#;;castiel ( like the naked guy at the rave. )

[samwenahetbait]

Supernatural, Season 7, and the Positive and Negative Symptoms of Schizophrenia/Psychosis

I just finished season 7 of Supernatural. Season 7 and Sam’s arc, and later Cas’ arc, interested me a lot because I’m schizoaffective (schizoaffective being schizophrenia plus a mood disorder, either bipolar or depression, in my case depression).

I’ve done a lot of research on the disorder and spectrum of disorders and when watching the beginning of honey!Cas I thought this would be a really interesting way to show the ways the show does and doesn’t portray psychotic disorders well.

I’ll be using both Sam and Cas, Sam for positive symptoms and Cas for negative symptoms, and evaluating them for how accurate they are to DSM 5 criteria for psychosis, criteria for schizophrenia (understanding that neither of them could be diagnosed due to duration and the magical nature of their problem), and accuracy to personal experience (not all psychotic experiences are the same, obviously, so this is not the most accurate test, but lets do it anyways lol)

This is gonna be long, so more under the cut!

So a bit of background of the DSM 5 criteria for schizophrenia and DSM 4 criteria for psychosis not otherwise specified, which is still in use in hospitals and doctors offices and would definitely still be used in 2012. The DSM 5 criteria for schizophrenia includes two or more of the following, with one having to be one of the first three: hallucinations, delusions (things that you believe as true even when presented evidence you’re false), disorganized speech, grossly disorganized or catatonic behavior, negative symptoms. The duration must be for six months including prodrome (mostly negative symptoms), with at least one month of active symptoms.

The DSM 4 says psychosis not otherwise specified includes delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech, grossly disorganized or catatonic behavior about which the doctor cannot make another, better diagnosis.

Positive Symptoms

“Positive” and “negative” symptoms are a bit misleading. what they really mean are positive symptoms are things the disorder adds that aren’t there originally (hallucinations, delusions, disordered speech), and negative symptoms are things that are taken away (blunted affect, poverty of speech, avolition or lack of energy)

[ID: Sam looks to the left. He says “he’s singing “stairway to heaven” right now.” End ID]

Sam is our character who experiences positive symptoms with Hallucifer. There are multiple types of hallucinations, the most common being auditory. Combination auditory and visual hallucinations are possible but they’re more rare than the media makes you believe.

Sam has a stereotypical case of what an outsider with no research may think psychosis or schizophrenia is - he has a voice that will not let him sleep, that constantly bothers him. Sam qualifies for Psychosis Not Otherwise Specified in that he has a prominent hallucination and does not qualify for another disorder.

What’s interesting about Sam’s psychosis to me watching, though, was the hallucination was the only sign of psychosis he had. It was severe and caused depression, derealization, dissociation, and insomnia but he never had delusions outside of the hallucinations, never had disordered speech outside of sleep deprivation, never had bizarre movements or disorganized behaviors. The only way to get a schizophrenia diagnosis with only hallucinations is if you have two or more voices who talk to each other, which he does not have. Sam would absolutely not qualify for a schizophrenia diagnosis.

As for personal experience - I’ve been hospitalized because voices have made it impossible for me to sleep so this arc hit close to home. I thought at times he was a little too well put together and honestly think there were moments in the season the writers forgot he was actively hallucinating. I thought that besides only having hallucinations and it being the Hollywood hallucination Sam’s arc with his “voice” was fairly easy for me to empathize with - but not easy for anyone else to treat him with respect. Here’s a link to a quiz I made about which ableist phrase used against Sam in season 7 you are

Negative Symptoms

[ID: Meg, in a nurses outfit, crosses her arms. Castiel’s profile is seen. Meg says “He’s been like the naked guy at the rave ever since he woke up.” End ID]

Cas, when absorbing Sam’s hell trauma, originally has his one positive symptom - hallucinations of Lucifer. However, after he wakes up from his coma he has one and a half noticeable positive symptoms and one and a half marked negative symptoms.

Cas experiences some form of hallucination (he tells Sam that he “sees everything” when asked what he sees) but it’s unclear what he means by this. He has noticeable disorganized speech however in that he will end conversations during important discussions and change the topic, which is an aspect of disorganized speech.

I would also argue Cas experiences a negative symptoms known in disorganized schizophrenia particularly, although anyone with psychosis can have it: inappropriate affect. Some people with schizophrenia will laugh during moments when they should be crying or show inappropriate emotional responses, uncontrolled. Cas doesn’t seem to have control over his emotions and will make jokes and laugh during tense or upsetting situations. Part of that is also due to his complete disconnect with reality and what is happening in the situation. It could also be argued he experienced disorganized movement or catatonia, as we see him staring blankly and sitting still at the end of 7.17.

Castiel definitely qualifies for PNOS through his disconnect with reality, possible hallucinations, and disorganized speech, as well as with inappropriate affect and possible catatonia. Despite having more on the list than Sam he still doesn’t qualify for schizophrenia.

This is getting longer than anticipated so I’ll try to make this section shorter. I don’t think honey!cas was written to be psychotic. I don’t think he was written with an illness in mind. I don’t think either of them were. I think Cas was written to be funny crazy and Sam to be scary crazy. But in writing a funny crazy character the writers accidentally hit somewhere personal as someone living with the cognitive and neurological effects of schizoaffective. I watched honey!cas on a bad cognitive day and sobbed when they were mean to him because I related to the disorganized speech and the inappropriate behavior. Is it good representation? No. It’s exaggerated and ridiculed. It’s deeply ableist. And the way the writer’s treat him and have others treat him is deeply ableist. But I did find myself relating and rooting for him.

