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Supernatural fic: These Cloistered Rooms
Title: These Cloistered Rooms
Author: triedunture
Rating: PG
Genre and/or Pairing: Dean/Cas (preslash, one-sided), Sam
Spoilers: through season 4
Warnings: mentions of past rape of original characters, unabashed sex pollen, UST
Word Count: 7,000
Summary: Sam and Dean are still trying to stop Lucifer and Michael from doing the Apocalypse Hoedown in their borrowed meatsuits, and Cas calls them to New York to recover a powerful weapon: a pill that can turn a human into an angel's bondservant, which is just as bad and kinky as it sounds.

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Sam watched the smokestacks and graffitied warehouses fly by from the passenger seat of the Impala. It was a change from fields and woods, from the Midwest, from the South, from the small towns and empty counties where they usually found work. It was different, and Sam liked different. Dean did not. And he didn't care who knew.

"Look at this," Dean grumbled from the driver's seat, not for the first time since setting rubber to the Jersey Turnpike. "Makes you sick."

Dean wasn't referring to the smell of the chemical factories or the sight of the black smoke billowing from refineries. He meant the skyline of New York, which flitted in and out of view from behind buildings and hills, growing larger and larger from across the Hudson River.

Sunlight glinted off the city's skyscrapers, making Dean groan irritably and flick down his sun visor. "This town sucks," Dean continued. "All noisy and dirty and the people!" His hands gripped the steering wheel tightly as a semi careened in front of them, jockeying for a better position to enter the Lincoln Tunnel. "Fucking jerks!"

"Should have taken the George Washington bridge," Sam muttered.

"I ain't going over that thing. This way's better, trust me. I know what I'm doing."

"Dean, you've only been here once. And you were, like, thirteen." Sam said in a tone that straddled reasonable and patronizing. "What have you got against New York, anyway? It's not that bad."

Dean grunted. "Once was enough. Jesus, Sammy, the thing with the natural history museum?" He gave a dramatic shiver. "I never ran so fast in my life. Still can't watch Jurassic Park when they show it on TV."

Sam frowned, finally turning away from his window to eye his brother. "Wait, what?"

"You know. The dinosaur that chased us? When dad was investigating the poltergeists?"

"Dean..." Sam's forehead wrinkled. "That's the plot of Night at the Museum. That didn't actually happen."

"Yes it did! Oh my god, when that stupid movie came out I said, 'That's exactly like that one time in New York when dad was investigating those poltergeists and we ended up getting chased by taxidermied elephants and piles of angry dinosaur bones.' And you were all like--"

"No, the dinosaur never came to life. It was the Eskimo ghosts, remember? And we had to find the remains in the basement while dad was trapped in the marine biology exhibit."

"Yeah, but there was a dinosaur too," Dean said stubbornly. Sam gave up and turned back to stare out the window.

They inched their way into the tunnel along with the rest of the traffic, and Sam's eyes adjusted slowly to the yellow-orange lights. "We should try to call Cas when we get out of the tunnel. Hopefully we'll have some time to grab food. Maybe some pizza or something." Sam turned from his study of the tiled walls of the tunnel to find his brother glaring at him. "What?"

"It almost sounds like you're looking forward to this dumbass job, Sammy."

Sam shifted uneasily in his seat, trying to get his long legs into the right position. He picked his words carefully, like steps through a minefield. "I just think it will be nice to be in a town with more than one dive bar and a laundromat."

A snort from the driver's seat. "Yeah, well, I'd take a coin-op and a beer over this any day." Another car darted in front of them, and Dean leaned on the horn. "Cas better be there like he promised. Jesus, I can't believe we're going to another fucking museum."

Sam sat back in his seat with a sigh. The car finally reached the end of the tunnel and wound its way through the maze of ramps into Manhattan proper.

Faced with the traffic of 42nd Street, Dean was unwilling to stop for pizza. The Impala rolled from red light to red light as Sam consulted his Blackberry. He directed Dean turn-by-turn onto the West Side Highway, and finally the traffic thinned to a manageable level. The river was now on their right, brown and glinting under the early summer sun.

From there it was a straight shot north, almost to the very end of the island before a hill loomed dark and imposing on the left. "This is it," Sam said. "This exit."

