony with Dean’s chest, and Dean’s whole body quivered.
Letting out a long breath, “I know. I know now.” Cas murmured quiet, pressing another kiss into Dean’s hair. And Dean felt like a warm crest was sweeping through him, a long, strong undulating wave, that saved him from the brink of doom, and at last, carried him home on its wake.