.𖥔 ๋ .•⋆.𖤍.⋆•. ๋𖥔.

By the time the impact registered, the ferocious jaws of the beast were already firmly embedded in the muscle of your inner thigh, just above the knee. Running on a flood of pure adrenaline, you swung at the creature, hoping to knock it loose with your remaining strength. A surge of blinding, white-hot pain like nothing you’ve ever felt before let you know how productive that idea was. The broken scream that tore from your throat alerted the seraph, engaged in his own battle, to your rapidly deteriorating situation.

Flipping his blade to a reverse grip, Castiel brought it down into the shoulder of the demon in front of him. Golden light poured from her eyes and mouth as grace consumed her, bathing Cas in a heavenly aura, highlighting his celestial- albeit borrowed- features.

The angel heard your cry as he ripped the blade loose again. His head snapped in your direction, eyes widening as he quickly appraised your dire circumstances. Moving with a grace reserved for the divine, Castiel crossed the wooden floor of the suburban living room so quickly that the air formed a current of wind that billowed the bottom of his coat as he moved.

Taking in your form, he notices the trail of blood running down your leg and traces it upward to its point of origin, the gnarled mess of tissue still locked securely within the hell hound’s maw. As if by instinct alone, the soldier drove his angel blade through the skull of the invisible beast. At least it was supposed to be invisible, but in a grim display of mortality, it had taken on a veritable cloak of your blood, defining the grotesque features of your assailant like bringing life to an abomination meant only for one’s darkest nightmares. A wailing howl could be heard as the canine’s skeletal frame, once concealed in its wickedness from the eyes of mortal men, illuminated and turned to ash before your eyes.

Feeling the dog release its hold, your body involuntarily relaxed, and your limp leg took you to the ground, collapsing in a heap of blood and overwhelming pain. The smell of iron is intensifying by the second in the confined space, signifying just how much of your life blood the beast had drained from you, and continued to drain despite its own demise. Castiel rushed to you, catching you swiftly, cradling you in his arms to keep your head from impacting the solid floor and causing even more harm to you.

His eyes run over you, wide with disbelief at the horrific sight before him. As a soldier of Heaven, Cas knew that he had seen some of the very worst torture that humanity and their divine brethren could inflict upon each other, but in that moment, he would have struggled to find a single memory quite as terrifying as the one unfolding before him in real time.

Castiel was struck almost completely dumb, unable to decide which of the million thoughts running through his mind should make it out of his mouth first, leaving him utterly silent as he held you in his lap. Despite his inability to form coherent speech, he moved one hand from your head, brushing a piece of your hair out of your eyes as he went, and with precision, began to put pressure on the wound in an attempt to stem the bleeding.

In all of the chaos of his mind, all he can manage to say is, “I’m sorry.” Whispering it over and over again like a solemn prayer seeking forgiveness for a sin that he could not yet articulate. Cas’ brain is working overtime to process his thoughts. He manages to add a few more words to his vocabulary, and his mantra begins to change. “I’m sorry. I- I should have been faster. I-” his voice hollow and catching in his throat at the realization that these might just be the last words you will ever hear him say.

Watching you drift in and out of consciousness, your eyes fighting to keep sleep at bay, your breathing was shallower than he had ever heard it, even in the quiet moments of rest you stole in the back of the Impala when you thought no one was looking. The ones where you would start sitting curled up on your side of the back seat, leaning your head against the window and trying to make yourself as small as possible. But somehow, every time you would wake up with your head resting on the angel’s shoulder, seemingly through coincidence alone. He would never admit that he would move you in your sleep to keep your head from bouncing off the glass due to Dean’s less-than-careful driving. He would never admit that he found the warm weight of your head resting on him to be one of the most calming forces he has ever encountered. He would never admit that he would do anything to give you only pleasant dreams, so that he can hear those soft snores and feel you subconsciously nuzzle into him with a small smile on your face.

The twitch of your hand snaps Castiel back to reality. He is stunned to see it rise from where it had been thus far, clutching your other leg as a coping measure against the agony, slowly but steadily through tremendous effort. Your blood-soaked fingers come to rest against the angel’s chest, unwittingly smearing your blood into the fabric and staining a patch of red in the center of his crisp, white dress shirt. The heat of it felt to him as if it would burn the skin of his vessel, as if to brand him with a symbol of his failure. His inability to keep the most important thing in his life out of harm’s way seeks to immolate him from the inside, guilt threatening to eat him alive with every pained groan that slips unbidden from your lips.

The pain, though intense and overwhelming in its outset, gave way to something altogether more frightening. An all-encompassing numbness, brought on by the overwhelming amount of red leaving your body, began at the tips of your fingers and toes and crept steadily inward from all directions, aiming to eventually swallow you whole.

Your sight began to cloud, the ever-growing vignette encroaching further and further upon your field of vision, until all that remained in view was Castiel’s face. Softened in your gaze and accompanied by a pair of what looked to be wings. Castiel’s wings. Ones you had never been able to see before, always knew were there, but had never felt you deserved to see. They flickered in and out of view like an old tube TV picture filled with snowy static. You almost couldn’t believe what you were looking at, as if they were some mirage in a desert to your bleary eyes. Large and obsidian feathers glinted and shimmered in what seemed to be an ethereal light, completely devoid of a source, seeming instead to emanate from the air around Castiel himself. They even rustled and flared with each move the angel made, as though trying to assist in performing some function.

The sight is enough to distract you from your situation for a moment, to provide a momentary solace in the midst of your suffering. Using what is left of your rapidly dwindling strength, you whisper to your angel, ”They are beautiful. You are beautiful, Cas.” Your hand falls limp from his chest, and you finally succumb to the advancing dark.

𖤍: Hello again, favored ones! I hope I have not caused you too much undue pain, but I am ever a lover of angst. I have been under the weather recently, so writing has been a bit difficult, but I am glad I was able to get this out to you all! If you have any requests, please drop me a line. I'd love to hear from you! :)

The past few weeks have been marked by a string of violent murders, but the most startling part was that nobody seemed to notice. Everything was just as it had always been, except for the fact that lately, people could be right in front of you one minute, drinking and enjoying their lives only to be found in pieces with their picture on the front page of the newspaper the following day. 

One of your regulars had met exactly that fate less than a week ago. Then a local preschool teacher you had graduated high school with, then the store clerk at the local supermarket who always greeted you with a kind smile while he bagged your groceries. Whatever was going on, though, it seemed unlikely to stop anytime soon. Unless someone was willing to do something about it, that is. 

From there, you began to look deeper into what was really happening to these people. Not knowing where to start, you combed back through the articles detailing each victim’s grisly demise. What connected them, what set them apart, anything that might provide some sort of clue as to why they were targeted in the first place. 

Since then, you couldn’t get it out of your mind. Running through the details over and over, wondering if there was something crucial you had missed. Your focus bordered on obsession and may have led to one or more patrons receiving a stiffer drink than they ordered, but that seemed like an acceptable trade off, all things considered. 

Pouring those last few drops into the patron's glass, you handed the drink over to with a smile before making your way to the end of the bar. The man you had greeted earlier was slightly hunched in his seat, leaning forward with his elbows on the bar top, in the middle of wrapping up a phone call as you walked up to him. “Yeah, I’ll let you know what I can find…Yep….Alright, I’ll keep you updated, Dean…Okay. Yeah, bye.” With that he hung up, slid his Blackberry into the pocket of his trousers, and lifted his gaze to you. His hazel eyes were enough to catch you off guard. He was the classic pretty boy with soft-looking hair, just enough muscle, and a smile that lit up his face. That’s not to mention his stature. Even sitting down, it was apparent that he was above average in the height department. All in all, he was an attractive man. The kind of attractive that could be disarming if you let it. And you would be willing to bet your bottom dollar that he knew it too. 

“Hi! Welcome to Lucky’s. What can I get you?” You asked laying down a drink napkin with a smile, leaning over the bar toward him to hear his answer. 

“Whiskey, neat please. And you wouldn’t happen to have been working around this time last week would you?” Pausing he reached into the hidden pocket of his suit jacket and withdrew his credentials. Lifting the badge for your view, he introduced himself as Special Agent Jim Morrison. 

“Funny,” you quipped with a little chuckle to yourself, “That’s not the first fake ID I’ve seen tonight.” 

The man looked startled for a moment, eyes widened and brows furrowed, his attention flicking between your face and the badge in his hand before he recovered his composure. Then, he settled his gaze back on you with a confused determination. “What do you mean?” He started with a breathy laugh. Glancing slightly downward, his tongue lightly swipes his bottom lip, pulling it between his teeth for a moment. The crooked smile, though, does little to mask his discomfort at being caught in his lie. “This badge is-“

“Oh, give it up,” you cut him off, holding him at attention with the sharpness of your gaze. “First of all, the photo is in the wrong place. Second, you have no badge number. And is Morrison even your real name or are you just a fan of The Doors, too?” You let him stew in his discomfort for a second before resigning slightly as you looked down at the drink napkin in front of him, “Look, it’s fine. I don’t need to know, okay, just put it away.” 

