Fic: The Stillness (5/?) Dean/Castiel
Title: The Stillness, Chapter 5- The Seeking
Author: Aerilex
Fandom: Supernatural
Genre: Gen, Friendship/Pre-slash
Rating: PG
Characters: Balthazar, Dean, mentions of Cas and Sam
Word Count: ~2015
Disclaimer: Yeah, no. I don’t own any of them. If I did, well…yeah.
Warnings: AU from 6x15, mentions of occurrences from 6x16 and my own version of the rest
Summary: Balthazar shares the news with Dean. Dean tries to be nice.
A/N: I really have nothing to say for this, or anything. Just that I hope everyone can enjoy…
Chapter Four
Dean’s already having a crappy day when the ultimate shitstorm hits in the form of one dick angel bashing his way through Bobby’s house and nearly tearing off Dean’s arm in his frantic search for his missing brother, and it isn’t until he hears that that Dean starts to freak out himself because really? Isn’t part of Balthazar’s freaking raison d’être to make sure Cas is okay or something?
Wait. He should maybe back up a minute.
The day starts with Dean waking from a none-too-pleasant dream involving heat and slickness and the softness of feathers. He is comfortable enough to admit the dream may have involved an angel. He is not comfortable enough to admit which one it may have been. Either way, he wakes up to the craptastic realization that a) his skin is flushed, sticky, and uncomfortably warm, b) he has the beginnings of a migraine induced from sleep deprivation, and c) he has a bit of a problem that he’s going to need to take care of beyond the usual routine of thinking unsexy thoughts. Fuck.
He soon figures out he should have just stayed in bed.
Turns out the lead they had on ganking the Mother of freaking All—something about a
It only gets worse.
He’s tried not to call Cas down to Earth for the 11 days it’s been since Balthazar spirited him away to Heaven so he could heal up. He’s thought of sending some encouraging prayers here and there, just something to let Castiel know he hopes he’s doing better, but every time something stops him. The bitter aftertaste of it is something like whiskey and guilt. He doesn’t reflect on it much.
But this time when Sam and Bobby suggest that he make the call because they literally know jack-shit about this whole thing, Castiel doesn’t show. Dean waits for five minutes in silence before casting a half-plaintive, half-worried look skyward. “So I guess you’re busy right now. Soon as you get a minute, though, Cas. We could use some help.”
It isn’t for another couple of hours that Dean finally feels the strange electric displacement of air and hears the rustling of fabric and feathers that he has come to associate with their wingman, and he’s almost buzzed enough on the Johnny Walker he’s been throwing back not to notice the difference.
He isn’t buzzed enough not to notice the accented cussing going on, nor can he really ignore the hands on his shoulders that spin him around to face a distraught, obviously-stressed Balthazar. “Where is he? Didn’t he come here? He must have come here.” Balthazar’s answering his own questions and looks like someone managed to sucker punch him and maybe steal his puppy on top of it. Dean tries not to worry.
“The hell’re you talkin’ about?” Dean slurs, then as an afterthought gives Balthazar a gruff shove to dislodge his grip. “’nd keep your hands off. Christ.”
Balthazar only looks more pissed off, which should set off all kinds of red flags. The angel flicks Dean in the chest, and the air leaves his lungs in a whoosh as he flies backwards to collide with Bobby’s sofa. The couch sails into the wall with a thump, bouncing Dean up twice before he manages to settle to stillness and he realizes he’s now covered in whiskey. He glares sharply at the angel, only to see Balthazar pacing the length of the room, his hand hovering over every surface but not quite touching—like he’s scanning over the place with his palm.
Before Dean can ask what the hell he’s doing, Balthazar spits a venomous curse and whirls on him. “He didn’t come here? How could he not have come here—he’s always here. It’s the one blasted constant he has, why wouldn’t he be…” He trails off, and Dean realizes that this is the closest he has ever seen Balthazar—who’s always so cockily unflappable and who brushes aside a serious situation with a joke and a playboy smile—to falling completely apart. Obviously something terrible is going on, and Dean tries to shake the cobwebs of his alcohol-induced haze away so he can focus properly.
“Hey. Hey!” he says gruffly, reaching out to snatch the material at the angel’s shoulder as Balthazar moves to pass him on another weird hand-scan circuit. Balthazar spins to him, practically snarling, and yeah—Dean should probably remember that he can’t exactly act the same way he would with Cas around other angels, ‘cause they’re not all as patient as Cas is (and Dean knows how limited Castiel’s patience with him actually is, so he’s kind of lucky he hasn’t gotten his ass smited—smote—whatever, yet) and he’s just drunk enough to make a good idea out of running off at the mouth. “Seriously, dude. What are you on about?” Dean asks, trying to remain calm and not somehow incite Balthazar’s volatile temper. This is an unfamiliar practice for him, but he thinks maybe he’s managing to somehow do it right, because Balthazar stops moving like a madman long enough to pin him with a glare.