The area they now drove through was heavily wooded, the bright greenery of parkland a stark contrast to the steel-and-glass jungle they'd left behind. The Impala crept slowly along the steep hill, giving a wide berth to spandex-clad bicyclists packed along the shoulder. They rounded a gentle bend, past flower beds filled with yellow and red tulips, and found Castiel standing in a small parking lot between a humming ice cream truck and a van that had the phrase "Saint Mary's Summer Camp and Bible Study" emblazoned on the side in yellow script.

Behind him was the stone facade of what looked like a castle, or perhaps a fort.

"You're late," Cas said by way of greeting as Dean parked underneath a shady oak.

"He took the tunnel," Sam said through his rolled-down window.

The angel cocked his head to the side. "You should have taken the bridge."

Sam turned to his brother with a smug look on his face, his mouth opening to gloat, but Dean held up a finger and made an "A-a-a-ah!" noise that meant he didn't want to hear it. The hunters unfolded themselves from the car, their doors smacking closed within seconds of each other.

"So. The Cloisters." Dean squinted up at the stone tower. "Now can you tell us about the big secret job you got for us here?"

"I'm sorry, I couldn't explain over the phone. This matter is very delicate." Cas turned to stare at the building too. "I didn't want anyone to overhear."

"Yeah, I've been reading up on this place." Sam reached into the Impala and drew out his laptop from the passenger seat. He flipped it open on the car's roof and read aloud. "The Cloisters, the medieval wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, built from the remains of at least six French nunneries dating back to the middle ages, a repository of some of the rarest Judeo-Christian artifacts in the world."

"You think they've got something better than the Colt here?" Dean quirked an eyebrow at Castiel. "Something that might actually slow down the devil?"

"No." Cas was doing that thing where he stared at Dean like he'd never seen him before in his life, or was memorizing him anew. "Something that might slow us down. If it falls into the wrong hands."

"What is it?" Sam asked.

Cas bowed his head, seemingly studying his scuffed loafers. "Something that will force a human to become an angel's bondservant."

"Whoa, no, wait, that's against the rules." Dean laid his hands on his own chest, a protective gesture. "Zac said I had to give my meatsuit up to Michael freely. They can't force me to say yes."

"They can with Shemyaza's troche," Cas answered.

"Shem-what now?"

Sam swung himself up to sit on the Impala's hood, typing away with his laptop balanced on his knees. "It says here that Shemyaza was a fallen angel who supposedly lead a rebel band from heaven to earth, where they would coax the daughters of men into, erm, sexual intercourse." Sam glanced up, his face a mask of concern. "Holy crap. Are we looking for an angel date-rape drug?"

Dean spun towards Cas, his mouth a tiny O of angry surprise, working on his eventual response. "Oh. Hell no."

"Shemyaza and his faction created the troche to exploit humans, yes." Cas said, piercing the Winchesters with his stare. "But the pill can be used for any number coercions. When a human swallows it, he is able to perceive an angel's true form."

"Without the usual eyes-bleeding, ears-splitting side effects?" Dean asked.

"Precisely." Cas shifted uncomfortably on his feet. "Shemyaza preferred his concubines to be more or less intact. At the start of their liaison, at any rate."

Dean's lips flattened into a line that meant both distaste with and begrudging understanding of something awful. "Angels. Are. Dicks," he said.

Cas nodded, only half-listening while scanning the parking lot. "We should hurry." He turned back toward the Cloisters and began walking, his trench coat billowing around him. "You will need to cover the admission fee."

Sam and Dean exchanged a look, one that meant Christ, seriously? on Dean's part and angels: what are ya gonna do? on Sam's.

They entered the building through an old portcullis. Signs guided them to the entrance, where a small, stooped woman was distributing admission badges from behind a little wooden podium. Beyond her, a large stone vestibule opened wide, bright with stained glass windows. The three of them stood in line behind the bible camp class, a dozen or so little kids in bright white uniform shirts chattering loud and happy, their harried camp counselor counting heads.

Dean continued his earlier conversation with Castiel in a whisper, as the echoes in the hall carried. "So a human swallows the pill, sees an angel in all its glory, somehow doesn't explode, and then what? How does that turn them into a loveslave?"

"Humans aren't meant to behold an angel's true form." Cas's gaze roamed past the children and the other humans to the carved ceiling. "The shock of it makes a human very susceptible to an angel's commands."

"So it's like seeing Angela Jolie naked or something?" Dean asked.

"I'm not familiar with that experience," Castiel answered.