Leaning over the bar to point out the discrepancies, it was impossible for Sam not to notice your chest. Your skin looked soft, a delicate chain hung around your neck with a pendant that fell beneath the collar of your shirt, likely nestled in the valley between your breasts. The warm creamy vanilla of your perfume blended with the quiet sweetness of your skin hit him the moment you leaned close, and he swore it nearly lifted him from his seat.

Sam chuckled to himself, recovering quickly and looking for a way to salvage the situation. Not usually the sort of man to go silent when in the presence of an attractive woman, he suddenly found himself at a loss for what to say. This woman was dangerous in every beautifully disarming way. It made him feel like he was 16 again, unsure and out of his league. Your charm numbed his senses while your wit robbed him of his certainty. “Uh, yeah okay. You got me,” he started coming clean with a shrug and a shake of his head. “My name’s Sam. Sam Winchester. By the way, uh, how did you know all that? Nobody’s ever questioned it before.”

“Well, Sam,” you paused, deciding you liked the way his name felt on your tongue, “...the fact that you just admitted to having impersonated law enforcement before aside, my dad was a cop. Always told me to watch out for guys who like waving badges around. Told me how to protect myself. So, I made an educated guess. It just happened to be right,” you replied with a wink. 

Reaching for the bottle of whiskey, you poured him his drink with a knowing smile. “You’re cute, but if you’re gonna lie to me, at least laminate it better next time.” You had to admit, it felt good to have a guy like him on his heels for you. “What was it you were looking to ask me?” 

The question snapped Sam from his trance. Oh, right! There was actually a reason he was here, and it wasn’t just to stare at you. “Yeah, so get this,” he begins, clearing his throat. He goes on to explain that he was inquiring for information about the recent murders plaguing the town, mentioning that each of the victims had visited Lucky’s in the days before their demise. He then produced a set of photographs from the file he had been resting his elbows on for you to view. Handing them over the bar to you, he asks, “Do you remember seeing any of these people in the bar over the past few weeks? If they were with anyone or went home with anyone?”

As the two of you talked about the case, you grew more and more impressed by Sam’s ability to put together all of the seemingly unrelated pieces of the puzzle. But if you were being honest with yourself, you were impressed by more than just his intellect. His voice was like butter laid melting over the ambient noise of the bar, and despite the gruesome subject matter at hand, you reckon you could listen to him speak all day. ‘This is wrong,’ you thought to yourself. ‘All of these people are either dead or missing and here I am drooling over a guy when I should be helping him find out what’s happening! Get it together!’ Your resolve lasts all of two seconds when you catch his eyes again. 

            Looking at the bent photograph in your hand, the lights begin to flicker above your head. Once, twice, and a third time before cutting out completely with an audible snap. A buzzing whine can be heard as the power drains from the neon sign outside. The air shifts suddenly, taking on a disembodied chill that creeps its way into your bones. 

            “…That’s not an electrical surge, is it?” you ask, trying fruitlessly to keep the faintest hint of fear from entering your voice. Sam is already scanning the vicinity, seemingly on high alert. His eyes dart back and forth around the room observing his surroundings as a trained warrior would in battle.

“Hurry. Do you keep salt behind the bar?” he asks, snapping his gaze to you. His brown eyes are wide with severity. 

“Salt?” you ask, blinking, not all that sure you heard the man correctly. What would he want salt for at a time like this? A margarita to calm his nerves? It is at this point that you begin to thank your lucky stars that the only other patron you had in the last hour decided that one drink was enough and left promptly after finishing it, leaving you and Sam alone in the bar. 

Another noise captures both of your attentions. A low groan emanating from the back hallway with no logical source. You can hear the rumbling of boxes being tossed about in the stockroom. The bottles on the wall behind you begin to rattle as the noises get louder and louder.

“Just-whatever you have. Grab it. Now.” Sam whispers, his jaw locked with tension, clearly readying himself to face whatever is behind that door. 

He’s already moving, muscles tensing under the thin material of his dress shirt as he pulls something silver from the waistband of his trousers, the metal glinting in the moonlight coming in the store window. In an instant, the fake FBI crime investigator is gone, and Sam becomes something else entirely. Something more akin to a hunter than a bureaucrat.

You hesitate. Frozen in your fear, you want to reach for the margarita salt, but you can’t. Your fingers won’t comply with any command that your brain sends their way. 

The back door slams open with a loud crash, pieces of plywood splintering off into the air with the force of it. A gust of frigid air blasts from the opening, nearly knocking you off your feet and throwing the bottles off of their shelves above your head. Ducking to avoid the falling glass, you find the salt container and toss it to Sam. 

“Stay down!” he tells you with the authority of a man who’s seen this sort of thing before. He circles the end of the bar toward the source of the noise, gun raised with the salt held in his nondominant hand.

In the darkness, a shadow shifts. A loud crash, then another, the sound of claws scraping against tile. From your position, you see relatively little. Moving slightly to peek your head out from behind the bar, you see something vaguely humanoid in shape but invisible, outlined in a layer of broken glass and wood fragments, vibrating like heat haze as it moves ever closer. 

Sam steps forward, between you and the creature, aims, and fires once. The sound reverberates through you, shaking you to your core. The entity screeches and disappears, blanketing the bar in an uneasy silence. The only sound left is the faint huffs of panted breath as you both come down from the rush of adrenaline. 

Broken glass glints in fractals on the floor as the lights flicker back on. You are still crouched behind the bar counter, heart thundering in your chest and a tightness in your throat, not knowing where to even begin processing what just happened. 

“Please tell me that I just imagined all of that, and it was just a giant raccoon or something,” you ask, shattering the stark silence and shuddering at how loud your voice sounds in comparison. 

Sam returns his weapon to his waistband, breathing hard, but managing a small smile. “Only if raccoons can be invisible and try to eat people around here,” He replies.

“Fantastic. You brought an invisible creature into my bar that may or may not want to kill me,” You retort, your voice dripping with sarcasm. At your sass, Sam chuckles, shaking his head as a grin takes over his face. 

“You’re welcome for not letting it get you, by the way”

“Oh is that what that was? You saving me? Because from where I’m standing, you owe me a new stockroom door,” you gesture to the carnage left in the creature’s wake with a nod of your head. Despite the severity of your earlier situation, you can’t help but find yourself becoming more and more at ease the more you talk to Sam. Something about his presence and demeanor acts like a balm to your frayed nerves.  

“Add it to my tab. Along with that drink I didn’t get to buy you.” Sam allows himself to look at you, as if hoping for approval for his poorly disguised flirtation.

Meeting his shy smile with one of your own, you reach under the bar hoping to find two rocks glasses untouched by the broken glass. Finding exactly that, you grab the closest bottle of whiskey left intact and pour the both of you a drink, trying in vain to steady the visible shaking of your hands as you pour. 

“So…a fake badge, a real gun, and an invisible monster…You gonna tell me what the hell is going on? Does this have something to do with all of those people you were asking about earlier?” you ask, beginning to put the pieces together in your head to try and figure out exactly what you have found yourself in the middle of tonight. 

Lowering his gaze for a moment, as if struggling to choose his course of action, he lets out a huff of air before looking up to meet your eyes again with a look of sincerity. “Usually this is the part where people scream, run away, and try to convince themselves that didn’t just happen.”

You counter, “Which part? When the invisible man shows up and rockstars the place or when the fake FBI agent pulls a gun?”

Sam grins, finding your resilient humor refreshing. “Either. Both. I lose track, to be honest.”

“Lucky for you, I’m not that easy to scare away.” you reply with a small smile.

“Lucky for me, huh?” Sam repeats under his breath with a light shake of his head at your cheeky attitude. Dean might just have to wait a little bit longer for that update, and to Sam, that is just fine.

𖤍: Greetings! I hope you have enjoyed this one shot! I am looking to write more of these, so please send me a request or leave a comment about what you would like to read next. Any suggestions are appreciated! Also, please let me know if you would like to be added to the tag list so you never miss an update!

 ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚ Thank you to @pixopix for the dividers used! ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

In truth, Sam didn’t even know what this latest argument was really about. It began with him showing concern for your well being. At least that is how he would describe it. You would probably give a very different appraisal of his intentions. One thing he does know is that he would do just about anything to wipe that damned smirk off of your face.

Yes, let the record show, Sam Winchester does not like to lose. Growing up with a brother like Dean so close in age and with his at times headstrong personality, Sam was used to debates, and more importantly winning them. At one point in his life, he even wanted to practice law, a profession in which he would quite literally argue for a living. But upon meeting you, it seemed all of his training was for naught. He just can’t seem to form a coherent point to save his own life. It’s gotten so bad that he has resigned himself to not looking at you out of necessity, choosing instead to lock his gaze slightly above your head like a child with stage fright in order to even have a fighting chance at a rebuttal. Your obstinance was simply too distracting. But he’d be damned again before he let you know that. 

“So what, Winchester? You’re not even going to look at me?” you demand, hands gesturing to emphasize your question before returning to their new found home on your hips with a huff of annoyance. Sam would never hurt you. You knew this intimately. Hell the only reason you were even arguing to begin with was the ‘unnecessary’ risk you took on the last hunt that left you with a nasty gash to your upper arm. Sure it looked pretty rough and needed a few well placed stitches, but when thinking about how that blow had been meant for Sam, aimed to mangle or worse, there was no doubt in your mind that the choice you made was worth it.

