Chapter Text
Even bound and chained inside a devil’s trap on the other side of a steel door, Alastair strikes a whole new level of fear and hatred inside of Dean. It roils deep inside him, something dark and terrible, something he wishes never saw the daylight again. He turns away from the sight.
“Take me back,” he demands.
Uriel sighs, exasperation clear. “Your task is not yet complete.”
“Dean, we would not ask this of you if it were not absolutely necessary,” Castiel says earnestly.
He knows. Dean knows and that’s why he can’t just pretend that none of this concerns him like he truly wants to. Because Dean steps in and helps when someone needs him. But...
“You mind giving us some privacy, chuckles?” he says, keeping his eyes on Castiel. He can feel Uriel’s gaze on the side of his head, but the douchebag leaves without another word.
“Seems like you’re not in charge anymore, Cas,” Dean says instead of the pleas that want to come out.
The eyes of the angel are still conflicted, but Castiel’s form relaxes minutely as he stares unwaveringly at Dean.
“My superiors were concerned about my... sympathies towards you,” he finally admits with reluctance. “In order that my focus remains on the mission, I have been ordered to stand back.”
If anyone had told Dean that he would make acquaintances with an angel, call him by a nickname and look to him for support as the world is coming to an end, he might have shot the person on principle.
Don’t make me do this, Cas, he wants to say.
As if Castiel read his mind, his eyes become sad. Sympathies, indeed.
Dean barks out a bitter laugh. “Cas, you know what you found when you went down into the pit. I’m going to become that thing again and it ain’t going to be pretty.” He barely suppresses the urge to cover his face and scream. “I walk through that door, I’ll be coming out worse than ever.”
Even as he says this, he’s sickened by the desire he feels for the blood he is about to spill. Oh, he had enjoyed it. Alastair had made sure of that. He almost doesn’t notice his fingers twitch beside him; at that, he turns away from the angel lest the anticipation or agony shows on his face.
“I will be here waiting for you. You will still be Dean Winchester when this is over,” Castiel says with the kind of conviction that Dean does not have, and unfortunately it doesn’t make up for what he’s lacking. There are no words to reply with.
As Dean glances at the door, he can feel his heart grow cold and a darkness fill his mind, his face devoid of emotions.
He breathes, grabs the handle of the cart filled with equipment appropriate for what he is about to do.
When the door closes behind him, he feels like he’ll never be able to leave again.
- - - - -
In the beginning, it was all physical.
Layers of skin and muscle peeled off until there was nothing left but bones, organs in a dripping pile on the ground because they were no longer supported. An eyeball gouged out of its socket every half hour. Skull cracked open so that the brain was left exposed to drilling and countless screws that later acted as conductors to wave after wave of electric currents. On better days, Alastair would only pull out each nail and toenail slowly before stabbing them into his gums.
Some years later, his dad was listing all the ways he had failed their family, destroyed it beyond repair. Killed himself in front of Dean’s eyes because he could no longer handle the disappointment his firstborn was. Sam wondered at the gall Dean had to come searching for him when he finally had freedom, get his girlfriend killed and make his life miserable. His eyes then turned yellow and he thanked Dean for leading him down the path to hell.
His mom asked why he had left her alone in that burning house.
After that, it was an unpredictable mixture of everything, that even the whiplash it gave him from the change of pace and scene was torture in itself.
And the few years before he broke, Dean was alone. Not a speck of light or dust or blood to keep him company. Bound thoroughly so he couldn't hug himself. Couldn't hear anything, not even his own breathing.
When Alastair had been present, the years had seemed like centuries. This deprivation felt like an eternity.
Dean had cried, the tears on his face the only point of contact he had during that time. Dean had been still, silent because no amount of noise had made a difference in the vast darkness, as if lost in space.
So alone that a chasm formed where his heart had once been. Grew and swallowed every inch of his being. His very soul.
He never wanted to go back to that.
In the end, he said yes.
- - - - -
His grip on the cart tightens because he can’t have his hands shaking, not in front of Alastair who looks at him with dead eyes.
“This isn’t going to get personal, is it?” he drawls, voice sliding over Dean like a web trapping him. “Because you know, I only wanted the best for you.”
Dean’s voice is surprisingly steady, flat even, when he finally opens his mouth. “Shut up, Alastair.”
“Now, now, is that any way to treat your closest companion of the last few decades?”
The way he casually brings up the worst times in Dean’s life makes his stomach roil. With queasiness or delight, he doesn’t know. Maybe both.
There’s already blood on the demon, indication that there had been a scuffle during his capture. It’s quite different, the knowledge that it’s Alastair’s own blood that stains him now; not Dean’s, not anyone else’s. And it excites him, because here is his tormenter, bound and vulnerable, ready to bleed. Bleed like a helpless lamb about to be slaughtered by Dean’s hands. Excitement wars with the fear of bathing in blood out of sheer enjoyment once again.
The mere thought clouds over everything else in his mind that he almost forgets what he came here for.
“I ain’t here for a beer and catching up,” he says as he moves to the side of the cart, right hand sliding over the tools at his disposal.
Alastair looks positively ecstatic now. “Well, I know that, hm, practising is as good as ‘catching up’ in our world. Don’t want to fall behind, do we.”
Ignoring the words, Dean takes in what he sees, from the chains that chafe the arms to the bloody grin that twists the face into something hideous. “Who’s killing the angels, Alastair?”
“Oh, is that what’s happening? I hope they go extinct soon; it’s about time,” Alastair says cheerfully, blood mixed with saliva bubbling out of a corner of his mouth.
He thinks that the timing couldn’t have been better: Cap and Barnes gone, Sammy safe with Bobby. This is a secret between him, heaven, and hell.
A syringe filled with holy water is his first choice, because fire under your skin is a good shock to the system. And it makes you want to claw off your own flesh.
At last, a smile spreads his lips. He feels so empty.
“I hope you won’t make this easy,” Dean says as he approaches, stopping close enough to see every wrinkle that lines the unknown man’s face, but keeping his distance in case Alastair decides to take a chunk out of his nose.
“Anything for you, my dear student. Make me proud.” Alastair doesn’t blink, doesn’t even glance at the syringe he’s holding.
That doesn’t make it any less satisfying when a pained gurgle bursts from his lips.
- - - - -
In another life, perhaps Dean might have said no. The darkness, the silence, the void might have become his home, and he might have chosen to stay alone. After all, that was what he deserved.