The summer camp kids were slowly herded away, and Sam began picking through his wallet, eyeing the sign above the podium that announced the museum ticket prices. "Okay, so three adults at twenty bucks apiece--"

"Dude, that's just the suggested donation." Dean pointed to the sign's small print.

"It's a museum, Dean. Don't be such a cheapskate."

"You're paying in cash? Just use one of the cards," Dean hissed as they approached the podium.

"Unlike you, I believe in supporting the arts," Sam said archly. "Three adults, please." This was directed at the old lady at the ticket counter, who smiled in a matronly fashion and handed over three blue metal buttons with the Met insignia stamped on it in exchange for Sam's cash. She was also prepared to spread open a museum map and explain the layout of the exhibits, but Castiel cut her off before she could get to the tapestry room.

"Where can we find the troche?"

She blinked, her smile faltering only a bit. "The what, sir?"

"Uh, we're art students," Sam said, his eyebrows high in that 'please, please believe us' expression he had. "We're looking for an artifact we've been hearing about. It looks kind of like a pill." He made a small circle with his thumb and forefinger. "Do you have anything like that on display?"

"Oh, no, dear." She frowned. "I don't know anything about that."

Dean turned to Cas and said under his breath, "And how can you be sure the thing is here?"

"I felt something in the vicinity calling to me and, after much prayer, concluded that it could only be the troche. We will merely have to canvass the building to find it."

Dean heaved a sigh and cast his eyes upwards. "God almighty, give me strength."

"If he did, I very much doubt we'd be concerned with finding the troche; all our problems would be solved," Cas pointed out unhelpfully. Dean shook his head, unable to keep the tiny smirk from stealing over his lips.

Sam was almost done stumbling through the interaction with the ticket lady, thanking her and saying they would just take a look themselves. He grabbed Dean's elbow and led him into the great hall, Cas following close behind.

"So what does it look like?" Sam asked.

Castiel glared at him as if affronted. "I have never seen one." Said as if only the worst kind of angel ever had.

"For fuck's sake!" Dean huffed.

"However," Cas continued without missing a beat, "I have heard whispered rumors that the troches were carved from the bones of demigods. Its magic is very old and very powerful. I believe I will be able to sense its presence."

"Great. Fantastic." Dean put his hands on his hips and turned around in a slow circle, considering all the various hallways they had to choose from. "We better split up. Sam, keep an eye on Clarence here. I'll be on the lookout for something swallowable."

Sam watched his brother stalk off towards a recreation of a medieval altar, his shoulders a stiff, stressed line. Then he turned back to his angelic charge and tried for a reassuring smile. "Ready?"

They walked through the cool stone corridors, taking in the engravings of saints, the crumbling crucifixes, the famous tapestry of the captured unicorn. Sam paused to consider each artifact they saw, wondering if perhaps a pill could be hidden inside, or stuck to the back, or was somehow metaphorical in nature.

He looked up from his study of the tapestry to find Cas staring into the open courtyard, where small orange trees were blossoming alongside large pots of azaleas.

"So you really think Michael would use the troche on Dean?" Sam asked, just to fill the eerie silence.

"Yes," was the simple answer.

"It's good that you're looking out for him, then." Sam meant it as a passing nicety, just a bland statement of fact. He didn't think anything weird (bitterness, suspicion) had leaked into his words until Cas was standing right in front of his nose, his blue eyes piercing.

"You forget that Lucifer is also an angel, Sam. Shemyaza's troche would be a weapon for him as well. I am trying to protect you both."

Sam swallowed. "Yeah, no, I get that, it's just--"

Cas tipped his head just an inch to the side, his eyes softening by degrees. "You are aware of my affection for your brother."

"Uh." It hadn't been a question, really, and Sam wasn't sure what he was supposed to say to that. "I mean, sure."

The angel held his gaze for one long beat before dropping his eyes to the ground. "He does not know?" Definitely a question this time.

"I, ah, don't think he does." Sam slipped his hands into his jean pockets, his shoulders rounding in discomfort. "You know Dean."

"You are protective of him as well." Cas touched Sam's arm, and Sam looked down at Cas's hand wildly. "I promise you, I plan nothing untoward. I wish only to keep Dean safe."

"Oh. Good. Thanks?"

"I am glad you do not disapprove."

"Okay, honestly? I'm not even sure what I would be disapproving of." Sam held his hands up defensively. "When you say 'affection,' do you mean you, what? Like Dean? Like, romantically? Can angels do that?"