If Sam was honest with himself for even a moment, he would be forced to admit that the sight of your stubborn defiance did more to kindle his lust than anything else. Fanning a flame burning underneath his skin that he continued to fight tooth and nail in vain to control. Admitting to himself that these feelings existed would break his one rule. The one he clung to that held the chain together around his heart, protecting him from being hurt again like a weathered shield in battle. He has protected this boundary for years, and for good reason, in his mind. Since Jessica, since Madison, since Ruby and the tangled up mess of torn tissue and regret that she left in her wake. It was evident to Sam that he wasn’t meant to be happy, at least not in that way. He could have one night stands to his heart’s content, but they could never fill the void left in his soul, inflicting within him this aching emptiness of dissatisfaction and reopening a forever weeping wound that would seemingly never heal. He would never do that to you. He would never allow you to become a part of his rot. If Sam was to cross that line, it would have to mean to you even a fraction of what it would mean to him. Seeing this as a veritable impossibility, Sam resigned himself to the purgatory he built within his own mind, trapped between his devotion for you and desiring nothing at all, accepting your anger and frustration as a poor substitute for the passion he would never allow himself to even ask for, much less receive. 

“Call me Winchester again…,”he started, quickly thinking better of making his empty threat, “All I’m saying is you should let the real hunters handle it before you get yourself killed!” Sam knew as soon as he said it that he went too far. The bitter taste on his tongue, tinged with the acidic burn of regret, lingered long after the words left his lips. The stunned silence on your part leant credence to just out of line he had been. 

“What did you just say to me?” you ask, head pulling back on your shoulders like a venomous serpent preparing to strike at the moment of weakness. An ominous edge to your words that sent chills running in his blood. Watching you move with rapt attention, Sam can only attempt to anticipate you as you move, steadily advancing like a creeping death threatening to swallow him whole in your rage. 

He takes a few steps back to try to create some distance between himself and the oncoming storm that he can work with. His retreat is halted in its tracks when his back meets the immovable cool metal of the refrigerator door, finding no ground left to surrender. 

Though his withdrawal was halted, you show no sign of stopping. Truthfully, you didn’t know what you would do once you reached Sam. You knew the brothers often solved their disputes through physical violence. You also knew you could throw a decent punch, especially with your anger to fuel you. But one thing you knew above all else was that you would never hit Sam, no matter how frustrated he made you. That didn’t mean you would let his attitude slide though. Not by a long shot. 

Upon reaching Sam, you raise your hand to clutch the collar of his shirt, but something stops you. In a matter of seconds, Sam catches your hand in midair, spinning your bodies together in one smooth dancelike motion, leaving you pinned between the unforgiving cold metal door and the searing heat of his muscled chest. Looking up from your new position to meet his eyes, it is easy to see that you have changed places, both physically and figuratively, from stalking toward him like a predator to becoming his prey. 

In his gaze there is something different than rage. Something molten and gravitational in its passion that lacks all the malice of rage. This was the opposite of unbridled fury, as it sought to retain too much control, clawing endlessly in vain to maintain its grasp on the reins. The desire in his eyes was so intense, it left you speechless in its wake. The electric current running through your bodies was palpable, arcing through the hand he still hadn’t remembered to let go of. 

It seemed Sam was experiencing the same static charge as he broke the stare, only for a moment, to glance at your fingers still held firmly in his grasp before flicking his attention back to you, though not holding them there faithfully. In the moments that felt like an eternity but could have only been a minute at the very most, you watched as his hazel eyes jumped from your eyes to your lips and then back again. Once, twice, and then again, almost as if asking you to use your will to do what he could not. To end his torment with an act of your own that would send you both tumbling happily into oblivion.

Tired of the waiting and emboldened by the roaring surge of ardent need kindled in your earlier argument, you make your move as if by instinct alone. Tilting your head and rising onto the balls of your feet, you stretch slightly to close the distance between the two of you, gently at first as if testing the waters of this new experience. 

Alarm bells chimed in symphony inside Sam’s brain, warning of the impending danger he was hurtling toward by allowing himself to have this, to get too close. But at that moment, he was sure that he could not have cared any less if he tried. 

With all of the fervor of a man so often denied, Sam returned the kiss, moving to press your hand still in his grasp to the door above your head, entwining his fingers with your own. The flood gates had been opened. What followed was a frenzy, a gnashing of tongues and teeth. A veritable explosion of all of the pent up fury and passion you had both felt in secret for so long but avoided acknowledging for fear of the cosmic repercussions. A beast you had both created but refused to name. 

Sam’s other hand found purchase on the crest of your hip. A comfortable spot of skin where your shirt had ridden up in the earlier struggle, it was warm to the touch from the raging fire within. His thumb gently kneaded the flesh while he used the grip of his fingers to pull you ever closer, arching your back and slotting a knee between your legs to further weave your bodies together. 

Breaking the kiss for only a moment, Sam’s hand above your head breaks the connection, moving steadily down to move a piece of hair from your face. Tenderly, he laces his fingers into your hair cradling your cheek. As he looks you over, it is plain to see that he has been overtaken, pupils blown wide swallowing his hazel irises with lust. You allow yourself to nuzzle into his delicate grasp, the skin roughened by years of work and the scar that still crisscrossed his palm as a symbol of all of the pain he had endured in his past that still refused to let him go. You turn your head slightly in his hold to be able to plant a soft kiss to the marred flesh as if to soothe it, your eyes fluttering closed for a moment before returning to meet his again. Lost in each other’s embrace, you had no idea that you were no longer alone. 

“Finally!” Dean’s voice thundered from the kitchen doorway, shattering the intimate moment like glass on impact. “It was getting to be like a bad soap opera in here. Just not on the table, guys, please? People do eat here.”

Sam stumbled back from you out of surprise, leaving you to mourn the loss of his warmth. 

Sensing the unease as he rounded the corner into the kitchen behind Dean, Cas asked, “Did I miss something?” For an other-worldly being, he seemed to have the comedic timing of a trained professional.

Chuckling to himself at the positively wicked idea brewing in his head, Dean replied, “Yeah. Sammy will explain it to you later,” before leaving, tossing a, “Have fun, you two!” over his shoulder as he pulled Cas from the room by the collar of his trench coat. 

Finally alone again, Sam returns his attention to you, eyes wide and still slightly panting from the earlier excitement that his brother had so thoughtlessly interrupted. 

“We’re going to have to talk about this, aren’t we?” Sam asked, not sounding at all interested at the prospect. Having to put words to what just happened, to what he felt, seemed a Herculean task when his head was still spinning, and all he wanted to do was pick up where you had left off.

“Probably. But that can wait,” you reply, slowly dragging a palm down his chest, making sure to press just hard enough to rake your nails over the barely restrained muscle, drawing out the slightest hint of delicious pain. “Right, Winchester?”

𖤍: Greetings, everyone! I hope you all enjoyed this one-shot. If you have any requests, please send me a request. I'd love to hear from you! :) Also, please let me know if you would like to be added to the tag list so you never miss an update!

 ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚ Thank you to @saradika-graphics for the dividers used! ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

Still being relatively new to the life that the boys lead, the first few months of traveling with the brothers were an…interesting experience. From the banter and bickering to the scenic views of all that America has to offer flying past the rear window as you sat watching the world go by, there was always something to keep your attention. This included the somewhat limited selection of classic rock making up Dean’s cassette tape collection. 

As much as you enjoyed the music he played, the longer you traveled with them, the more you began to realize that the collection would benefit from a new addition. So with Dean’s birthday fast approaching, you began drafting a plan to somehow purchase a new cassette tape for him. It would have to be “new to him”, as you weren’t sure if they even made cassettes anymore. Sam had made that point a time or two when trying to convince his brother to update ‘Baby’s’ tape deck to something from the current millenia at the very least. 

Living the lifestyle of hunters and being together so often, it is difficult to find alone time with which to do something like this, but fate seemed to be on your side, as the perfect opportunity landed directly in your lap, albeit under some rather gruesome circumstances. 

In a small college town in rural Pennsylvania, female students kept disappearing from parties just off campus only to reappear days later in pieces in the pastures of local farmers. The latest student that met her end to this unknown creature was a music major who happened to work at a small record store in town. 

‘What are the odds?’ you thought to yourself.

Sitting across the table from Sam in the diner down the street from the college, you listened as he described the facts of the case. You knew this would be your chance. “Someone’s going to need to visit the record store. See if anybody she worked with might have a clue as to why she was targeted by whatever this thing is,” Sam explains. Seeing your opening, you speak up.

“I’ll go,” you volunteer. “Maybe they’ll be willing to tell me more if I look like I could be a future target.”

Your excuse seems straight forward enough to be believable. Sam seems satisfied, but Dean is not quite convinced. 

“You sure you want to go by yourself? Not that I think you can’t handle it, sweetheart, but you do have a point about being this beastie’s target demographic.” 

