Work Text:
The first time the Righteous Man sees Castiel’s vessel, he stabs it. His knife slips through the skin of its chest and scrapes against the collarbone, nicks its subclavian veins and arteries, and punctures the very top of the left lung. Castiel stares at the knife, fascinated. The sensation is strange. Castiel has never had something inside him like this; cold and sharp, creating a harsh bridge between the earthly plane and his vessel’s tender innards. It’s not unpleasant, he thinks. He’s not quite sure what to make of it. He touches the hilt with a single fingertip, and shivers imperceptibly. He rubs blood between the vessel’s thumb and forefinger, and is quietly pleased by the slick, easy motion.
He pokes at the knife with his grace, and it—it tickles. It sends some strange electrical impulse up the vessel’s spine, and Castiel does it again, and again, and again, though he cannot say why. He touches the hilt of the knife with the vessel’s fingers, again, and his true eyes slip closed. He will keep it, he decides. The knife will stay where it rests until Castiel is told otherwise.
Dean is staring at him. There must be some emotion there, Castiel knows, but he cannot read it. Everything is much more difficult, now that Dean’s soul is muted by layers of bone and sinew and flesh.
“What are you?” Dean says—no, wait. That, Castiel thinks, is a demand.
“I am an angel of the Lord,” Castiel replies. And Dean laughs, and laughs, and laughs.
_____
When he leaves the barn, Castiel goes to a beach perched at the far western shore of Lake Superior, and listens to the waves. He likes it here, he thinks. Instead of sand, the shore is comprised of round, pink granite pebbles, worn smooth by the water. If he listens closely, even the vessel’s limited ears can hear a faint clink, clink, clink as the tide constantly rearranges the delicately balanced stones.
He is due for a debrief—the Host clamors for it, their curiosity seeping into the edges of his thoughts. But inexplicably, Castiel finds himself reluctant to return. He has always enjoyed his time inhabiting a vessel; the dull human senses are so limiting, and so profoundly visceral in their limitation. How exhilarating, to feel the throat work as it swallows, to taste stale gasoline and fungal rot on the air, to feel the minute brush of clothing against bare skin! How incredible, to have a thing as wondrous and sensorial as a mouth, as a hand, as a squirming, reckless tongue!
In Heaven, Castiel is a creature with ten thousand roving eyes and dozens of wings and great, terrible rings of vibrating vocal cords, home to nine hundred ninety-two thousand, four hundred and three human souls slumbering inside their individual chambers. He is rather large, for an angel of his rank, and could easily hold twice that number. This makes him feel hollow and incomplete, sometimes, when he pays attention to the empty rooms inside him. He has no lips, no mouth. He has no tongue to taste or nose to smell—just his eyes, studded along his inner and outer walls, which see far more than the human nose or mouth can perceive. He does not touch, for he has no hands. He does not eat; he is not a thing that consumes. Instead, he is tightly bound to his brothers and sisters, slotted neatly together like kanawa tsugi joinery, and he waits patiently, hoping one of the newly dead souls will be assigned to one of the empty rooms inside of him.
In truth, Castiel is somewhat envious of his vessel. And sometimes, when the Host is quiet, he contemplates keeping it, the same way he has chosen to keep the knife Dean thrust inside of him. He touches it once more. Runs his fingers around the split skin where it enters him, and pulls lightly at the torn flesh. He tilts his head and savors the hot, shivery feeling in the vessel’s gut and the warmth of its blood slowly dripping down his chest.
The lake is quiet, tonight. The moon is high and clear, as is the water, and the sterile pink granite rocks are eerily reminiscent of an earlier time and era, when the earth was new and the very first cyanobacteria were just beginning to stir. The air is cold on his face. It smells of dying fish and wet. Castiel delights in it, just as he delights in the water seeping through his socks and the way the rocks shift beneath his shoes.
When Uriel comes, Castiel is not particularly surprised. The Host is not patient, even on the best of days. What is surprising is that Uriel arrives in a vessel—a tall man with a stubborn mouth and clever eyes. From what Castiel remembers, Uriel despises the practice, and will not take a vessel unless he cannot avoid doing so.
Uriel stands some distance from the water’s edge, as though he is afraid to get his shoes wet. Castiel turns to step closer, and Uriel’s eyes catch on the knife still protruding from his chest.
“Don’t say it,” Castiel says, and works his way back up the beach, towards where Uriel stands.
“Say what?” Uriel replies, and steps neatly into Castiel’s path. A hint of a smile plays about his vessel’s lips, and there is a mirthful look in his eye.
“The quick-witted quip on the tip of your tongue.”
“Fine,” Uriel says, and pouts, just a little. “I’ll save it for someone who appreciates my ‘quick-witted quips.’”
Castiel sighs, and allows the vessel’s shoulders to slump. “I’m sorry, Uriel,” he says. “I do appreciate your quips. I am just… troubled, by the events that transpired tonight.”
