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[Castiel] Thursday's child has far to go. (childofthursday) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2013-09-25 21:23:00

Who: Castiel & Samandriel
What: In order to get more insight into why Dean is the way he is, Castiel takes Samandriel up on his offer to go walking through Dean’s dreams. It’s more painful than Cas is prepared for.
When: Wednesday (after Dean’s standing pie date with Scud) 9/25
Where: Dean’s head
Rating: Medium - TW - Alcoholism, Child Abuse, War, Trauma, pretty much anything and everything.
Status: Complete




While he’d been trapped, Samandriel learned a lot about the sleeping habits of one Dean Winchester. Like how he generally took a nap before Castiel came home from work and Dean started dinner. It was with two fingers on the mechanic’s forehead that Samandriel turned that nap into true sleep, a mental flick to the alarm clock and Dean wouldn’t be waking up until the next morning. He’d be hungry and he’d probably really have to pee, but at least he’d be rested for once. Sort of. All Samandriel could really do was ensure that he stayed asleep, not that it was good sleep.

Still, he took his time to make sure that Dean was comfortable on his and Castiel’s bed and just as the clock tipped over to the time that his brother got off of work, he heard the flutter of wings behind him. “Are you ready?” he asked softly, smoothing his finger’s over Dean’s hair as though he could somehow soothe all the pain contained in him with a gentle touch.

Cas hadn't even taken his coat off yet, but didn't really seem like he wanted to, either. He looked at Samandriel, and then down at his sleeping husband and let out a great sigh, nearly sad. "No," he admitted, and felt a little guilty for it, but that didn't stop him from moving to perch on the side of the bed beside the two of them. "But that doesn't matter."

Samandriel looked up at his brother far too sadly. With a kiss to Castiel’s forehead, he brought them both into Dean’s dreams. Of all the places in Dean’s head they could have ended up, Samandriel was actually hoping for anything but this. Dean’s childhood was a distressing place on a good day. This was very much not one of those “good” days. John was passed out in a recliner, drunk and snoring while Sam played trucks in the other room.

Dean himself was perched in the bathroom (with, unbeknownst to him, two angelic companions,) seemingly in a race with himself to sew up what would eventually only become a faint scar on his side before either John woke up again or Sam needed him. The pressure mounting was palpable, tiny fingers trying to work a needle loaded with dental floss, sewing through the sting of tears and not making a sound. Samandriel supposed that if anything served as a very vivid metaphor for Dean’s whole life, this was it.

Cas could only stare at that younger version of Dean who was doing something no small child should ever have had to do. His expression remained blank, impassive, but that certainly didn't mean that he felt either of those things. His fingers curled around Samandriel's shoulders, gripping tightly, as if Castiel was worried he might lose his balance in this dream world.

"He won't notice us talking?" Castiel asked, a tiny whisper that was still too loud in a silent bathroom.

“No,” Samandriel said softly. “We can’t affect anything here at all.” As if to prove his point, he reached over to brazenly knock down a cup from the sink only to have his hand go straight through. Dean finished his work, knotted off the floss and with the needle caught between his teeth, groped for the scissors. They went clattering quietly to the floor, but that didn’t stop him from freezing, holding his breath while he just listened for a long moment. Just to be sure.

"His father did this," Castiel said, sounding something altogether different from sad, but then paused too, as if terribly wary about Dean's own pause; scared something would happen that he wasn't ready to watch.

Dream mechanics should have been interesting. Castiel should have wanted to know what would happen if he tried exiting the bathroom, tried exploring. But he didn't, not really.

“Yes,” Samandriel confirmed. “His brother was napping for it.” He pointed out the door at a broken bottle near the television. “Dean wasn’t changing the channel fast enough.”

When nothing happened, Dean relaxed and cut the floss. He put all his supplies neatly back into a hidden pocket he’d made in his backpack and snuck out of the bathroom to go play with his brother. That was when the dream shifted and Dean morphed into a teenager before their eyes. A different series of equally shitty rooms. No Sam, though. Just Dean trying to do his homework while his drunk father made it absolutely clear how much of a piece of shit he thought Dean was. And Dean just sat there and took it.

John’s words echoed throughout the dreamscape, a mantra underscoring Dean’s entire life. Worthless. Selfish. Waste of Space. Stupid. Accident. Disrespectful. John’s booming voice kept going on and on on, layering insults louder and louder on top of each other. All the while Dean sat there staring at the same page in his algebra book, pencil in hand, shoulders stubbornly steady. No. All of him was stubbornly steady. He didn’t even blink. Samandriel had to look away.

