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Sam had 90% of a law degree, so he thought he was prepared to enter negotiations with the representatives of Heaven and Hell. They had been pursuing him separately for a while now, like they were the goddamn X-Men, recruiting him for special superhero school, except that instead of school it was an army, and instead of being a student, they wanted him to be the general.
Of course, Sam’s knee jerk reaction is to choose Heaven. Castiel’s case is convincing enough - peace on earth and mercy mild, etc., But Castiel’s not exactly your typical angel; he’s just way too nice. Sam’s seen what the more powerful ones can do, he’s seen Uriel raze an entire town, watched Ezekiel cut a swath through granite as easily as if he were tearing paper, then fuck off to God knows where while Sam stopped the inevitable landslide. He could feel his twelve-year-old self crying out in pain, but there was no more denying the truth of it, that angels sucked major ass. They were not merciful guardians he had always believed they were, but self-righteous, apathetic monsters, more interested in ends than means, with no regard for human life.
Dean doesn’t have regard for human life, either, but he promises Sam total control over the demon army. Allegedly. It’s his God-given power, or whatever, that he has dominion over all of Hell’s citizens, starting with Dean and ending with the bigwigs, even, Crowley and Abaddon and Queen Lilith. Allegedly. Sam knows better than to trust a demon, really.
He’d like to think so, anyway.
The thing is, Sam’s really fucking powerful. He knows this. He’s known it his whole life, when birds would follow him and flowers grew where he walked, adults would do whatever he asked and he had girls and boys falling all over themselves to touch him, kiss him, fuck him. Castiel names him Antichrist, Dean calls him the Boy King, but Sam makes no claims to any position on the spectrum of good and evil. He’s just Sam. He’s never done anything to hurt anybody, and if he could, he’d fucking cut and run right now, slap on some Radiohead and disappear completely, cover his ass so Heaven and Hell could never find him, and wait out the apocalypse. This world has never felt right to Sam, has never given him any place to call home, never extended any kindness or compassion. He owes nothing to no one, starting with his loyalty and ending with his effort.
But Dean and Castiel are fucking persistent. Negotiations take longer than expected, and it gets to the point where neither of them want to leave the other alone with Sam for more than a minute, and even after months, Sam still can’t decide which one he should go with. Castiel is reasonable, logical, and jives with Sam’s idea of angelic mercy, but Dean is aggressive as all hell, relentless, and surprisingly well-versed in the darker side of theology. And he keeps staring at Sam’s mouth, tongue poking out of the corner, swiping across his full, lower lip. It’s incredibly distracting when Sam is trying to listen to Castiel talk about lilies and Dean keeps looking at him like he wants to fucking eat him alive.
It doesn’t help that Sam would probably thank him for it.
Somehow it comes to this, to Sam falling asleep in the middle of negotiations - he’s only human after all - and waking up to Dean sprawled out on the bed next to him, Castiel nowhere to be found. It’s not a bad arrangement, per se; Dean’s bloodthirsty glee is all but turned off in the mornings, before he gets his hands on some coffee, and Sam is pretty sure that Castiel doesn’t sleep, which is probably for the best, because Sam doesn’t really want anyone to see him like this in the mornings, when Dean has shifted in his sleep to crawl up next to him, one heavy arm slung over Sam’s shoulder, his leg shoved up in between Sam’s knees, and Sam, shamefully, hard as a fucking rock. Sam’s no monk, but he’s starting to chafe under the constant supervision; for the last few months he’s only had his hand and his one single, solitary sex toy that he is 115% certain Castiel knows about but refuses to mention out of embarrassment.
Not to mention that there is something very, very appealing about the thought of saddling up and riding Dean like a pony. Hell, Castiel, too. They’re both hotter than the freaking sun, and Sam’s common sense is slowly suffocating beneath a mountain of sexual tension.
Damn his fickle dick.
He’s already showered and jerked off twice when Dean comes to join him in the kitchen, almost shoving him over in his quest for coffee, which Sam has ever so graciously already laid out for him, expecting no thanks but wouldn’t that be appreciated, Dean the Demon thanking his king for the gift of caffeine. “Dean,” he says from his seat at the table, “you gotta stop sleeping in my bed.”
Dean takes a long, long drink of coffee, downing the whole mug in one go with no regard for his no-longer-necessary lungs, letting out a mighty “phaah!” as he finishes, setting the mug on the counter. “Why? You’re comfortable. Heh, maybe I like sleeping in your bed, waking up with you sprawled all over me, your ass backed up onto my dick.” He has no filter, ever, but especially not in the morning, every single lewd thought tumbling out without provocation.
Sam blushes. “That’s… the point. Please stop - ”
“What, touching you? Cuddling with you?” He’s waking up now, running fingers through aggressively sexy bed head, arching his back in a morning stretch, shirt riding up his stomach. Sam’s mouth honestly waters.