“Evidently, you were troubled in more ways than one.”
Castiel shakes his head, and casually flicks the hilt of the knife. It feels—it feels good. “This is not ‘trouble.’ It doesn’t even hurt.” Uriel smiles, at that, and reaches out to flick the end of the knife too. Castiel hardly manages to contain the vessel’s instinctive gasp.
He turns to stare out at the lake. It is still and quiet, smooth like the fine china plates that were popular the last time he took a vessel. He puts his hands in his pockets, and is surprised to find things hidden away there—crumply paper and cold metal coins.
“He didn’t remember me,” Castiel says, after a time. “And he couldn’t see me, either. I had to take a vessel just to speak with him.”
Uriel shakes his head. If he is surprised, Castiel cannot say. “So,” he drawls, “the fate of Heaven rests on the shoulders of a blind little ape. Father did love his jokes, I suppose.”
Castiel sighs. “He’s not an ape, Uriel.”
“Semantics. What else did the boy say?”
“He said he doesn’t believe we exist.” Uriel raises his brows, incredulous. Castiel swallows, and continues. “He laughed when I told him what I am.”
“Ungrateful, blind, and faithless. I should toss him back into the Pit myself.”
Castiel bristles. “You know why you can’t do that,” he says, and stares over at Uriel’s profile, noting the way his vessel’s eyes narrow and tense.
“Do I?” Uriel says, and turns, so he faces Castiel directly. “Am I truly supposed to believe that this—this stupid, ignorant little fool is the Righteous Man? The Sword that Michael himself will wield in the days to come? We might as well march into battle with nothing but twigs.”
“You didn’t see him, Uriel. Not the way I did.” And oh, what a sight it was. The soul, piercing white and overlaid with deep black, pockmarked corruption, towering over the blasted, blighted lands of Hell like some strange Medieval castle. And the self-image it projected; part mangled flesh, part sulphuric smoke. The sharp-edged tool it clutched tight in its fist. The way it carved into the weeping soul below it, the artful scene of pain and despair. How it felt, when Castiel scooped that raw, starving, screaming thing inside of himself. And when it bit at his innermost walls until he bled, then suckled on his grace—Castiel shudders at the mere memory. He feels the echoes of it even now; the faint impression of hungry, tearing teeth deep inside.
“If you had seen him there,” Castiel says, “you wouldn’t doubt his importance.”
“Importance,” Uriel sniffs, crossing his arms. “We used to be important, back in the day.”
“No, we weren’t. Archangels are important. Our superiors are important. We are soldiers. We go where we are told to go, and we die when we are told to die. And besides,” Castiel says, “whatever Dean Winchester is, he is not faithless. I saw the shape of it in Hell, and again when he struck me. He is afraid. Very afraid. Of what, I cannot say.” Castiel brushes his fingers down the handle of the blade in his chest. “Afraid of me, perhaps.”
“Good. He should fear you. They all should.”
“No,” he says. He looks down at his hands, red and wet. “This is bad. My orders are to gain his trust. How am I to do so if he is afraid of me?”
Beside him, Uriel rolls his eyes. “You make him less afraid, obviously.”
“But how do I do that? Human emotions are confusing and strange. If they wanted someone who could manipulate them with any amount of skill, they should have sent a Cupid.”
At this, Uriel laughs. “A Cupid? They don’t know any more about human emotion than we do, Castiel. And,” he declares, “I think you’ll find that human emotions are much easier to understand than you’ve guessed. The Righteous Man is supposed to be a great warrior, isn’t he? If you want him to trust you, returning his silly little knife,” Uriel taps a finger against the hilt, “could be a place to start.”
He says nothing. Uriel looks at him, long and hard, and Castiel does his best to avoid squirming under his gaze.
“Why did you keep it, Castiel?” Uriel murmurs. As though he knows he is asking Castiel to confess a secret.
“I—“ Castiel cuts himself off and shrugs. The knife inside him shifts and grinds against the vessel’s collarbone. Like this, Castiel can almost convince himself that the sensation is not steel on mortal bone; instead, it is teeth inside him, ripping and tearing and sucking at his creature-parts and fifth-dimensional meat. “I don’t know,” Castiel says, decisively.
“You should be careful,” Uriel says, his voice grave and severe. “Our superiors won’t like that answer.”
“I’m aware,” Castiel replies. “But it is the only answer I can give.”
Uriel frowns. “Our superiors won’t like that, either.”
For a moment, Castiel pauses. He turns his true eyes to the true Uriel, lashed to his side in Heaven; the true Uriel looks at him in turn, his eyes wary and afraid. Castiel feels cold, all along the many places where their heavenly bodies are pressed together. He wonders how many other eyes are turned towards their two infinitesimal vessels, perched at the edge of a beach millions of miles below. He wonders who they are performing for, in this little play with a humble cast of two.
