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Sam settles into bed again, half exhausted and half hesitant. The nightmare had really thrown him off, and he’d woken with a twinge in his shoulder he could swear was worse than before.
He left the light on and closed his eyes, but the red behind his eyelids just reminded him of cracking necks and bodies strewn in dim scarlet flashes, of the feeling of blood and archangel power curling through his veins. Switched the light off. Complete darkness, no windows, cage. Great. He sighed, rolled over, feeling lumbering in the tiny windowless room. Brought the blanket over his head. Worse somehow – he couldn’t breathe. He left a small gap in the blanket for air, like the opposite of breathing into a brown bag, and willed his eyes shut.
How Sam got to sleep he didn’t know. There was the red again. The flashing lights on the ancient machines. This time, he couldn’t hear Dean charging through the corridors. Bodies everywhere but silence. Maybe a small muttering, echoes. He is himself only not just himself. Too much blood coursing through him, and sharing with a bunk buddy. He feels more than sees a hunter behind him. Clicks his knuckles irritably, into a tight fist, then sharp- splays his hand out, and the hunter crumples to the floor.
Not-him can feel grace echoing through the halls, weak and faltering but there. Dean’s room. Quirks his head with curiosity, and looks through the open door. Lucifer’s interest seems to override any fury he has. Because Cas is slumped on Dean’s bed with a dagger in his guts, and Dean is hectically trying to stop the blood, hands shaking but determined.
‘It’s okay Cas, I’ve got this, your grace will do the rest,’ and he’s ripped a stream of cloth from his shirt, perfectly plaid.
Cas looks anywhere but at Dean, tries to shift and his expression curdles. ‘My grace is not doing well right now.’
‘It’s fine it’s fine,’ Dean breathes. ‘The dagger isn’t deep, but I need to pull it out now.’ He grips Cas’s arm and looks to him for permission.
‘Oh so you’re looking at me now,’ Cas grunts. There’s blood on his teeth and in the strain of his voice.
Dean sags. ‘Please,’ he whispers. Cas is still looking aside. ‘I’m sorry.’
Dean sits slumped in defeat for a minute, hands still shaking, but it’s a different reason for shaking now. He stops. Crowds over Cas, the dagger horrifically still jutting out of his gut, but he lightly holds his hands to Cas’s face, a terrified feather of a touch. Cas freezes.
‘When you left,’ Dean croaked, ‘that’s when I realised that we were real.’ He taps his finger to Cas’s cheek. ‘We.’ Finally Cas looks up, but the blue isn’t ice now. Dean inhales and holds on tighter. ‘You were in my life by your own free will.’
Cas smiles a bloodstained smile, lifts his fingertips to Dean’s arm and lightly holds them there. Then looks down at the dark blood pooling at his stomach. ‘Get it out.’
Speed rushed back to Dean like being woken up, feverish, grabbing whisky and needle, rushing the plaid bandage under Cas’s back, ready to tie round when the dagger comes out. One, two, three, and a horrid wet drag, and Dean almost begging in a torrent of I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry but it was for everything and anything, and for pulling the bandage so tight round Cas’s stomach that Cas grabs hold of him in pain. He doesn’t realise that he’s still saying it until Cas weakly dips his knuckles to Dean’s lips, and that’s when he falters.
That’s also when Sam feels a twitch in his neck, like not-him is bored now. Sam’s heart hammers and thuds and he feels his neck angle and then-
Normal pitch black cage room again.