“I was going to say ‘molesting me,’ but okay.”
“Mmm, but you’re so warm, Sammy. God, you’re so fucking hot, all limbs and long hair and fuckin’…” His voice catches on a yawn, mouth unhinging. Sam would be unsurprised to see a set of fangs, but no, Dean’s an entirely different monster. It’s fine all the same - Sam never went in for the Twilight phase, anyway. “When I wake up properly, I’m gonna kiss ya.”
“Whatever, Dean.”
“You will not,” comes the pained, gravel-grit voice of Castiel from the doorway. “I will not allow you to force yourself on him.”
“Morning to you, too, feather-fucker.”
“Hey, Cas.” They have this dialogue every damn morning, and it’s starting to drive them all a bit crazy. “Can’t negotiations wait until after breakfast?”
“You can do both, can you not? I do not require sustenance, and neither does Dean.”
He just does not fucking get it, does he. “Yeah, I know, I just thought…” He just thought that maybe he’d get a morning off, that maybe he could pretend for a moment that this wasn’t happening, that maybe he’d have an hour to himself to watch TV, read Game of Thrones, go for a walk down to the shitty park for no other reason than that he can, unburdened by his supernatural besties. “Never mind. It’s nothing.” He stands up from the table, snatching up his plate of half-finished eggs. “Let’s at least relocate to the couch.”
Sam sinking into the ratty, old couch seat, Castiel leaning forward in his chair across the expanse of the stained, uneven coffee table, and Dean, uncontainable Dean, sprawled over the arm of the couch or knocking on walls or pacing up and down; their sick, twisted parody of domesticity was funny at first, but now it’s just exhausting. Sam needs to make a choice.
“I do not want to push you, Sam, but there are forces moving beyond my control. My brothers and sisters are mobilizing, and they will not wait much longer. You must make a decision, and soon.” Castiel implores, hands folded in his lap. Dean scoffs.
“Bullshit, dude, they can’t do a damn thing without a memo from the Big Kahuna. They can wait as long as they fuckin’ like.”
Sam sighs. “Look, Cas - “
“I wish you would not interrupt me during my statement, demon,” Castiel interjects, and of course, the irony is completely lost on him, for fuck’s sake, “I allow you your allotted time, please show me the same courtesy.”
Dean’s usual, full-belly laugh is nowhere to be found in the guffaw that forces its way out of his throat. It’s a terrifying sound, a predatory screech, and Dean flexes his claws. “Is this some kinda joke? Like I don’t sit by with my thumb up my ass while you steamroll over all of my statements, you self-righteous, racist pig - “
“As if your side can offer anything that Heaven cannot match - “
“Oh, yeah, of course! Heaven’s reward, life as a human weapon, a goddamn puppet, that’s what Sam deserves - “
“You seek to damn him further, and yourself, you filthy creature, crawling in the mud, begging for your favor - “ Castiel is standing up now, the whole building shaking, a supernova waiting to happen in the tiny, grimy apartment.
“Enough!” Sam shouts, jumping up, “Shut up!” The coffee table cbreak in half with a deafening crack, a neat slice through the old wood. They stop. They turn to him, waiting. “Cool off, both of you! Negotiations are over for today.”
“Sam, I was only trying - “ only trying to blow up the whole goddamn county by picking a fight with a low-level demon, Jesus Christ, but Castiel has done enough fucking damage today.
“Cas, just - get out. Go away. Come back tomorrow.” He blinks. He disappears with a flutter of wings. Sam feels almost sick, the stubbornly resistant religious part of him shaking with shame at telling an angel to fuck off.
“Aw, Sammy, I knew you’d take my side eventually - “
“Shut up,” Sam says. He’s mad. He’s fucking furious. He expects the two of them to behave like rational, mature adults - although God knows why, they haven’t given him any reason to believe it - and every single time they disappoint. Dean looks like he’s about to retaliate, but he takes one look at Sam’s face and snaps his mouth shut, crossing his arms, slumping down in the now-vacant chair. He’s pouting like a child, like he didn’t try to start shit either. Sam falls back onto the couch, head in his hands. His table is broken and his head is aching and he’s probably going to vomit all over Dean. God, this is so fucking frustrating. “I’m not taking your side. I’m mad at both of you. Can’t you two have one day where you don’t try to level a small town over me? That’s not gonna help either case.”
“Hey, ‘s not my fault that you’re valuable property.”
“Oh yeah, that’s totally the way to get me to join your cause, by treating me like an object.”
“That’s what they’ll do to you,” Dean says, suddenly surging up. He steps over the broken coffee table, looming over Sam. “You’ve seen them work, you know what they think of you. ‘Abomination.’ ‘Weapon.’ You’re not a person to them, Sam.” He’s right. Dean’s 100% right. The angels don’t treat him like a person; most of them don’t even want anything to do with him. He’s an unfortunately extremely powerful ally, and he knows that Heaven and Hell both are only contacting him out of desperation, a last resort in a cataclysm at a standstill to try to force the cosmic ball rolling.