And then, he brushes his grace up against the knife in his chest and finds he doesn’t care. “Well,” Castiel says, spreading his many wings, “our superiors aren’t here.”
_____
Robert Singer’s home is small, and cramped, and dark. Castiel assumes the wallpaper was bright and cheerful, once, but years of dirt and dust and cigarette smoke have stained it dark, with a distinct yellow tint to the grime. The floor is a maze of squeaking nails and groaning timbers; Castiel hovers his vessel’s feet an inch above the worn wooden boards to avoid waking the people slumbering inside. Castiel passes through the kitchen, with its too-small countertops piled high with used dishes, and edges past a bathroom with a rust-ringed porcelain sink. He finds a glass-faced cabinet full of guns and a rather sizable collection of empty beer bottles tucked away in a room behind the stairs. He notes the trim—dark—and the wainscoting that lines the halls. He finds Robert asleep in his room, and Sam snoring gently on a too-small twin-sized bed tucked in the attic.
He finds Dean on a sagging couch. Sleeping, just like the others. His shoes are still on his feet, and he still wears his heavy jacket and uncomfortable jeans. A flat, old pillow is folded in half and shoved under his head. A dark red blanket is halfheartedly tossed over his legs. Castiel cannot see his face—at some point in the night, Dean turned his face into the back of the couch, and now he lies pressed against it, as though he wants the misshapen cushions to swallow him whole.
Castiel steps in close, until he can see the side of Dean’s neck and the soft swell of his cheek. He kneels, so he can look more closely. He studies the slight curl of Dean’s hair against his nape and inhales his sleep-smell; sweat and whiskey-sour breath. Like this, his soul has slipped closer to the surface. Castiel finds himself captivated by its many twists and turns. He hungers for it, in a way that makes him wish his true body had a mouth with which to swallow.
He moves even closer, until his vessel’s chapped lips are a mere whisper away from Dean’s jaw. Up close, Dean’s skin is a complex arrangement of fine hairs and pores and freckles. Castiel has never wanted like this. Not even in his earliest days, when the world was so young and fresh that there were no dead souls to fill his empty spaces.
And, so. Castiel watches over Dean the way he once watched Jesus of Nazareth sleep for one last time in the Garden of Gethsemane. He, too, slept fully clothed and afraid—the sandals still strapped to his feet, messy tear tracks still drying upon his face. That moment has since been memorialized in grand, blue-black paintings, a single streak of golden light haloing Christ’s somber, contemplative face.
Castiel wonders if this too will be memorialized in the centuries to come. If, once this story becomes gospel, some aspiring artist will paint this moment, just as painters of old have illustrated the entire arc of Christ’s life, over and over and over again. He wonders what such a painting would look like—would Robert’s house be as golden and bright as John Everett Millais imagined the humble home Christ was raised in? Or would it be transformed as the classical painters do—the grim walls replaced with delicate archways and spiraling curlicues. Castiel pictures it in detail; Dean’s blanket a lush brocade, his shirt a fine linen, open at the throat. His mouth prim in sleep, his hair curling delicately against his brow.
Would the Castiel in the painting be allowed to touch him? He pictures that, too; an errant, brush-stroked finger pressed gently against Dean’s bare shoulder, his lips just barely brushing the shell of Dean’s ear. He moves his own mouth up, up, until he, too, can just barely brush Dean’s ear with his own lips. It feels—Castiel can hardly stand it. It feels the same way the knife does, when he touches it.
He palms the knife’s handle, inch by inch. He curls his fingers around the wood one-by-one, until his hand is wrapped around the hilt, but he still—even now, he cannot bring himself to pull it free. Instead, he wiggles it back and forth, and wishes for things he cannot have, and a mouth he will never possess.
He pulls it free, eventually. The blade sticks against his collarbone for a moment, then slides easily through his softer meat and flesh. It leaves Castiel empty, as he was before Dean filled him so well and so thoroughly that he still craves it, even now. He—he longs, he covets. He wants to open his nonexistent maw and swallow Dean whole. He wants to take Dean from Michael—to claim Dean for himself, to take Dean’s vessel as his own and place Dean’s soul inside his innermost empty rooms and never, ever let either of them go.
After a time, the Host’s clamoring rises to a level he can no longer ignore. And so, he looks one last time—commits the Righteous Man to memory—and strokes his grace along Dean’s slumbering soul. It hisses and bites, just as it did in Hell. Castiel smiles, quiet and slow, and gently pries its metaphysical teeth free.
He leaves the knife on a nearby coffee table, the blade still red and slick with blood. He reaches out, tempted to press his palm to Dean’s cheek, but refrains before he can. And then, Castiel slowly, painstakingly reels his vessel back upwards, into Heaven. He is late for his debrief, and his superiors will have many questions.