Sam didn't think it possible, but Cas's pale face became even more pinched. "No," he said. "We cannot. Not well, and not happily." He shook his head as if to clear his thoughts. "I'm sorry, it would only burden you if I attempted to explain."

A twinge of sympathy passed through Sam's chest, and he knew it showed on his face. "Cas..."

"Hey, Jimmy Stewart!" Dean hissed from a doorway. "Come on, think I found something."

The three of them made their way into one of the smaller exhibit rooms, far from the courtyard and the crowd of visitors. Dean stopped in front of a tiny glass case on a thin pedestal. Inside, suspended in plasticine, was an ivory sphere about the size of a walnut. It was opened like a diorama, its tiny doors winging out to its sides. Inside the sphere were minuscule angels and saints carved in relief, the intricate spires of great cathedrals made miniature.

Sam bent to read the accompanying plaque. "Rosary bead, 3rd century." He stood. "That's one honking horse pill. What do you think, Cas?"

"That is the troche," Castiel whispered. "It is pulling at my grace very forcefully."

"Does it hurt?" Dean asked in a low voice, concerned yet businesslike. Sam spared him a glance.

Cas shook his head, his eyes still glued to the bead. "It's an uncomfortable sensation, but not painful."

"Well." Dean slipped a hand into his jacket. "Let's liberate this heavenly GHB, huh?"

Before Sam could even open his mouth and suggest maybe, just maybe, they shouldn't conduct a smash-and-grab in broad daylight inside one of the world's most secure museums, they were interrupted. The old lady from the ticket counter appeared at the glass case beside them, exclaiming, "Oh! Did you find what you were looking for?" She pulled her pastel yellow cardigan tightly around her shoulders against the drafty chill.

Dean grimaced and removed his hand from whatever weapon he was hiding in his coat. "Yeah, sure did."

The woman peered down at the rosary bead with a gentle smile. "A lovely piece, one of my absolute favorites. There's not another like it in the world, you know. Not intact, anyway." Her voice took on a faraway, dreamy quality, like snow coming down in a field.

Castiel took a step backward and grasped Dean's elbow. Sam watched this gesture closely, his eyebrows shooting up to his hairline.

"We should leave," the angel said quietly.

"Oh, but you just arrived! And there's so much to see." The woman lifted her head and shot them a look, and somehow, in the shadowy light, her face became a rotting husk, the skin papered thinly to a grinning skull. "The collection is extensive."

A heavy hand landed on Sam's shoulder, and they all turned to see a heavyset black woman in a security guard uniform, her eyes sunken in her sockets and her face flickering in and out of focus. "Ghosts?" Sam's voice was low and shocked. A glob of ectoplasm dripped from his sleeve like oil, splattering on the floor audibly.

"Guardians," Cas supplied. "Very powerful guardians."

"No shit," Dean hissed. He looked from his brother to Castiel, and then, with after what seemed like only a nanosecond's worth of thought, Dean grabbed the gun inside his jacket and smashed through the glass case that held the troche.

"Run!" he shouted as he grabbed the unholy pill in a handful of glass shards. Alarms were blaring, and the overhead lights were flicking on and off, though it was impossible to tell if it was because of the ghostly presence or the security system. Sam shoved away the host holding his shoulder, and Castiel barreled his way past the possessed ticket lady. They followed Dean as he tore down the corridor, darting through the maze of exhibit cases and confused patrons.

"What are they?" Sam shouted at Castiel as they rounded a sharp corner.

"They must be--" Cas attempted, only to come face to face with one of the guardians, a soccer mom who stepped in his path, her eyes milky white.

"You will not take another one of my sisters, monster," the ghost growled. With the slightest motion of her hand, Castiel was thrown back into an ancient stone tomb, his head cracking against the hard surface.

"Cas!" Dean fired off a round, but it wasn't a salt shell and had little effect. The bullet hit the security guard in the shoulder, but she just kept coming. The loud crack of the gun had set off the bystanders, who screamed and swarmed for the exits. Sam caught sight of the bible camp group in their crisp white shirts.

"Dean, we need to get out of here! Too many people!"

A fierce nod. "Let's go, Cas." He reached for the angel's arm, but Castiel got up under his own power, his hands clutching the carved stone face of a saint-king for balance. He stared at the possessed ticket lady and the handful of those like her that now crowded into the room: two security guards, a Korean tourist with her camera still around her neck, the soccer mom, the camp counselor. All with white-out eyes and faces that phased between normal and awful.