“What, like I’m a person to you?”
He’s just not sure where he stands with Dean. He never has been. With Heaven, he gets it, they have a natural aversion to anything without wings, anything that doesn’t fit into their neat little good and evil box, but Dean… the way he looks at Sam, sometimes. It’s more than lust, more than desire. Castiel says it’s covetousness, but Sam’s not so sure. He’s woken up numerous times to the demon sharing his bed, staring at him with stars in his eyes, gaze dragging over Sam so slowly as to memorize every line of him, every curve and every color. He shushes Sam back to sleep with such gentleness, with quiet words and a timid hand coming out to stroke his hair. “You’re safe, Sammy,” he promises, just this side of a sigh, “I’ll keep you safe. I’ll keep you.” In the morning, he’ll deny everything, but it lingers anyway, in the way he dogs Sam’s heels, hangs on Sam’s every word.
It’s unnerving, to say the least.
Dean, somehow, can still loom even while he gets down onto his knees, in between Sam’s spread legs, hands sliding up towards his thighs. “You don’t even know, do you?”
“Know what?”
“What you are to me.” The air is thick enough to suffocate them both, but Dean’s hands on his knees threaten to do him in first. Dean crowds him, crawling up the length of his body, hands bracketing his shoulders, and Sam is trapped, wonderfully, gloriously trapped. He wouldn’t try to run even if he could, and why would he, when all he’s wanted for months now is this, Dean’s body hovering over his own, Dean’s mouth close enough to kiss. His own mouth hangs open and he runs his tongue across his lower lip, and Dean shudders, a full bodied shiver, hands clenching and unclenching, eyes flicking back and forth, black and green and black again. He growls with the force of his want, and Sam can see it, see right into the black, twisted soul of him, see everything Dean wants, sees himself laid out as Dean worships him, offers him flesh and blood, sucks his dick on the throne of hell, “Sam, Sammy, let me kiss you, lord, let me kiss you,” he whispers like he’s dying for it, like Sam is the only thing he’ll ever need ever again.
He wants to say yes. He wants to say yes so badly. “No,” slips out instead. “I’m still mad at you.”
There is a moment where he thinks Dean will kiss him anyway. Then he backs off. Sam is suddenly, overwhelmingly, bone-crushingly tired, his patience running out of him like water. He scrubs a hand over his face, letting his head fall back. “No more talking. Come back tomorrow, Dean.” When he looks up, Dean is gone. He is alone. He salts the doors and windows, just to make sure.
—
The next morning, he wakes up alone, too, for the first time in months. It would be refreshing, if his bed weren’t so cold. When he stumbles into the kitchen, Castiel is already there, making himself uncomfortable on the linoleum. “Hello, Sam.”
He sighs. “Can we please wait on negotiations until I’ve made coffee? Just give me like, four minutes.”
Castiel nods. “Four minutes. Yes.”
“Um, I don’t actually mean… never mind.” Hyperbole is utterly lost on Heaven’s army. Sam is just tired enough and just annoyed enough to mark that down on his mental chart of pros and cons. “Just, sit down, make yourself comfortable.”
“I am fine here, thank you,” and he is, he would literally stand there until the end of days because weird human courtesies make little to no sense to him, and Sam has just about had enough of his trenchcoat and his simpering and the years of wasted belief.
“Castiel,” he says in a voice not to be argued with, “sit the fuck down.” He does. His ass is in the chair so quickly it squeaks, no question, just immediate and total obedience, and Sam literally can’t do this anymore; no one should have this power, this horrible, destructive power that isolates and alienates and leaves him adrift on the sea of destiny. Sam crashes into the chair opposite, head in his hands. “I’m so fucking sorry, Jesus, I didn’t - I didn’t think, I just, I’m so, so sorry Cas, please, just - “ his breath shudders in and out, shoulders bowed with the weight of broken faith, because what’s the point of belief in a higher power when you are the higher power? “Help me,” he whispers between grinding teeth, eyes shut, pulling at his hair, “help me, please.”
And then there are hands on his, pulling them from his head, holding them together. “Peace,” comes the voice from above, “You shall know peace. Breathe, Sam.” The hand of doubt squeezes his lungs, wraps an iron band around his heart, and he feels so cold, all the way down to his marrow, but Castiel holds his hands in his own, a beacon of warmth that trickles through Sam like a slow, steady fire, a spark shooting across the kindling in his veins. “Peace,” he says again. A steady hand comes to rest in his hair, stroking softly, and Sam struggles to match his breath to it, wretched, gasping sobs that give way to heavy, slow pants. “Peace,” he says a third time.