‘He does have a point,’ you think to yourself. Choosing to deflect his concern in a playful way, you reply teasingly, “You sure you don’t just want to take a trip to a record store?” Not waiting for his reply you continue, “I’ll be fine. I promise. Besides, I’m sure Sam would appreciate your input at the crimescenes. Right?” At this, you look to Sam, trying to convince him silently (almost telepathically so) to agree with your assertion. 

“Yeah sure. It probably would look better if a team showed up to investigate rather than a lone cop.” Sam replied. With that, it seemed like you had managed to convince Dean to let you take this one by yourself. Paying for your meals, you left the diner and piled back into the Impala. 

Arriving at the record store, Dean pulled into a parking space located near the back of the building, out of sight of the main entrance. Turning in his seat, his eyes land on you with a look of pride mixed with a hint of that concern from earlier that he hasn’t been able to completely put to rest. You know he’s proud of you. Why wouldn’t he be? The love of his life is a total badass who he can depend on to do the job, do it well, and come back alive every time. But there is always that little voice in the back of his head that whispers, ‘What if this time is different? What if her luck runs out this time? What if this time…is the last time?’ 

But each time, you knowingly silence those poisonous thoughts with a soft kiss, to which Sam always makes a face of mild disgust, and a quick, “I’ll be fine.”

“You better be,” he replies with a smirk, “Now, go get ‘em, tiger. Call if you need anything, okay?” 

Climbing out of the car, you nod, bundling your coat around your form to brace yourself against the January chill as you make your way around the corner of the building and out of sight. Upon entering the record store, the smell of dust and age floods over you. A little bell tinkles above your head announcing your arrival as you cross the threshold into the hole-in-the-wall storefront that seems to have been lost to time itself.  Amidst rows of meticulously arranged CDs, records, and other music related merchandise, an older graying man stands crouched near a box of what looked like new shirts he was attempting to fold and shelve for sale. The man looks up upon hearing the sound of the bell.

“Hey there!” He greets you warmly, “Let me know if you need any help.”

Seizing the opportunity, you respond, “Yeah actually. I could use your help. I was wondering if you could help me with something.” You proceed to explain your situation to the man. Telling him you were on the hunt for the perfect cassette tape for your Led Zeppelin loving boyfriend, and asking him if he could help you in this endeavour. Using your actual request as an impromptu cover story, you find subtle ways to sneak in questions about his former employee. 

Leading you through the shop’s collection of cassette tapes, the man’s wrinkled fingers stilled on a particular, unlabeled case. Pulling the tape out of the stack, he turns it over a few times in his hands, before he says, “Yeah, this will be perfect.” Sensing your confusion, he continues, “So this tape is actually a mix of songs from different albums that were never officially put on tape before.” He opens the case and pulls out the small slip of paper that lies behind the tape, serving as a makeshift setlist, and hands it to you. Among the songs on the list, one stood out to you immediately: ‘Traveling Riverside Blues’ by Led Zeppelin. 

Seeing one of Dean’s favorite songs of all time surrounded by other great songs in the lineup, you felt giddy. ‘This would be the perfect gift,’ you thought to yourself. “I’ll take it!” Quickly you begin counting out the cash needed to pay the man, but he suddenly stops you. 

“Don’t worry about it,” the man says, putting the tape into your hands and patting them as they close around it. “Nobody buys tapes anymore, you’re doing me a favor. And if this boyfriend of yours will appreciate it and enjoy it, then it will have been worth it for me.” There is a kindness in the man’s smile that wrinkles the skin around his eyes, giving him the look of a grandfather lovingly imparting a piece of himself, his music, to the next generation so that it can be enjoyed for years to come. 

Thanking the man profusely, you make your way back out into the cold, tucking the case into the interior wallet pocket of your leather jacket as you go. Walking quickly through the frigid chill, you make your way toward the main street where you had agreed to meet the boys upon completing your individual fact-finding missions.

The day of Dean’s birthday came in like a lamb, so quiet you would almost miss it, and maybe that was by design. Over the years, Dean had become accustomed to ignoring his feelings in favor of providing for the needs of those around him, namely you and his brother. Always making sure to celebrate Sam in his own way, to make his day special, the way his father was meant to. But somewhere along the way, celebrating his own birthday had become more of a chore than it was worth in his eyes. The growing number of twinkling candles shined less brightly when you lit them for yourself. The magic died for Dean, and for all intents and purposes he had accepted it. What else could he do? In his mind, it was better to keep moving. To celebrate things that deserved celebration. He’ll just get himself a beer in the next town they pass through and call it a day, he thought to himself. 

As luck would have it, it just so happened that the 24th of January fell perfectly at the end of a case you had been working in Minnesota, leaving you with a decent drive back to the bunker. Sam decided to sit this one out, preferring to continue researching the next big bad on the radar, leaving you and Dean alone to handle the call together. The case in question was a simple salt-and-burn, albeit unheard of anymore in the midst of the angel/demon pissing contest you seem to have found yourselves in the middle of as of late. It was refreshing to return to your hunting roots for a change. 

But even more refreshing was the time alone you got to spend with Dean. You had to admit, even after all this time, seeing him work still gives you butterflies. Watching him charm witnesses out of their silence, cleaning and assembling weapons with the practiced grace of a soldier, and don’t even start about how good that man looked digging up that spirit’s remains, all sweaty and dirty singing Journey to no one in particular in a key all his own (or perhaps no key at all) while you kept watch. All the while the tape sat, wrapped in a bit of newspaper that you found, in your jacket pocket, waiting for the perfect opportunity.

Said perfect opportunity arrived with the dawn, as it was time to hit the road again. ‘Wanted to get home and help Sammy with his research,’ he claimed. Really he just wanted to get moving again, never staying idle for too long, lest he drown in his own thoughts and remember what day it was. 

As you loaded the last of your belongings into the back seat, you pondered what you would say. How does one best approach the celebration of someone who has spent practically their whole life avoiding being celebrated, whether intentionally or not? Though your intentions are good, you cannot help but worry. Would he be upset with you for bringing it up? Was there a reason he seemed so intent to let the day go by without a word like any other would?

Sitting in the passenger seat of the Impala, you decide now is the time. This way, if he enjoyed the gift, he would be able to listen to the tape on the long drive home. Deciding all of the equipment was properly stored, Dean slammed ‘Baby’s’ trunk and came to sit beside you on the driver’s side. Putting his key in and sparking the ignition, you decide it is now or never. 

“Hey D. Can you wait for a second? I just-I just want to talk about something.” 

“Sure, sweetheart. What’s going on? Everything okay?” Dean replies, clearly worried by the sudden need to talk. In his experience, when a woman says she needs to talk, it never goes well.

“I know we’ve been together for a while, and…I’ve never brought it up before,” you begin pensively. All of your would-be preparation for this conversation seemingly leaves your head as soon as Dean looks at you with those eyes of his. Full of patience and concern. ‘Dammit! Why does he have to be so good at that?’ you think. 

“Hey, it’s okay. Alright? No need to let me down gently. I can take it,” Dean offers with what is clearly a pained chuckle in an attempt to seem okay with whatever he thinks you are about to say. 

In that moment you realize that through your hesitance, Dean has arrived at a very different conclusion about where this conversation is headed than you had intended. 

“No! My God-no! I didn’t mean-ugh!” you sputter, a hand coming to cradle your brow in annoyance at your own ineptitude. “No, D. I don’t want to break up with you! I would never do that on your birthday.”

Dean freezes in his seat, out of neither shock nor fear alone, but maybe some mixture of the two. At the mention of his birthday, a number of thoughts pull his brain in different directions at once. 

First out of the gate is, ‘It’s my birthday?’ After all of these years of avoidance, it was almost easy to unintentionally convince himself he did not have one. 

Following closely behind is, ‘Is it really my birthday?’ Not too long ago, in his mind at least, the two of you had been snuggled up together in his man cave watching a nostalgic horror movie marathon for Halloween. Sam manned the mini popcorn machine and Dean was in charge of the remote, a duty he took on with the utmost enthusiasm, not at all unlike a middle aged dad with a thermostat. It had been an attempt to introduce Cas to what, in Dean’s humble opinion at least, were some of the best movies ever made as part of his ‘humanity training’ as it had lovingly come to be called. The cute little family bonding moment was a memory that he would cherish forever.

And entering Dean’s mind last, ‘How does she know about my birthday?’ Dean is sure he never mentioned it to you. Maybe Sammy said something? ‘No,’ he thinks. ‘I doubt if he even remembers. Then again, the kid always was good with numbers.’

During his whole internal monologue, you could only watch as the questions flickered across his face in rapid succession. Part of you wanted to intervene, but you didn’t even know what to say. How can you talk someone into moving through years of repressed disappointment?

“I’m sorry. I-I shouldn’t have brought it up. I-” Dean cut you off quickly. 

“No. No, it’s okay sweetheart. Really. I’m fine,” he said, as if saying it aloud would somehow make him believe it too. 

“I’m sorry,” you reiterated. “I meant to do this gently, but I screwed it all up.” You pause, taking a steadying breath. Your hand moves to your jacket pocket, taking out the little wrapped package with a crudely tied bow. “Anyway, I…just wanted to give you this. Happy Birthday, Dean.” You held out the gift with lightly shaking hands, waiting with bated breath to see whether or not he would accept it. 