“It’s Cas, you fuckwit. I can’t find Cassy.”
And even though he’s hearing the broken quality of Balthazar’s voice, that raw, terrible fear that wrenches his own gut whenever Sammy’s in some kind of trouble, he still manages to see red. “You lost Cas?!” Dean accuses, now fixing Balthazar with his own Winchester-patented Glare o’ Doom. God, as if Dean doesn’t already have enough of a reason to fucking hate Balthazar’s fucking guts. As if he wasn’t already worried as hell about Castiel. “How the hell could you lose Cas? I thought you were keeping an eye on him while he healed or whatever.”
Balthazar looks mildly guilty, but quickly covers the expression with one of disdain. “In case you forgot, precious, Cassy’s leading an army in Heaven. Someone had to make sure all the grunts kept up with fighting the good fight and all. I left Cassy in a warded chamber, but…somehow he was summoned away.”
“So where the hell is he?” Dean growls, gritting his teeth.
He realizes it’s a stupid question even before Balthazar snarks back, “If I knew that,
If something didn’t catch in his brain at the accusatory tone in Balthazar’s voice, Dean knows he’d be more than a little bit pissed at what the angel is implying—that he somehow has something to do with the sudden Silver Alert on Cas. He tries to remain patient, really really tries because he remembers the look in Castiel’s eyes the last time he and Balthazar had been at each other’s throats. He takes a deep breath in, and releases it in a heavy sigh. “No,” he enunciates slowly, “we didn’t summon Cas. I wouldn’t do that, not when he was hurt.”
He wonders why he feels so defensive, and gets annoyed when Balthazar latches onto it and snorts derisively. “Right, because you’ve never pushed him past his limits before,” he says acidly. Before Dean can take proper offense to this statement, Balthazar leans in close, his eyes wild and dangerous like a wolf challenging a threat to its pack. “You and I both know, Dean Winchester, that if you needed something, really needed something, you’d only have to push a little and Cassy would give you his whole world—he can’t deny you anything.” He leans back, and the fierce expression on his face vanishes, replaced by something more urgent, like he’s just remembered that he doesn’t have time to be up on his soapbox.
Dean lets the moment slide, noting it down for later attack ‘cause not even the brothers who seem to have Castiel’s back get away with that shit, and moves to the problem at hand. “You said he was summoned? So can we track the spell that was used to summon him?”
“I tried that,” Balthazar says, glaring sharply at Dean from the corner of his eye like Dean’s a disgusting insect and Balthazar’s fighting down the urge to squish it because he’s an angel and he’s supposed to love all God’s creatures no matter how vile. “I can’t track the spell or his Grace. He is…I’ve lost him.”
He actually sounds kind of devastated, and that really fucking worries Dean. The angels are supposed to be the top of the food chain here, right under God and apparently Death, if the guy’s words in
“So where do we look?” Dean asks urgently.
“We don’t,” Balthazar replies evenly, his menace only belied by the tightness around his eyes. “First, Cassy would kill me if so much as a single hair on your hollow little head was moved a fraction out of place. And second—and more importantly to me, at least—if I can’t find Cassy in Heaven and I can’t find on no Earth, then there are only a few places left that he can possibly be, and neither are fit for a living, breathing human such as yourself.”
It takes a minute, then Dean’s eyes widen with apprehension. “You mean Hell, don’t you? You think Cas is in Hell.”
“Cookie for you,” Balthazar replies flatly. “He may also be in the Between. So I have to be very careful about finding him—and I certainly don’t need to be looking after any humans while I’m searching.”
Dean fixes the angel with a piercing look. “So maybe we can’t go but we can still help.” Balthazar gives him what Dean thinks is the flattest, most condescending stare he’s ever seen—and having known Bobby Singer, Dean’s seen plenty of those. He scowls and adds pointedly, “He’s our family too, Balthazar.” Don’t be a dick, he thinks, half-hoping the angel hears though he intends to go about this as nicely as possible.
Balthazar stares at him, then gives a jerky, abrupt nod. “You should keep looking for information on the Mother of All.”
“What, like how to kill her?” Dean asks. “’Cause we kinda already dead-ended on that one with some Phoenix-thing.”
Balthazar had been turning away, squaring his shoulders as if for flight. At Dean’s words, he jerks and twists around to stare at the hunter. “What did you just say?”
Dean blinks, furrowing his brow at Balthazar’s strange expression. “We found something about the ashes of a
Balthazar’s eyes narrow as he murmurs, “The Arisen…” Then he shifts through the air and winks out of sight.
Dean is tempted to throw up his hands in exasperation ‘cause really? Angels fucking suck at proper bow-outs. But then he remembers Castiel, and he blanches as he turns.
“Sammy!” he calls up the stairs. “We got a Mother to kill and an angel to find!”
Chapter Six