If only.
After a while, his breath evens out, and Sam pulls away, rubbing at his eyes. “Sorry. Thanks.” Castiel stands before him, hands pulling back.
“What are you sorry for?”
For that embarrassing display. What a fine leader he makes, crying at the drop of a hat. “For using my power on you. The sitting and the comfort thing. Yeah. Sorry.”
Sam knows the wings are mainly metaphor and misinterpretation, but Cas really does look like a bird when he cocks his head in confusion. “You did not force me.”
“I didn’t?”
“Not entirely. The command to sit, yes, but nothing more.” Castiel eases back down in his chair, gently, every joint and muscle working perfectly to maximize comfort and efficiency, and it’s so unhuman it makes Sam’s skin crawl. But he’s trying. He’s trying. “It may surprise you to hear this, but despite what some of my brothers and sisters think, I do believe you would be a large asset to our cause - not only because of your power, but also because of your person.”
Sam laughs, watery and limp. He can’t help it; his person is cowardly, weak, he runs away at the first sign of responsibility and he can’t make an obvious choice for the fate of the entire goddamn planet. What exactly about him could angels want? What exactly about him would demons follow? “I thought I was the the Antichrist. Doesn’t that automatically preclude evil?” Heaven’s army certainly thinks so. There’s no love lost between Sam and most of the garrison. Michael refuses to even deal with him directly, sending his lower peons to negotiate for him. He knows what they think of him - it’s as clear as day. Dean’s voice creeps back to him, abomination, weapon. Monster. He’s a monster.
Castiel shifts in his chair, the most human gesture he’s made all day. “It is possible, yes. It is equally possible that you are not. Antichrist is a position, a title, rather than one man. The demons believe that you are the false prophet, spoken of in the Revelation of John.”
“And what do you believe?” He wants to know. He needs to know. He doesn’t want to know.
“I.” Castiel looks away. Sam’s heart is in his throat, breath all but disappeared. This is it, Cas hates him. He thinks he’s evil, he thinks that Sam is going to go nuclear over the universe’s ass - “I believe, instead, that you may be Elijah. That you will aid us in the fight against the Beast. That you fight for righteousness, and love, and eternal life.”
His blood is deafening, heart jumping out of his mouth, stomach knotted around itself, divine validation striking through to the very core of him. It’s so much. It’s all so much, God and destiny and the Beast and the war and he’s just Sam, pathetic, tiny, human Sam, inherently neutral and hanging by a thread off the edge of a cliff. He slaps a hand over his mouth before he screams, or weeps, or laughs, or some disturbed combination of all three, shoulders shaking.
“Sam?” Castiel makes to stand up, but Sam throws out a hand. He shakes his head. He can’t speak. “Sam, are you… let me help, please - “
“No,” he gasps, “no. Just. Stop. Stay there.” He feels every electron in his skin, every leyline crisscrossing overhead, every pulse of energy from him to Cas, to the baby bird outside his window and the star in its final death throes on the opposite side of reality. He doesn’t want anyone to touch him. He doesn’t want anyone to see him like this. “Go away.”
But Castiel remains, rooted in his chair on the other side of the table, holding vigil. He will not leave. Sam can see it, see all of him - short of the apocalypse starting right this moment, he will not move until Sam returns to himself, which surely he must.
It’s incredible. Sam doesn’t even have that kind of faith in himself.
Still, Sam pulls himself back from his second breakdown of the morning, somehow, the knots unravelling. Eventually, he can even sit up, hands on his temples. “Sorry. Again.” He’s going to instate a new rule, as soon as Dean gets here - no more morning meetings. It’s bad for everybody involved.
“I am still unsure why you are apologizing.”
“Just…” Sam gestures vaguely, to nothing, “I dunno. I’m supposed to be kingly, or, or dignified, or. Something. Not… this.”
“I do not see a problem with ‘this,’” he says, raising his hands in order to perform air quotes. “All that ‘this’ tells me is that you have compassion, empathy. That you are human.”
What a joke. Nothing about him is human. Nothing he has lived through counts as a human experience. He’s a force of nature, a bioweapon, and he would do well to remember it.
There’s a knock at the front door, and a muffled voice drifts in. “Sammy? It’s, uh. It’s me. Dean. Your favorite demon. Um… Is this a bad time?” That’s about as polite it gets, with Dean. Even Cas is confused.
“Why has he not entered?” Castiel asks, standing up. Sam stands up, too, turning to the forgotten coffee pot.
“I was pissed yesterday, so I made him leave, then I salted the doors. In retrospect, it was kind of petty… anyway. If you could go let him in, let me just make some coffee. I’ll be out in a minute.”
“Of course.” He leaves. From the next room over, Dean insults the angel. Castiel admonishes him quietly.
Sam clutches the countertop, and takes a deep, deep breath.