Dean looks stunned. A gift? For him? Someone he loves went out of their way to get him a gift for his birthday? He reaches out hesitantly and takes the gift from your hands pausing for the tiniest moment, as if he was unsure whether or not he should. Assessing the small parcel’s weight in his hands, he speaks. 

“You - you didn’t have to do this,” his voice shaking a little, dripping with an unusual humility.

“I know,” you reply firmly in direct contrast to his doubt, “But you deserve it, Dean. You deserve to have someone who cares about you enough to remember and celebrate you. If you don't want it, that’s okay. Just say the word, and I’ll never bring it up again, but I just wanted to- to make sure you knew somebody remembered.”

His bewildered eyes leave yours, moving to focus on the gift in his hands. Slowly, he begins unwrapping it, untying the bow and pulling off the paper, revealing the tape underneath. Because there was no title card inside the case when you bought it, you had come up with the idea to design your own by hand, complete with little doodles next to the track names and a drawing of the band’s classic logo. But the real star of the show was what you put in the back of the case. Turning it over in his hands, Dean was immediately struck by the image that lay before him. 

In the back of the cassette case was a picture of the four of you, his own little family, all laughing and smiling together in a candid image. He momentarily wondered how you were able to get the shot, until he remembered the camera you had found on a tripod back at the bunker. You had been fooling around with it in recent weeks, figuring out how it worked. It turned out it had a recording function, and you were able to take a still image from the recorded film. Though you needed to cut down the edges a bit, it fit the small space perfectly, as if it was meant to be there all along. 

Now, Dean Winchester is not the kind of man who cries out of happiness, but as he pulled you across the leather bench seat and into his arms, you could have sworn you saw a glassy look in his eyes, like the swell of emotion might just make it to the surface. 

“Thank you, baby. Thank you,” Dean murmurs into your shoulder, pressing you to his chest and enveloping you in his warmth. Oh, what you wouldn’t give to keep that feeling forever. To lose yourself wholly in it and never let go. 

It is in that shared moment that you both realize that nothing further needs explaining. No more words have to be said, and after a while, Dean pulled away from the embrace, pressing a tender kiss to your forehead as he opened the tape case. Placing the tape into ‘Baby’s’ radio console, the music begins to play, and Dean returns one hand to the wheel while his other hand remains joined with yours in your lap. You play with his fingers as he pulls out of the parking lot of the motel and onto the highway. Exhaling a breath you didn’t know you were holding, you whisper again, “Happy Birthday, Dean.”

𖤍: Hello again, everyone! I hope you all enjoyed this first attempt at oneshot writing!. I am looking to continue writing one-shots and other short-form fiction, so if you have any requests, please send me a request or a dm. I'd love to hear from you! :) Also, please let me know if you would like to be added to a tag list so you never miss an update!

After a beat of silence, Castiel appears. His head on a swivel, he is clearly assessing the surroundings for what manner of danger you had found yourself in to need his help. Turning to one side and then the other, his coat flares, following his movement on a slight delay as crystalline eyes scan the room with the precision of a soldier. All of a sudden he stops, staring again at a seemingly empty spot in the room just outside of the ring of light created by the faintly flickering overhead lamp.

“What’s going on?” he asks, though it is not exactly clear who he is speaking to as he is still holding his gaze on that same spot in the room. All of a sudden, he shifts his eyes, landing all of their cobalt intensity on you. 

Taking a deep breath to maintain your resolve, you begin,”We need to talk.”

The serious tone of your voice tells Castiel everything he needs to know about what the subject of your conversation would be. He knows in an instant that he has been cornered and can no longer avoid the issue. Sure, you hadn’t used holy fire to confine him, but you had captured him all the same. This entrapment is of a moral nature. Fleeing now would only lead you to go digging for answers on your own, further endangering you. Something Castiel knows he cannot allow to happen. Deciding it would do no good to feign ignorance, the angel gets right to the point, replying, “I told you. I am handling it.” 

His tone, though icy and severe, holds no malice suggesting he genuinely feels the situation would be best if left alone. But you just cannot accept that. Too many odd things have been happening in quick succession for you to be able to just ignore the emerging pattern. 

“I don’t buy it. One minute everything is fine, the next you disappear for a week with no warning, going completely radio silent. Then you return acting like everything is fine all the while counting shadows and staring at me as if I need saving from something. Is that it? Do you think I need saving?”

You speak with an urgency that betrays your growing unease with the whole situation. You have always had a terrible habit of needing to feel in control of everything in your life. Born out of the instability inherent in your family’s lifestyle, transient and often filled with danger, you are left with little to depend on for feelings of safety. As a child, you should have been able to turn to your father for that protection. But when his alcoholism and need for revenge effectively took him from you too, you were forced to turn your attention inward to find the reassurance you needed. In short, the idea of facing down an unseen enemy while someone meant to help you chooses to leave you in the dark does nothing but heighten your already present anxieties, but you would be damned if you allowed anyone else to see that. 

For a moment, there is nothing but a stark and uncomfortable silence as Castiel attempts to form his reply. His mouth opens as if to speak, but the words die before reaching his lips, and he closes his mouth once again. He knows any excuse he could give would only prolong the inevitable. Torn between his allegiances to you and to his brother, he chooses to split the difference. To tell a lie but only by omission. One that would both protect the secret he was tasked with keeping and temporarily assuage your fears until he can find more concrete information pertaining to your situation. 

“Things have been…changing in Heaven. Decisions being made that haven’t been for centuries. Ancient traditions being evoked and for what purpose, I do not know. I don’t like being left in the dark any more than you do,” Castiel offers in reply after careful thought, clearly choosing his words very deliberately.

“Not that I don’t care about Heaven’s internal politics, but what does any of that have to do with me?” You retort, trying to redirect him to the heart of the issue. “It’s clear from your behavior that something is coming for me. I just want to know what I’m up against.” His eyes continued darting back and forth between you and that seemingly empty space over your shoulder. “And another thing,” you continued,”Why do you keep looking at me like that? Like…,” you hesitate to find the right words, “-like there’s somebody else you’re talking to. I think you know more than you’re telling me.” 

You pause, taking in the pained look of guilt plaguing the angel’s borrowed face. It is clear that there is more to his story than he is sharing. “Listen,” you continue with a sigh, softening your tone in response to his clear discomfort while still remaining steadfast in your desire to know the truth. “I know there’s more to the story, okay? There always is. And maybe you’re not at liberty to share everything, but…” pausing again, you meet the seraph’s gaze with one of your own that holds in it your determination to protect all that you hold dear, but despite your efforts, mixed within your stare is a small dose of your fear. “Just promise that you’ll tell me if my brothers and I are in danger. Please. I can’t-I can’t lose them” 

It is clear that your plea has an effect on the angel. There is a palpable release of tension in his posture as he realizes he is being let off the hook for the time being. 

With a nod, Cas responds softly, “You have my word,” He disappears in a flutter of feathers, effectively rendering the matter closed- with an asterisk. You never did get an answer as to why he keeps looking over your shoulder.

As if sensing your thought, the metallic clatter of a tool impacting the cement floor behind you immediately draws your attention. Quickly spinning on your heel toward the sound of the noise, you are met with nothing but pitch-black darkness. 

Sick of feeling like a plaything to whatever this creature is, you decide to call out into the void. “Show yourself, you coward! I know you’re out there!” You will your voice not to shake as you invoke your would-be stalker to show itself, simultaneously looking around for any hunting supplies you could use should you need to. You have faced plenty of ghosts in your life and know that Bobby has a habit of keeping salt in just about every conceivable location for split second access. Locating a small container of table salt on a nearby counter without taking your eyes off of the blank space before you, you quickly flip open the pour spout and draw a circle for yourself on the floor. 

Stepping inside your circle, emboldened by your new level of protection, you continue taunting your phantom, “No use pretending now! I know you’re there, so you can stop hiding, you coward. What kind of ghost are you?” Your retort drips with defiance, tired of being toyed with and ready to unmask the entity once and for all. 

The harsh sound of gravel crunching against the cement floor underfoot accompanies a slowly but steadily advancing darkness. One that bends the light of the lamp overhead around itself like a black hole in the shape of a man. The figure strides smoothly toward you and stops only a hair’s breadth away from you, being careful to avoid the ring of salt at your feet. 

‘I will not be intimidated,’ you repeat to yourself over and over again in your head as one would a mantra. Tilting your head to look the figure in the would-be eyes, you stare it down with all of the stubbornness you can muster. The aroma from before has returned, intense like a man’s cologne enhanced with a cloying sweetness reminiscent of warm vanilla and honey. It nearly makes you lose your nerve. 

A scuffing sound from the floor captures your attention. Looking down, you are just in time to see a tendril of that inky blackness in the shape of a leg emerge from the figure making the scuffing sound as the foot breaks your salt line with no hesitation. 

Out of the ether, a man’s voice whispers in your ear with a teasing chuckle.

“Not quite. Try again.”

As if to punctuate his taunt, the light above your head explodes, raining a shower of sparks and broken glass down upon you. With a puff of air like the beat of unseen wings, the figure dissipates as if it was never there to begin with, leaving you all alone in the dark.