Castiel didn't seem able to look away though, he just stared and listened until his ears almost hurt over it -- which was weird, since he knew technically this was not his real form. After a long, long moment, he glanced at Samandriel, offered his hand in comfort, although he wasn't sure which of them it might help more.

"How does one fix this?" He asked, feeling lost and more than a little sick. "He believes all these things he's being told, here. You know that, though." It wasn't accusing, just understanding and hurt.

“I don’t know,” Samandriel replied honestly. The layering of words, (truths, really to Dean,) stopped abruptly with his father roaring, “Look at me when I’m talking to you!” The table and all of Dean’s things clattered to the side. Samandriel turned to see his brother-in-law gripped roughly by the collar of his shirt, not a teenager any longer but the man they both knew. Dean didn’t seem to realize.

The silence hung heavy for a moment until John cast Dean aside. “Clean up this mess and make the damn dinner like I told you to.” Dean got up, methodically picking up the table, the homework that would never get done, and his ruined notebook and broken pencil. Samandriel watched him clean up the remnants of the spaghetti he’d made for Sam when he got home off the wall.

"It's awful," Castiel said, suddenly paying a keen amount of attention to the floor. Samandriel and himself hadn't had the easiest or best childhoods either, he knew, but this was a different sort of bad. Where the angels had dealt mostly in neglect, Dean had the opposite of that problem. Too much attention, and all of it negative.

"His father makes me want to turn to violence," Castiel admitted, although he knew he shouldn't. It wasn't the sort of thing any man or angel should lust after. "I don't understand how he thinks he is like -- that man."

“It’s because right down to his core, he believes every adjective about himself but…” Samandriel looked over at Dean, watching the t-shirt change to a uniform and feeling grody tile become sand under his feet. The sound of gunshots and explosions in the distance. Dean kneeling not over a thrown pot of spaghetti but a fallen comrade. “He’s realized enough to know that those words apply to John as well.” The other man in his unit looked disturbingly like Dean’s brother. Samandriel knew it wasn’t, that this was just the dream fucking with Dean, but it was still hard. A whole platoon made up of nothing but Sams and Castiels. All of them dying one by one. Dean running around in panic trying to save them all, ignoring that his own body was being shot through while he ran.

“In the end, he can’t separate himself from John’s words and so he just lumps himself in with him. The apple not falling far from the tree and that.” Samandriel watched Dean impassively. “Like now. When he wakes up from this dream, he’ll focus not on what he was willing to sacrifice or push through, but on the fact that he couldn’t save anyone.” The smell in the air was somehow worse than the dead eyes of Winchesters on the ground. Samandriel was pretty sure that acrid, nauseating smell was what death actually smelled like, what war did, and not some sort of figment of Dean’s subconscious.

Everything about this scene made Castiel's stomach turn, made him want to bend over vomit until there was absolutely nothing left in him -- not even feelings. It was a really stupid thing to wish for, but it was there anyway.

He wasn't sure that understanding this made it better or easier. Everything felt more difficult now because how could he have hope for better things when he saw how far the uphill climb could be? It wasn't even a hill. It was just just a pit of abuse, self loathing and death. Castiel wondered if it was wrong or bad that it was easier to look at all of his own dead selves than it was to watch Dean.

"Samandriel." He didn't even know what to say, what to do, and nearly hated himself for it.

“Here,” Samandriel said. It would take a lot of his strength in this world, more than he thought he could manage properly, but for Castiel’s sake he would do that. “You may have to fly me home after this.” Dean’s dreams were as stubborn as the man himself, but regardless, Samandriel walked to his poor broken brother-in-law. The angel wasn’t strong enough yet to simply exert power to make Dean dream something he hadn’t already, but he could bring the man back to something he still had in him.

His fingers rested on the fabric between shoulderblades, great wings of dawning spreading behind Samandriel while he did. They found themselves in Castiel’s living room, and instead of crouched over a body, Dean’s arms were out while a little girl toddled with Castiel’s footsteps, whole hands gripping the angel’s bigger fingers. The coffee table had been pushed aside and the room itself was a mild level of chaos, but there was happiness and peace radiating off both Dean and the dream of his husband.

Samandriel wobbled a little bit, but managed to catch himself on the couch enough to rest.

