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The door slammed shut with the finality of a death cry, like the wisp of a moment that separated a fragile human life from eternal silence. Castiel sensed the tears welling up in his eyes, had done so for a while now. He couldn't even remember when the crushing feeling of certainty had settled somewhere in the pit of his stomach. It had probably happened hours ago, the second Dean had mentioned that both his mother and Jack were missing.
Ever since then, Castiel's human body had been steadily sliding out of his grasp, his waning powers woefully inadequate to wrestle it back under control. On his way to this remote cabin, he'd been forced to halt at the edge of the road multiple times because his vision had blurred too much to keep going without endangering others. Each time, he'd managed to fight the tears back down, because they weren't his to spill.
The phantom sensation of a chokehold around his throat was new, though. That had only set in when Dean's words had cut him deeper than any of his brethren's blades ever had. Every sentence Castiel had managed to force past the constriction in his vocal chords had been coarse as sand in his mouth, stifling him from within. Breaths full of dust, he'd used up what little remained of his resolve to give Dean the last thing he had left to give—an explanation.
An apology, of course, was out of the question. Some things could not be forgiven. The moment Rowena had spoken the words nobody in the room had been willing to hear, Castiel had known he'd lost absolutely everything. His entire existence, this new life he'd built for himself far away from Heaven's Host, lay shattered in pieces on the half-rotten floorboards of this cabin that might have been a home a long time ago. Whatever purpose it may have had once, now it sat forgotten at the edge of a blast site, waiting for the deterioration to progress further.
Though Castiel's wings were broken and his grace diminished, his instinct for flight was intact. It ran through every nerve this human body had to offer, coiling it tight enough to spring without warning. The instinct was strong, pushing him to leave right this instant, to take flight in his car rather than with a flap of wings, and fade out of the Winchesters' lives before he could do any more harm.
Once more, his body refused to do his bidding, though, rooting him to the spot. Despite knowing better, despite knowing he'd reached the limits of what he could take, he lifted his gaze. The pain on Sam's face, the pain he had caused, knocked the breath out of him in a violent exhale. They looked at each other in silence, the sound of splintered furniture still echoing from the dust particles floating in the air between them.
"Cas…" Sam breathed, his voice as wrecked as Castiel's insides.
Castiel swallowed in the doomed attempt to free his throat from the weight pushing against it, choking him. His empty fists curled at his sides, useless against a foe no weapon could kill. Perhaps he would have considered actually battling that stifling lump with his blade, if there wasn't one last mission to fulfill. Bring back the woman whose name he'd lost any right to even think —or die trying.
One of these possibilities was far more likely than the other, considering the shreds of communication he'd picked up from his siblings lately. The Empty had proven that the Host was too weakened now to withstand an invasion. And every single angel still alive knew who was to blame for that. There was so much blood on his hands.
"You know Dean didn't mean that," Sam said, far too quiet to be heard over the barrier of guilt and pain that stood between them.
Castiel said nothing.
"...right?" Sam asked, whisper-soft, and despite all the hurt they harbored, his eyes widened in a plea Castiel couldn't heed.
The silence stretched between them, pressed down on both of them until they were drowning in it.
"Dean was right," Castiel finally said, hating the sound of his own voice grating against the sand in his airways. "This is my fault."
Sam looked stricken, and Castiel regretted having spoken at all. As always, he'd just ended up making a bad thing even worse.
"Cas, no," Sam said, taking a single step towards him. Castiel wasn't sure what Sam had seen on his face, but whatever it was made him halt in his movement. "This isn't on you."
"M—" Castiel started, only just catching himself before saying her name again. "She would still be here, Sam, if only I hadn't—" The pitiful remnants of his strength left him all at once in a single exhale, his shoulders deflating and his legs almost giving in on him. He let his gaze fall to the ground, stuck it to a broken floorboard. "We'd still be a family," he added, the pain of a lifetime condensed into a single whispered sentence.
The touch of warmth on his shoulder caught him by surprise, let him rasp in another breath in a way that was far too human for the grace that was still floating through this mortal hull, though it seemed to drift further out of his reach with every passing year. There was no going back for him. And no going forward either.
"Cas… we are still a family," Sam said, voice soft but tone insistent.
And somehow this kindness Castiel didn't deserve weighed heavier than all that bundled up pain, because that was what finally made his knees buckle.
"Whoa, hey," Sam said, going down to the floor with him until they were both kneeling, catching each other's weight. Both of Sam's hands were on his shoulders now, and the hunter gave his face a worried inspection. "Cas, you okay?"
Acting on the instinct that several years among humans had taught him, Castiel nodded in blatant defiance of the truth. "Yes."
Sam huffed out a breath that might have been a smile under any other circumstances. One of his hands moved from Castiel's shoulder to the spot where his jaw met his neck, patting it once. The sensation shook loose the memory of a very different time. Sam must have followed his mental leap, because he suddenly whispered, "The only person who has screwed things up more consistently than you is me."
It was Castiel's turn to breathe out a non-smile in a place that had forgotten the meaning of laughter a long time ago. The moonlight falling in through yellowed curtains illuminated Nick's body in the corner of the room, the sheet covering him not quite large enough to conceal the grisly sight of broken and charred fingers. Jack had done this.
Castiel's vision blurred yet another time on this long, horrible day, and a tear for them all finally broke free, even if it wasn't his place to cry. Sam's eyes widened slightly in reaction, tracking the path of the tear down Castiel's cheek. Then they grew impossibly soft around the edges before Sam pulled him closer with gentle pressure against his shoulder blades.
Castiel allowed himself to sink against Sam fully, returning the embrace, resting his chin on Sam's shoulder. A broken sound cut through the silence, and Castiel wasn't sure who of them had released it. He decided it didn't matter, and placed what remained of his ruined wings around Sam in the ether, the shame of tattered feathers invisible to human eyes.
~