𖤍: Hello again, everyone! I hope you all enjoyed this newest installment of 'Tethered'. I am looking to start writing one-shots and other short-form fiction, so if you have any requests, please feel free to send me a request or a dm. I'd love to hear from you! :) Also, please let me know if you would like to be added to the tag list so you never miss an update!

 ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚ Thank you to @saradika-graphics for the dividers used! ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

Tag list: @phantomcurses @kymimi

Sitting alone at the worn wooden table, a book in one hand while hunt-and-peck typing on Sam’s laptop with the other, you had just spent the better part of the morning attempting to corroborate a source’s account of the next possible doomsday disaster. A cup of tea you had made seemingly a lifetime ago sits abandoned to go cold before you, amongst a meticulously arranged collection of documents that, to the casual observer, would appear to be in total disarray. Reading glasses rest low on your nose, not something you wear often, but with the amount of research on your plate, your poor eyes could use all of the assistance they could get; along with the added benefit of filtering out some of the harsh blue light from the computer screen. You could only take one kind of headache at a time and right now you are in the thick of one of the always entertaining ‘been awake for almost 72 hours’ variety. 

Try as you might to get some sleep, something has been trying harder to prevent it from happening. In the waking world, you and your brothers have been crisscrossing the country at a breakneck pace in recent weeks. Not that you were unaccustomed to sleeping on the road, but the breaks between cases have been few and far between as of late and the occasional nap in the back of the impala wasn’t quite cutting it anymore. But when you did finally eek out a moment of rest for yourself, you were plagued by dreams of strange and often disturbing natures. Given your livelihood, it is surprising in itself that you are disturbed by much of anything anymore, but these dreams were…different. They felt important, as if you were meant to take in as much of what happened as you could in order to carry it over into your waking mind. Flashes of images like slides in a carousel pervade even the briefest of catnaps, leaving you all but unable to sleep in any capacity. 

These visions as you’ve come to call them, bizarre and nightmarish as they are, leave you in a frightful state upon waking; often in a cold sweat, panting and shaking, unsure of what to make of what you have just seen. Despite their disorientating presentation, it is clear to you that these dreams tend to follow a distinct pattern. They all gravitate toward similar themes: love, pain, and sacrifice. In almost every one of your dreams, someone dies. If not one of your brothers, then it’s Bobby or Cas. Even you yourself have met your end a time or two in the dreamworld. In every scene, the love you have for people you care about is highlighted and exploited, but for what purpose you could not figure out. 

In the midst of all this carnage though, there is often a man. Always standing off to the side, away from the chaos unfolding before you, his appearance is crystal clear in all but his face. Like an underdeveloped polaroid picture, for some reason you can never get a good look at his features. Always bathed in shadow or distorted in some other way, it is as if maintaining his anonymity is of paramount importance. But why? Who is he? And why does he keep appearing inside your head where he certainly does not belong?

‘If only I could figure out who he is. Maybe that would get the dreams to stop,’ you thought to yourself, ‘Like singing a song through to its rightful conclusion to get rid of an earworm.’

Pausing his march for a moment, Castiel nodded in quick acknowledgement of your existence, adding his customary “Hello” in greeting. 

“Hey Cas! Where have you been? You’ve been gone for days, we were worried something had happened to you?” you offered by way of starting a conversation. After his erratic behavior the last time you saw him, you thought an explanation would be warranted. 

“Something did happen. Many things that I cannot begin to explain, nor is it my place to. Just know that it is being handled,” He responded briskly as if trying to move on from the conversation as quickly as possible. You want to push the issue to make him explain his cryptic behavior, but the chance never comes. 

Just as you open your mouth to press him further, your brothers barrel through the kitchen door, grocery bags in hand, almost colliding with the seraph in their path.

“Cas! Just the halo we wanted to see!” Dean exclaimed with a hint of attitude betraying his annoyance with being left hanging for days on end when his prayers had gone unanswered.

“Yeah, we were praying to you. What happened? Were you called back to heaven?” Sam chimed in in tandem with his brother. Both men probe the angel for information which he would do just about anything to avoid giving them. At least, not yet. 

If Castiel was honest with himself, he would admit that his investigation was not off to a great start. What few answers he did manage to uncover only opened up more questions, leaving him fighting upstream against currents far older than even he is. One thing he knows, however, is this conspiracy runs deep. His usual contacts either knew nothing or were resistant to talking upon the mention of guardians in general, leaving the angel with a bitter taste in his mouth to accompany the sinking feeling in his chest. Something was definitely wrong with the whole situation, but he was no closer to figuring out what or why than when he started. 

“Hello, Dean. Sam.” Cas responded as he usually would to try to maintain the illusion of normalcy. His gaze shifted back and forth between your siblings, but it seemed to catch ever so slightly on you as it passed, hesitating for the faintest moment with a hint of something akin to sympathy in his eyes. “I…was called away. Forgive me,” he speaks with a rigidity in his voice that suggests more to the story but ultimately confirms nothing. 

“What were you-?”

“Nevermind,” the angel cut Dean off with a word. “It’s over now. Can we get back to averting the apocalypse?”

You shared side-eyed glances with your brothers which they returned, obviously dissatisfied with his response but also in agreement with the importance of the task before them. But you were not as easily convinced to let it go. Not yet. 

If something is happening behind the scenes, especially involving your family, you would make sure you know about it before it comes through your front door. 

The next few hours are spent filling Castiel in on everything he missed during his time away; all of the reading, researching, and translating that brings you all ever closer to finding a way to stop Lilith’s advance once and for all. Progress has been slow going, and Lilith’s movements have been equally difficult to track as of late. With so many seals to choose from all over the world, choosing when and where to make a stand against her is a tricky business. Every so often, though, you would catch the seraph staring at you with that same pitying look on his face. Every time, darting his eyes away as soon as he was caught. But there was more to it. In addition to staring at you, you would find the angel staring into space, holding his gaze on a seemingly empty corner of the room as if something in it concerned him. Seeing this being, usually so composed and level-headed, behaving so oddly concerns you greatly. 

So much so that all you can think about is finding a way to get Castiel alone. You just need to get him alone and press him about what exactly is being “handled” and why he is so out of sorts. Why has he been looking at you all afternoon like one would a wounded animal or an innocent man condemned to death? You are determined to find out. 

Before long, night falls over South Dakota. Under the cloak of darkness you manage to leave the group, making some vague excuse about needing to take a break from researching to clear your head. Slipping out the kitchen door, you quickly make your way through the labyrinth of rusted auto-bodies until you reach the main storage shed on Bobby’s property. Filled with equal parts dust and neglected tools, you felt it would be the perfect secluded location for your little heart-to-heart with Castiel. 

Finding the rusted light panel near the door by touch in the darkness, you brush away the cobwebs obscuring it from view and flip the switch. The overhead light groans to life, bathing the space before you in a sickly yellow glow that flickers with age. With small and careful steps, you make your way through the piles of forgotten auto-parts to the center of the shadowy room. 

Taking a deep breath to ground yourself, you are taken aback by a familiar scent in the air that does not belong there. In the midst of the musty smell of mold and decay, the same sweet, chocolaty spice cuts through the stale air, like you walked into a confectionary by mistake. 

This is not a one-off occurrence either. For the past week, you have been having seemingly random bouts of unexplainable sensation. Saccharine smells out of nowhere, items changing position when your back is turned, and the instinctual feeling of not being alone in a space where every other sense knows you to be. In all of this unexplained phenomena however, one constant remains. You are not afraid. There is a sense of calm that seems to accompany these occurrences, as if you are not meant to be alarmed by the possibility that someone or something is truly there beside you. As if the presence meant to embrace you rather than to attack you. Despite this aura of tranquil intentions, your years of experience hunting the supernatural prohibit you from accepting that this spirit, or whatever it is, really has innocent intentions with you. 

Standing alone in the garage, an urge rises within you to call out to the spirit. To invoke whomever or whatever was there with you. To command it out of the shadows and finally show itself to you so you could put a face to the feelings, but also to reassure yourself that you haven’t been steadily losing your mind over the past week.

But something stops you. Maybe it is a half-hearted desire to hold on to the only thing that has provided you even a modicum of peace in months. With the world quite literally falling apart around you, you are in no great hurry to let that peace go, no matter how fleeting or unexplainable it may be. Or perhaps there is a part of you that intuitively understands that knowing the truth might only open a veritable Pandora’s box, the likes of which you and your brothers could not afford to devote the time and energy required to deal with it right now. So as strange as your situation is, it will have to wait for the time being. And just like that, the command died on your tongue. 

The act of praying has always felt uncomfortable for you. The kind of thing you knew brought comfort to others but always left you feeling empty. Like making a telephone call with no one on the other end of the line. Upon meeting Castiel and being instructed to pray to him when in need of his attention, that hollow feeling inside you seemed to change its shape. Now, instead of your calls having no receiver, it feels like a missed connection, like a redirection along the way. ‘Nevermind my feelings,’ you remind yourself, ’I have to do this.’

Brushing aside your misgivings, you bow your head, close your eyes, and begin to pray.