"I am not an enemy," Castiel said to them. "Please, sisters, be at peace."

"Not likely, angel," the ticket woman sneered, her face buzzing back and forth from human to grotesque. "You trespass into our cloistered rooms even now."

She gestured once, her hand slicing through the air, and the heavy wooden doors slammed shut, sealing the exhibit room. Sam put his back to the wall, useless without a weapon.

"You will die here as we did," the ghost said. Her voice was strained, slightly accented. Almost European.

Realization dawned. "The nuns," Sam whispered. "Dean, they came over with the stones. They're in the building itself."

Cas stumbled forward, his eyes flicking over to the brothers before settling back on the old woman, a hand outstretched. "You have protected the troche all this time. You have served well. But please believe me: we cannot leave it here. Angels more powerful than I are looking for it, and they will use its power to hurt people, as your sisters were hurt."

"Liar!" the ghost screeched. All around the room, glass cases cracked and shattered at the force of her voice. "You desire its power!"

"No. That is not what I desire." Castiel's voice was rough and low. He looked at Sam for just a moment, his eyes bright. "Let the brothers go. Fight me if you must, but allow them safe passage."

The ticket lady-turned-ghost twisted her borrowed face into a snarl. "You care what happens to them, angel?"

"They are my friends," Cas replied.

"Listen, ladies." Dean slipped his gun and the troche into his jacket and held his hands up in a peaceful gesture. "You got screwed over by some dick angels, I get it. It really sucks. But Cas here isn't a d-bag like they were. Well, I mean, not the rapey kind, anyway." Cas made a sour face, but Dean ignored it. "He's telling the truth. We're just trying to stop something even worse from happening."

The possessed women looked at each other silently, as if mentally conferring with each other. Then, after a long moment, the women reached out, their fingertips brushing the stonework of the walls. Ghostly light flared and short swords, similar in size and shape to Castiel's personal weapon, appeared to melt out of the brickwork and flow into the ghosts' waiting hands.

"We will draw his blood with the weapons his brothers left behind," the ghost inside the Korean woman growled. "He must pay for the sins that were done to us."

"Like hell he will," Dean hissed. He pulled his brother close by the arm, then clapped his free hand to Castiel's shoulder. "Whammy us, Cas!"

One dizzying, sickening second later, and they were out in the sunshine, sprawled on the grass. "I will never get used to that," Sam moaned, clutching his stomach.

Dean regained his feet first and surveyed the Cloisters on the hill behind them. In front of them was a low stone wall that marked the steep cliff face. Far below was the highway and the Hudson river.

"Think they're trapped inside the walls?" he asked.

Castiel drew his short sword from the folds of his coat. "Perhaps."

A screaming blast of air and heat flooded across the green lawn, and the ghosts appeared with their weapons in hand.

"Perhaps not," Cas amended.

The battle was nerve-wracking one. Corporeal super-ghosts were weird enough, but the fact that they wielded angelic swords that could kill anything, including Cas, made them more terrifying. Dean faced them down with not much more than an angry glare and his fists. "Sam, get with the Latin!" he shouted as he dodged a wild swipe from the camp counselor.

"Regna terrae, cantate Deo," Sam began. Castiel placed a hand on the Korean woman's forehead, and her body crumpled to the ground, free of the nun's spirit. Cas grabbed the sword from her slack hand.

The brawl continued along the promenade at the cliff's edge, metal clashing and singing against metal. Cas tossed Dean his extra sword just in time to block a blow from the ticket lady. She leaned in close to Dean, her blade screeching against his own, her grimace at odds with her grandmother's face.

"Hand over the angel, and I'll let you live," she said.

"Oh, that all?" Dean leaned in with all his weight, shoving her away. "Since we're making wishes, I've got one: go screw yourself, sister."

Her eyes darkened. Her fingers pointed swiftly towards the river, and before he knew it, Dean was flying over the stone wall and into the air.

One thing the movies get right about falling to your death: everything does slow down. Dean could see the cars on the road directly below, red and black and silver ants all stopped in their tracks. The look on his brother's face, his arm outstretched, frozen. And Castiel. One moment, he was standing next to Sam, his sword dripping with blood, his eyes burning bright. The next, he was gone, vanished. And the next (and this all happened slowly like a very patient child going through a flip book) Cas was in the air with Dean, his arms wrapped around him, his voice quiet against the whistle of the wind in Dean's ear: "I've got you."