Cas looked around the room, taking in himself, Dean. The child that wasn't. The mess of the room and the arrangement of the furniture. The comfortable pleasure and love here was palpable.

"He dreams this?" Cas' tone was wrecked, and he realized suddenly of all the scenarios shown to him, this was the one that had brought him to tears. And now that he was focused on it, it was hard to get them to subside, hard to breathe.

This dream was perfect. Too perfect. Because it seemed completely unattainable. Like some imaginary version of themselves that lived in ways that their real selves never, ever could.

But he was glad, somehow, that Dean might be positive enough to even imagine something like this.

“This is his hope,” Samandriel said, shifting on the couch. The little girl had Cas’ bright blue eyes and a grin that nearly took over her face when she finally made it to Dean and he rubbed his face hard in her shirt to make her squeal with laughter.

“And maybe part of him believes it’s completely unattainable, but he still has it.” The dream Castiel picked the child up, settling her against his hip. She babbled at him and he spoke to her as though he actually did understand baby. Dean stood and watched, smiling all lopsided and utterly full up with love.

It was just perfect and still for a moment right up until a mess of blonde hair and limbs came crashing around Dean’s thigh. “C’mon, Dad you promised we were gonna go to the park.” Dean ruffled the boy’s hair. “After you put your shoes on.” He looked pointedly at mismatched stocking feet.

The kid sighed heavily and stomped back up the stairs to go get his shoes, but even then, Dean was still ridiculously happy. “He’ll get over it, you know,” dream Cas said, bouncing their daughter. Dean just shook his head and went to go slip into his own shoes and grab his keys. “Come on, kiddo. Bus is leaving!”

Samandriel watched all of this and found himself somewhere lost in a pang of jealousy that his own parents had never been nearly so loving as Dean dreamt himself and Castiel.

“But all of this is his hope. Strong and brilliant that not only somewhere deep down does he know he can get over his own shit, but maybe you can actually learn to accept and embrace a little chaos too.” Samandriel looked over at his crying brother, reached up to rest a hand on his shoulder in comfort he didn’t think he should have to give. “Including the crayon on the wall behind the couch.”

Cas let out a choked little noise that ended up being a laugh -- broken but somehow bright at the same time. He leaned into his brother until their thighs were pressed up against each other, and he scrubbed at his face with the palms of his hands. This scene shouldn't have made him feel so desperate and weak, but it did. Because he wanted this in a way he'd never once before realized. He'd never even thought about children beyond a vague realization that Dean wanted them.

"I'm trying," he said, sounding earnest and hopeful and, yeah, more than a little scared. Because even know when he knew he shouldn't, he was thinking about the stupid marks on the stupid wall. He focused instead on Dean's smile - it was without a doubt the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.

Samandriel let Castiel have that moment with Dean’s smile for as long as he could, but in the end, he’d used up too much strength to get them to this one dream that he couldn’t keep them there any longer. Leaving the dream felt more like a sigh than anything else and Samandriel opened his eyes to Castiel’s room again. He wobbled again, barely having the strength left to sit up. In his sleep, Dean remained expressionless, but cried quietly. If Samandriel had to guess, it was probably for similar reasons to Castiel’s tears.

Apparently those tears had translated over to real life, because Cas' face was still streaked with them and his eyes looked like they were still threatening to overflow with more yet.

It didn't stop him though from reaching out and offering Samandriel a steadying grip. "You are Good, Samandriel," he told his brother in a hushed tone, filled with reverence and apology all at the same time.

“Take me home, Castiel,” he whispered, unable to bear being in the presence of so much emotion when he was already worn thin. “Please.”

Nodding as if he caught on to Samandriel's train of thought, Castiel schooled his expression into his normal blank one. And then they were gone from his bedroom, standing instead in Lucifer's living room. Wisely, the older angel said nothing.

Samandriel reached up to pull Castiel into a slow, empathic kiss before he broke away from that. He needed that affection after so much pain. Perhaps Castiel did too, but it mattered little in the moment when he was still swimming in Too Much. “Go back to him. I know you need to.”

At least making sure that Samandriel was seated first, he offered the younger angel another little kiss -- one on the forehead as if mirroring the actions of earlier. "As you like, brother," Castiel murmured softly and with as much warmth as he was able to manage.

And then he stood back, offered one more little smile that didn't quite reach his eyes, and then was gone.