𖤍: Hello everyone! I am so very sorry for the delay in posting. My life has been rather busy as of late, but I look forward to having more time to write in the near future. This chapter will flow right into the next, and I hope to post the next chapter within the next day or so. Please let me know if you would like to be added to the tag list so you never miss an update!

 ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚ Thank you to @saradika-graphics for the dividers used! ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

Tag list: @phantomcurses @kymimi

With all of the seals being broken around the world, you and your brothers had gotten tired of playing defense and were looking for anything that would help you make a stand against Lilith and her minions. But after days of searching for demonic omens and prophetic texts that might give you a clue about where to look, it started to seem like the Apocalypse would be more difficult to stop than you all had originally hoped. So far, you were on your fifth book that day and still had nothing to show for it. ‘Here’s hoping Cas had better luck’ you thought as you waited for him to materialize in the doorway of Bobby’s library. 

Out of nowhere, a slight chill ran up your spine, as all of a sudden, the atmosphere of the room shifted. Glancing toward Bobby and your brothers who were fully engrossed in their own conversation while crowded behind his desk, it was apparent they were oblivious to this sudden change. ‘All of this waiting around must have me on edge’ you thought, adjusting the well-worn plaid blanket over your body as you tried to return your focus to your reading. 

Something just didn’t feel right, though. The air felt too thick, too full. A barely-there smell of ozone mixed with an aromatic sweetness, almost like chocolate, came in ephemeral waves that you would easily miss if you weren’t paying attention. While the sensation was strange, it didn’t feel overtly threatening, as if you weren’t meant to be afraid. Not trusting that this wasn’t all in your head, you decided to ignore it, half-expecting it all to just dissipate as quickly as it came. 

 ‘Nevermind’ you thought, lightly shaking your head as if to banish your thoughts,’I just need to take a break soon or I’m going to go coo-coo for Cocoa Puffs’ Chuckling to yourself, you took a quick glance around the room and went back to your reading. Bobby had begun to explain something he had read to the boys when Castiel returned. 

Hearing a flap of wings, you looked up from your book. You were about to greet him and ask how his search had gone, when suddenly his eyes went wide, seemingly staring at nothing in a state of shock. It was like he was seeing a ghost, and you knew a thing or two about that. Before you or your brothers could ask him what was wrong, he took a few calculated steps into the room, lifted his hand as if to grab hold of something, or someone judging by the height of his reach, and disappeared as if he had never been there at all. 

Dean was already charging around the table as if he meant to catch the celestial before he could vanish, but it was too late. Cas was already gone. Sharing a look with your brothers, you start wondering if you should have mentioned your strange feeling. 

“Well, that was weird,” Sam offered with a look of concern on his face. 

“Weird? That’s all you can come up with? Dude looked like a wind up toy with his circuits on the fritz. What the hell was he reaching for?” Dean replied, obviously agitated in his confusion. Sam only shrugged with a small shake of his head. “Well, you two keep working on that translation. I’m going to take a lap and make sure we don’t have any uninvited guests.” 

“I’ll come with you,” you quickly volunteered, hoping that the short burst of action would provide the break you needed to put the situation out of your mind for the time being. 

After doing a complete sweep of the house and finding nothing out of place, you all decided to return to your previous fact-finding efforts and try to put the angel’s strange behavior on the back burner, hoping Cas would provide some explanation of what happened upon his return. 

You hadn’t noticed it at the time, but when Castiel disappeared, the aroma and the sensation of unseen company had also seemingly left with him.

In a flash, Gabriel found himself standing in what appeared to be the remains of a barn left to time’s decay. The air was thin with the November chill, and the archangel found the walls to be covered floor-to-ceiling in what looked to be sigil-adjacent gibberish, as if someone knew what they wanted to do but did not quite know the proper sigils with which to accomplish it. He didn’t have much time to take in his surroundings though, as Castiel was on him in an instant, taking the open collar of Gabriel’s jacket in his clenched fists as he drove his back into a nearby wooden post. 

“What are you doing here?” Castiel practically growled, his warm breath visible in the autumn air. 

“I don’t even know where ‘here’ is. You brought us here, Cas. Nice to see you too, by the way. How’ve you been?” Gabriel replied with all of his usual flair in an attempt to appear aloof. However behind his facade of amusement, his brain was working overtime trying to craft himself an excuse. In the meantime until he decided on a course of action, he would employ his favorite tool: casual misdirection. “Jeez! It has been a while, hasn’t it? A couple centuries at least. Well, what can I say, time really does fly when you’re having fun. But not even a ‘Good to see you, Gabriel. I missed you.’ Really I must say, I’m hurt.”

Very much not in the mood for Gabriel’s games, Castiel got straight to his point, rephrasing his initial question into a more precise demand for information with an extra push of his fists against the archangel’s ribs. “Enough, Gabriel. What were you doing spying on the Winchesters?” 

‘Spying? Is that really what he thinks this is?’ Gabriel thought to himself. He suddenly disappeared from Cas’s grasp and reappeared several feet behind him with his hands held casually at chest level in mock surrender. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I wasn’t spying on anyone. Who would I even be spying for? I was just…” He paused, not quite knowing what to say. Gabriel internally cursed. His silver tongue had never abandoned him before, but of course now when he needed it most, it was nowhere to be found, leaving him floundering to come up with his next move.

Spinning abruptly around, his trenchcoat fanning out behind him, Castiel locked eyes with his brother again, this time separated by a fair amount of distance. Gabriel’s yielding stance seemed to calm him to a small degree. He took a few slow steps forward, broken glass crunching underfoot as he went. Adjusting his coat and adopting a slightly more relaxed, but still annoyed tone, he asked, “Then what were you doing there? Did Zachariah send you? Well you can tell him I’m doing my job just fine without his interference.” 

 “Castiel, I think you and I both know that they don’t send me anywhere. Not anymore.” Gabriel replied with an assured smile that bordered on a smirk. He was right. Heaven really had given up on trying to get him to participate in recent years. If he didn’t like the job, he would just tune them out, preferring his life of solitude to the role his father’s minions expected him to play. Castiel never knew where Gabriel had gone following his exit from all things angel. If he was being honest, Gabriel had always been one of his favorite older brothers, so the absence was definitely felt. 

Though not afraid for his life, Gabriel knew of Castiel’s fiercely protective nature toward the Winchester siblings. He knew Cas well enough to know that he was not someone of whom he wanted to make an enemy. Daring to hope he knew Cas as well as he thought he did, he lowered his hands and began to come clean. “Fine. I.. I was there on my own, okay?” he started. “There’s…Something’s happened. Something that could very well change everything and…and I don’t know what to do about it.” 

“I don’t understand. Could you be any more vague?” Cas asked in his usual deadpan tone, brows meeting in mild confusion. 

“Was that a joke I just heard? Wow, Cas! I dare say, you’re learning!” Gabriel replied, trying to lighten the mood. All he got for his effort was a continued look of annoyance from the seraph who wanted nothing more than for Gabriel to get to his point. “Well you know how I went radio silent, right? Wanting to live my own eternal life and all of that. Well with the whole ‘fire and brimstone’, ‘end of days’ situation, I figured it might be a good idea to dust off the old angel radio, just to get a beat on the whole ‘Apocalypse’ business, so I could avoid it as much as possible…I don’t know. I can’t explain it. It was like I was meant to do it.” Gabriel paused again, as if unsure of how to phrase his next words. “When I tuned back in, an alarm must have gone off at HQ because within minutes a message came through direct. Now Castiel, I know it’s been a while but how are you with your angel history?” He asked, hoping Cas would know where he was going with this. 

“I know everything I need to. Just spit it out.” Cas replied, clearly ready to be through with this encounter, but not so done as to be uninterested in what Gabriel was getting at. In his mind, if it had to do with the Winchesters, it was essential that he knew about it immediately in order to better facilitate their safety. For the mission of course. Only for the sake of the mission. Not for any pesky emotional entanglements. Those, he knew, were messy, complicated and above all dangerous for everyone involved. 

“Guardians, Cas. I’m talking about guardians,” he let out in a huff of air, “We haven’t been regularly assigning them for centuries. Especially not archangel guardians. I know the humans have their own ideas of patrons and all that, but I’m talking grade A, bonafide guardian angels. Do you get it now? Do you get why I am royally screwed here?” Gabriel finished, returning to meet Cas’s gaze. His mask was slipping and the uncertainty underneath was apparent, his golden eyes betraying his every emotion. Even the fear he tried his hardest to hide. Not a fear that spawns shrieks of terror, no. This was the type of fear that burrowed in deep and spread its gnarled roots throughout one’s being. This was a situation in which he was truly not in control, and for Gabriel, that vulnerability was akin to a nightmare. 

It took Castiel a minute to speak. His eyes cast downward, darting back and forth as if he were puzzling out exactly how he should respond to this new revelation. One bit of crucial information was still missing. Returning his gaze to the archangel, he still held an air of hesitance as he spoke, “Okay. If what you’re telling me is true, you must have been assigned a particular person to protect. Who have you been assigned to? And why do you think that this is a bad thing? If Heaven has entrusted you with this task, surely that means that they have a plan. That is a good thing isn’t it?”