Then their feet were back on solid ground. Time caught up to itself. Dean's heart, which had stopped for the whole slow-mo thing, started thumping in his chest once more. The ghost who'd thrown him over the edge stood there, her face the picture of perplexity.

"You..." She studied Castiel closely.

"--Audi nos!" Sam shouted, finishing his incantation. The remaining women fell like discarded dolls, sprawling boneless on the grass. The milky white light left their eyes as the spirits that had possessed them screamed away in a flare of ghostly smoke. Then everything was quiet, save for one chirping bird far away.

Dean was the one to break the silence. "Nice catch, Cas. Talk about angels in the outfield." He brushed himself off.

Castiel's hand was still clutching at Dean's sleeve as if he was fearful of releasing him. Sam frowned and cleared his throat. "Still got the troche?"

Dean dug the carved bead from his inner coat pocket and held it up. "Sure do."

"Great. So how do we destroy it?"

"It can't be broken or burned. It has to be used. Only then does it lose its power," Cas said. "We will find a human wiling to endure its effects. If no angels are in the human's presence, all should be well." His fingers uncurled from Dean's sleeve one at a time. A light rain began to fall, darkening the paved pathways in little dots.

"Better find someplace dry," Sam commented, looking up at the dark skies. On the damp ground, one woman was already swimming back to consciousness, mumbling questions about where she was and what had happened. Yeah, the brothers agreed; time to take off.

They walked south, following the edge of the cliff until they reached a place that looked more Lord of the Rings than northern Manhattan. It was an overhang where the pathway carved right through the rock of the mountain, with ionic columns creating one giant front porch overlooking the Hudson. The stone ceiling was vaulted hundreds of meters above their heads, and the whole thing felt like some kind of ancient temple.

It was strange, but out of the rain. Dean was quiet, which was stranger.

Castiel held out his hand. "Give me the troche."

Dean didn't move. Sam shook the rain from his hair with a grunt. "C'mon, Dean, let him have it. It'll be safer with him. Hey, maybe we can talk Bobby into taking it; I'm sure he won't mind."

Dean either didn't hear him or didn't care. "That nun really didn't think you'd save me, you know," he said to Cas. "You could see it on her face. She was freaked."

"Yes." Castiel tilted his head in thought. "Those women knew only the worst of my brothers. I suppose it is not surprising they thought the worst of me." He stared at the patchwork stone ground.

"Well, she just didn't know you like we do," Dean said, and Sam could see the way those words, so casual, so blithe, cut through Cas.

The angel blinked once, hard. Castiel's granite eyes swept up to him once more, his hand out once more. "The troche. Please."

Dean plucked the pill from his pocket, rolling it between his palms. "So this is the last one, huh? No more worrying about angels and demons slipping us a roofie after this?"

"That is correct."

"And just out of curiosity, how long does this thing last?"

Castiel shrugged. "Twenty minutes, perhaps thirty."

"Hm." Dean examined the pill, holding it between his thumb and forefinger as if examining an insect specimen. "Well. You don't say."

Sam's eyes widened. "Dean--" he managed, his voice strangled.

But Sam Winchester was forever too late in stopping his older brother from doing stupid things. In one flick of the wrist, Dean popped the pill into his mouth and gave a neck-stretching swallow.

For a long moment, nothing happened.

Castiel stood there, his hand still held out to Dean, his colorless lips parted in shock. "Why...why did you do that?" he finally asked.

"Well, someone had to bite the bullet. Besides," a cocky smirk, "it's just you here. No Michael, no Lucifer. No one to boss me around, unless you want me to do a stupid monkey dance. But something tells me you won't."

Sam pinched the bridge of his nose, where a headache was forming. "Wow. Okay. The whole reason we came here, Dean, was to avoid one of us taking the pill. And you just go ahead and take it anyway! That's just classic you."

"Cool it, Sam. It's fine. Cas is the only angelic thing around for miles. And anyway, I don't feel any different." Dean closed his lips tight and drew his tongue across his teeth, trying to taste the last vestiges of what he'd just consumed. "Huh. Maybe it lost all its mojo. Wouldn't that just be the--" Dean stopped speaking, his eyes growing wide and fastening on Cas.

Sam eyed him with caution. "Dean?"

"I see it," Dean whispered, his voice small with awe. "Oh, man, Cas, you..."

To Sam Winchester's eyes, nothing had changed. Castiel was still standing there in the echoing, columned cavern in his ratty trench and tie. He was still wearing Jimmy Novak's unassuming face. He was standing a little too straight, a little too stiffly, just like he always did. But at Dean's questioning stare, Castiel did something Sam had never seen him do: he brought his hands up to cover his face as if in shame.

"Cas, no, don't." Dean stepped forward, tentatively at first, his hand outstretched between them. Then he closed the gap separating them and gently pried Castiel's hands from his eyes. "Let me look."

"Dean, what do you see?" Sam asked.

"My grace," Castiel answered, quiet and brittle. "My true form."

"It's like--" Dean's mouth worked open and closed as he attempted to put the sight into words for his brother. Nothing seemed adequate. Cas was still standing in front of him; he was vaguely aware of that human shape. But now he saw that Cas was also a bright, all-encompassing light, a white and gold glow that suffused the air and made it warm and sweetly scented. But to say Castiel was just light wasn't exactly right. He was also the absence of light, the opposite of white and gold. Something so completely not human in shape or being. Something beautiful and enormous, dwarfing Dean to the point where he felt very insignificant. "It's like nothing I've ever seen," Dean finally said.

Sam stood there for a long moment, shifting from foot to foot with his hands in his jean pockets. "Uh, I think I'm gonna go wait in the car," he said.

"Yeah, 'kay," Dean mumbled in return. He was too enraptured by some unseen thing in the air above Castiel's head.

Cas looked over at Sam wildly. "No, please don't leave." He approached Sam with pleading eyes, and Dean followed behind him, still staring at the towering presence over Cas's head. Cas leaned over to whisper in Sam's ear, "Your brother is very susceptible to my every command right now. I am not easily tempted but this..." Cas swallowed as Dean swiped at the space around him. "This is too much to bear."

"It's, like, the inside of a marble. Kind of. Except made of stars. And it smells the way shaving cream feels," Dean rambled. His hand pawed delicately at the air in front of his face. "Cas, are these your wings? They don't look like wings at all." He chuckled. "Cool."

Sam quirked his lips and gave Cas a shrug. "You're on your own, man. It's just twenty minutes. You'll be fine." He clapped a hand to Cas's shoulder and left them with a terse nod.

"Sam!" Cas called after him but he didn't even turn around.

Dean continued waving his hand through the air. "Can you feel that? Cas, that's my hand. Feel?"

Cas sighed. "Yes, Dean. I do."

"Well, I totally get what you were saying before about this pill. This is amazing. You're the size of the freakin' Chrysler building." Dean tipped his head back and dragged a hand through his hair, his eyes tracking up the angel's form. "You look fantastic," he added more quietly.

"In Heaven I am considered quite average-looking. Some might even say plain." Cas turned back to his rapt audience of one.

Dean closed his eyes, a smile playing on his lips. "And your voice. God damn, it's like music or something. I don't know, Cas, I think Heaven must be blind and deaf because this is awesome."

Castiel studied Dean's face, aglow with the joy of witnessing pure grace. It was not a sight he had ever seen before, and doubted he would ever see again. "You won't be able to recall this." Cas licked his vessel's lips, his human throat dry. "Your mind will hide all memory of my true self. If you remembered it...."

"Bloody eyes and the whole nine yards?"

Cas nodded, his eyes filling suddenly.

"I did not want you to see me this way, Dean," he said. A tear rolled down his vessel's cheek, the first he'd ever encountered. It felt awful, to be crying like this. His borrowed skin felt hot, and his eyes burned. But he couldn't stop the ridiculously human reaction. "You should have asked my permission before-- But you never ask! You assume claim where you have none, and I--"

Dean took a step back, his eyes even wider. The towering shape of Castiel, so wonderful and full of beauty, had grown terrifyingly dark. It swooped down towards Dean, a mass of thunder and blackness, of wide wings that weren't wings, and shining grace roiling in the middle of it all.

"And I--" Castiel stood trembling with his hands clenched into fists at his sides. "I must constantly fight my desire to do the same." He slumped, and his angelic form, too, retreated.

Dean stepped forward, peering into the swirling morass of grace to find the vague shape of Castiel's vessel. "I'm sorry, I didn't..." He reached out, his skin tingling as it passed through heavenly armor. He couldn't possibly hold onto that part of Castiel, but the familiar part he could handle. Arms around a trench-coated figure, nose buried in a shaking shoulder. "Fuck, Cas, just tell me what to do."

Castiel shook his head. "Not like this."