“No, it isn’t,” Gabriel's voice was dangerously calm as he spoke. “The whole reason I tuned back in to angel radio was to avoid Heaven’s ‘plans’. Not to get top billing in their newest stage production… No, no this is bad. There is definitely something they aren’t telling me. And whatever it is…it could get her killed.” His speech trailed off. His voice, laced with concern, grew noticeably softer when the conversation shifted to you. 

“Her? So it’s Y/n that you’ve been tasked with protecting.” Castiel ventured to guess. Not expecting a reply from the archangel, he took a cautious step closer and continued, “And you were planning on hiding this from her? Why?” 

The mention of your name made Gabriel freeze. Why was he hiding from you? His initial inclination had been to mask his presence from you as a means of maintaining distance. For your sake as well as his own. His interactions with you thus far had been…less than pleasant to say the least and left him with a stake in his chest on one occasion, which may or may not have been deserved depending on your point of view, but that was beside the point. But more than that, revealing that everything you had ever believed about him had been a lie didn’t seem like the best way to establish a foundation of trust. So, Gabriel chose the only path that he could. He chose to hide. He chose to observe from the shadows, allowing him to fulfill his duty of protection while simultaneously avoiding any need to explain himself or his actions to everyone. Well, almost everyone. 

“Castiel, I need you to promise me that you won’t breathe a word of this to anyone. Especially the Winchesters.” Gabriel watched Cas begin to shake his head while stepping back away from him. Gabriel met his retreat with a rapid advance that brought him to the angel’s side. “We don’t know why I was told to guard her, but I think we can safely assume that whatever is coming down the pike is not going to be a walk in the park for her. Until we know what she needs guarding from, it’s best if we keep this arrangement as close to the chest as possible. For all of our sakes. Understand?” Gabriel finished his plea, holding out his hands as if to beckon Castiel to join him in his deception. 

Castiel turned his back to his brother as he thought to himself for a moment. His first instinct was to tell the Winchesters the truth. ‘Whatever it is,’ he thought, ‘the Winchesters will be able to handle it. Right?’ That’s how it was supposed to be. But his thoughts did not end there. 

Not that he wanted to admit it, but Gabriel did have a point. He had not been made aware of this new development by his superiors, either. Why had it taken an incidental meeting with an archangel that no one had heard from in centuries for him to learn about this seemingly important omen for their future? Who made this call? Why wasn’t he informed? If he was being kept in the dark deliberately, maybe there really was something in the works that would endanger them all. As much as he wanted to deny it, Castiel had been having doubts about the origins of his orders for some time and this did nothing to assuage his misgivings. As much as he wanted to warn the Winchesters about the impending storm, until he knew more information, there was not much of a definitive warning that he could truly give. So, reluctantly he resigned to go along with Gabriel’s plan. 

“Fine. We will keep this between us until we know more about the situation. I will do my own…investigation on the matter. If I was purposefully kept in the dark about this, I want to know why. I will let you know if I find anything,”Castiel paused to emphasize his final words to his brother, “But I will not keep this secret forever. I suggest that you don’t either.”

With a beat of wings in the autumn air, he was gone leaving Gabriel alone in that abandoned barn with only his thoughts. Relieved he was able to persuade Castiel to silence, he let out a small sigh as he let himself relax into a more comfortable posture. Choosing to lean against an old wooden table near one corner of the room, he began to look inward. Feeling the pull he had been doing his best to ignore since he left you, he started to think over his conversation with Cas and formulate a plan to go forward with. 

Despite all that remained unknown, there were two things he knew to be absolute. One, he would find out who gave the order and why. Until he had those two crucial pieces of information, he would keep himself concealed from you and your brothers with the help of Castiel, for your safety as well as his own. And two, he felt sorry for whomever or whatever meant to do you harm because this urge he felt, deep in his chest like an ache that pervaded every essence of his being could make him do a lot of things. Like the face that launched a thousand ships, Gabriel knew that this compulsion could lead him to war with a smile on his face. He would do anything and everything in his power to keep you safe, even if it was the last thing he ever did.

𖤍: Hello, everyone! My fiance threatened that if I didn't stop re-reading my draft and post the thing already, he would take my laptop and post it for me lol. So hopefully, it is to your satisfaction. If not, you know who to blame. Haha. If you like what you read, please consider liking, sharing, & sending in a request for something you'd like me to write in the future.

 ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚ Thank you to @saradika-graphics for the dividers used! ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚

Sam had chosen a demon and the power she could provide over your family, a choice he is now trying to make amends for, and Dean can’t seem to find it within himself to forgive him, instead resorting to bottling up his pain and drinking copious amounts of alcohol to try to numb his regret. 

 Despite your brothers being physically by your side, they might as well be miles away in opposite directions, leaving you somewhere in the middle, not knowing what to think and who to trust. Unbeknownst to you, someone has been with you through it all. You just couldn’t see him.

Being assigned a guardian angel is rare these days. Heaven is rather busy so the tradition has since fallen by the wayside, but it does still happen. Even less common is the invocation of archangels in the tradition of guardianship. Especially the one who tends to let Heaven’s calls go to voicemail.

Gabriel could not remember the last time he felt the pull. It must have been centuries. Only recently, with all of the ‘Apocalypse’ noise, had he tuned back in to angel radio, so he was surprised to even receive an assignment at all. Everything in him told him to ignore it, to just pretend he hadn’t heard a thing and move on playing the part of the happy-go-lucky trickster, but when he heard your name he froze. ‘ Y/n Winchester? No. There’s… There’s no way that was right.’ he thought to himself in disbelief.

The name Winchester was enough to stop most supernatural creatures in their tracks, but Gabriel was anything but frightened by it. The Winchester boys were some of his favorite toys to play with when he needed some entertainment, but the girl was a different story. Ever since your first meeting on that college campus all those years ago when you looked him dead in the eyes while driving a stake through his chest (‘well, the illusion of my chest, but still’, he thought) there was something about you he just couldn’t shake. You were fierce and feminine, lethal and graceful, and overall unforgettable. In the years since, he has wondered how you were doing. Whether or not you kept that same spark that made you so electric, so incandescent in his eyes. 

He supposes it is possible that his selective hearing has struck again, making him hear what he wanted to instead of what he should. The one thing he could not blame on his hearing, though, was the pull. Like an invisible string being reeled ever tighter, he felt this irresistible urge to be near you. As if everything in his being were responding to some innate primal directive to protect and defend. It was the most human feeling he has ever experienced. This is not the first time he has felt this pull, but it is definitely the strongest, and if he is being honest, that thought terrifies him. One thing he knew for certain, he couldn’t tell you. 

‘This is not gonna end well.’ he thought with a roll of his eyes, taking stock of his situation as he attempted to pinpoint the location of your soul. His guardian status allowed him to sense your presence even with the warding carved into your ribs. ‘She’s either going to try to kill me or…no she’ll probably just try to kill me,’ he said to himself with a little chuckle. ‘Well, let’s see what she’s up to.’

Finding you, he made the decision that it would be best to remain invisible to you and your friends. This way he could both insure your safety, and avoid having to actually explain what the hell he was doing there until he could come up with a plausible excuse that wouldn’t make him seem like a total creep. One that you would actually believe because knowing your current hatred for all things halo that wasn’t exactly undeserved, he imagined you would not be too trusting of your Heaven-appointed bodyguard if you knew the truth.

Being careful to mask the sound of his wings, he landed in what appeared to have once been the living room of a house in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. Scanning the room, he noticed the piles and piles of old books, torn and peeling wallpaper, a small crackling fire in a soot-covered fireplace, the smell of dripping candle wax flooded his senses, but more than anything else, he noticed you. As beautiful as the day he met you, he found you curled up on a couch by the bay window with your nose in a book, apparently reading up on some new monster that needed putting down. There was a definite relief in being in your presence and feeling the loosening of the pull, like when a bungee cord returns to its normal state after being stretched. The pleasant sensation was supposed to compel the angel feeling it to be near their ward. ‘Like I needed any further convincing’ he thought to himself.

An older man he did not recognize was talking to your brothers while leafing through one of the many, many books on his desk, explaining a bit of lore he had uncovered in what sounded like an obscure translation of Revelations. The telltale flap of wings pulled him from his thoughts, Gabriel turned his head, his amber eyes meeting a pair of sapphires that he hadn’t expected to see. Castiel’s eyes widened in surprise, obviously not expecting to find an archangel casually observing his friends. Quickly, Gabriel brought a finger to his lips in an attempt to garner the seraph’s silence and keep him from announcing Gabriel’s presence to the whole group. Instead, Castiel walked swiftly toward his brother, lifted his hand to grasp Gabriel’s shoulder, and in a flutter of wings they were gone. 

𖤍: Hello everyone! This is the first fic I have posted, so hopefully the formatting is to your satisfaction. Please kindly let me know if there is something amiss. As a Gabriel fan, I thought it only right to start by giving him some love with my first post. I plan to make this a 3-ish part series, depending on where the mood takes me. If you like what you read, please consider liking, sharing, & sending in a request for something you'd like me to write in the future.

 ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚ Thank you to @saradika-graphics for the dividers used! ˚₊‧꒰ა 𓂋 ໒꒱ ‧₊˚