"Just go ahead and say it." Dean brought his hand up to card through the short dark hair at the back of Cas's head. "I'm not stupid. I already know."

"The troche is making you say these things."

"You're in love with me."

"Don't be absurd." A twinge where his heart would be.

"But it's weird, 'cause you're an angel and you've got all this baggage from Heaven and besides, we've got bigger things to worry about. The whole hill of beans spiel. Am I getting warmer?" Dean asked.

Cas frowned. "You feel only slightly feverish, but that is an expected side effect of the pill. And I don't remember mentioning legumes."

A huff of laughter, damp against his neck. "See, it's things like that, Cas, that keep me on your side." Dean drew back and examined Castiel's wild eyes. "When I come down from my GHB high, do me a favor, will you? Tell me you love me so I don't forget."

Bright eyes clouded with worry. "You say these things now only because you're under the influence of the troche. You don't mean it."

"Yeah, I do. Why do you think I took the pill? I wanted this."

"You will say anything right now if you thought it would please me."

"Fuck you, I mean it. Promise me you won't let me forget." He rested his chin on Cas's shoulder once more.

Castiel did not answer. With a little under three minutes left on the clock, he carefully brought his arms around Dean as well. Dean sighed, a small noise of content that owed more to Castiel's grace twining itself around his body than a vessel's arms. If a human had wandered by, he would have seen nothing more interesting than a young couple enjoying a moment of comfort. But to Dean's eyes, the unseen light and strength of the angel Castiel held him safe in the rarest of embraces.

"You'd be worth it," Dean murmured. "It wouldn't be easy, but if we just gave it a shot, we could--"

"Please don't speak any longer," Cas said, and because he'd swallowed the troche, Dean did as he was told.

The rain had slowed to a steady drizzle by the time Castiel approached the Impala with Dean slung over his shoulder. Sam, who had been dozing in the passenger seat, startled awake when their combined shadows fell across his window.

"Is he okay?" he asked, climbing out of the car.

"Humans almost always lose consciousness after the troche's effects wear off." Cas waited for Sam to open the door to the backseat before levering his burden into the car. "He will wake soon."

"Huh. Well, do you want to come with us to--?" Sam turned to find nothing but the soft shifting breeze that heralded an escaping angel.

Dean woke up somewhere around Atlantic City. "Ugh, talk about the mother of all hangovers," he groaned, pressing the heels of his hands into his eye sockets.

Sam glanced into the backseat, his hands still clutching the wheel. "So you got to see Cas all glowy. How was it?"

"Don't know. Don't remember." Dean blinked and sat up, leaning over the middle seat to better hear Sam. "Cas take off?"

"Yeah, after you passed out."

They pulled into a cheap motel that didn't check ID too thoroughly and prepared for a well-deserved full night's sleep. Except Dean couldn't shut off his brain, couldn't get rid of that niggling feeling eating away at him, and stared up at the cracked ceiling until 3 AM. Sick of laying there uselessly, Dean got out of bed. He padded outside to the desolate parking lot and watched the stars war with the blinking lights of satellites and jumbo jets. A long stretch of time passed before he recognized the prickling sensation of being watched.

He looked across the parking lot, by the tarp-covered swimming pool, and saw Cas standing in a handicap spot, his trench coat swaying in the night breeze.

"Hey," Dean said, his low voice carrying in the quiet night air. "Something wrong?"

Castiel shook his head.

Dean frowned. "Okay. Anything you want to share, then?"

Castiel mouthed the word "no," a silent syllable, before disappearing into the dark.

fin

I know I'm missing out on Something Big, because everyone's been writing fic for the season 6 finale, but alas, I have JUST STARTED watching season 6. So maybe some big, terrible, awful thing happened that makes this season 4-era fic look like an absolute antique, but them's the breaks. But if I in any way messed up hugely, please just consider it a harmless AU.

If you've never visited the Cloisters, it's a pretty awesome place and Sam is right: you should support the arts and visit. The columned cavern in the park is also a real place, though it's never actually been the scene of an angelic hug-a-thon as far as I am aware. The carved rosary bead is also real and can be seen on your immediate right as you enter the Late Gothic hall from the courtyard, I think. It's super rad.

In conclusion, I hoped you liked my educational UST story. I am still getting the hang of 1) writing these characters and 2) juggling more than 2 characters per scene in a 3rd person POV which is a lot harder than I thought it would be. I would love to hear any crit or comments so I can improve. Hearts and stars!