Fandom Response

I haven’t been in Supernatural fandom long (four months) and being involved with fandom while watching the show has been interesting. I’ve had pretty much everything at least somewhat spoiled so I was excited to see honey!cas and psychotic Sam in something other than gifs. I’ve seen maybe three people talk about sam’s psychosis, maybe because I don’t follow enough sam blogs, but it’s not something I’ve seen a lot of. everyone i’ve seen has been psychotic and made it clear he’s a psychotic character or been supportive of viewing him as psychotic. But honey!cas is very popular and...sexualized?

I’ve seen two responses to honey!cas: he’s so crazy or he’s so slutty. I’m going to ask both of those groups of people to see the character as a person experiencing cognitive issues and a break from reality. Not saying not to talk about honey!cas - he’s interesting, but please don’t sexualize him for being quirky when by quirky you mean delusional and please don’t do the opposite and demonize him for being vulnerable (and if that’s crazy. you should see me off my meds)

[mittensmorgul]

The TNT loop got me good today. 7.21 is... a new level of angst now. I’ve been yelling my incoherent feelings at @wigglebox about this, and decided I just needed to make all the parallels. So I’m just gonna quote chunks of the transcript for 7.21 here, and then comment on it. Because it is A Lot™

(honestly y’all should be glad I’m not a gif maker because a) it probably would make this post lethal, and 2) the first casualty would’ve been me)

Okay, here we go. For reference, I’m just using the transcript here, and basically annotating it with thoughts from the POV of 15.03. Some of it will be directly quoted from this transcript at the superwiki if you’d like to follow along for maximum pain (or to fill in any blanks I’ve left in the rest of the episode), and some of it will just be direct commentary. 

We begin with Cas awakening, bolting upright, from the catatonic state he’s been in since he’d healed Sam’s Hell Trauma. Remember, Cas took that wound into himself. Cas’s awakening wasn’t “natural.” It coincided with the awakening of the Prophet Kevin Tran, and Dean shattering the ancient rock concealing a long-buried “Word Of God.” I’d like to take a moment here to remind everyone why Sam had even suffered this trauma that Cas had to heal in the first place. Not only was “breaking Sam’s wall” one of the “terrible things” Cas had done in s6 in the name of trying to keep Dean from being conscripted back into service in the new Apocalypse Raphael was plotting, but it also led directly to The Worst Thing Cas Has Ever Done In The Name Of Doing The Right Thing Of His Own Free Will. Because ALL of this was couched in that language. In 6.20, in that final scene, this was the specific language that Cas used with Dean in his final attempt to earn Dean’s trust and support in his (soon to be) catastrophic plan. And Dean couldn’t give it to him. ALL of this is now currently wrapped up into the events of the first three episodes of s15. Free Will, the Word of God, a Cosmic Wound that has injured both Sam and Cas (and that Cas was unable to heal this time), Kevin Tran forced into service, A Plot to gather god-like power through the consumption of souls, a Rift into an afterlife for the purposes of releasing a terrible apocalypse on the world... heck... there’s probably more, but this will do nicely for a start, for the purposes of Painful, Awful Context.

FLASH TO TITLE CARD

(see what I mean? this is gonna be a long, bumpy ride... I should probably put this under a cut...)

The lightning flashes and odd weather effects from breaking open the tablet caused a worldwide disruption to the weather, to the point that a meteorologist on the radio said he wasn’t baffled by it, but offended.

So the Word of God being freed, from being given power by having been revealed, revealed something that went beyond confusion, and was just so wrong it actually made the guy ANGRY. Hmm. Kinda like Dean in early s15, yes? Dean’s our “offended weatherman.”

(I really miss the text separator line function. Thanks for taking that away from us, tungl. I guess I’ll have to insert something else between commentary... asterisks it is... I’ll keep it to three for a visual separation that hopefully won’t screw too badly with screen readers)

DEAN: So, what? We start the storm heard 'round the world? SAM: When we broke this thing [SAM touches the stone tablet] open last night, every maternity ward within a hundred-mile radius got slammed. Looks like any woman in the last month of her pregnancy went into labor.

WELL that’s definitely an interesting parallel... motherhood, giving birth. With the imagery of Rowena’s spell in 15.03 looking both like Mary and Jess in 1.01 as well as a weird sort of “reverse birth” of hundreds of souls.

***

Sam and Dean were planning to head West to Rufus’ cabin, until THIS, that had them heading in the exact opposite direction, because Cas:

SAM: What? [to DEAN] Cas is awake. DEAN: When? [SAM puts the phone on speaker and holds it out.] When? MEG: Last night about eight. DEAN: And you waited till now to call us? MEG: I've been busy with Cas. He's just a tad different than when he dozed off, 'kay? DEAN: What do you mean, different? MEG: Hey, Seacrest, guess what – not a nurse. Just playing one on TV. Want answers? Start driving.

Or, because Demon who teamed up with them specifically because they intended to use Cas for his specific power... Meg intended to earn Cas’s loyalty for her own security/protection/personal mission against Crowley, so she could swing him like a big hammer. In s15, Belphegor’s machinations were much the same, with his long-term plan to earn just enough of Cas’s trust to use him as the key to open the box holding Lilith’s Crook. By hook or by crook, right? Demons, man. I mean, I’ve mentioned the parallel to 8.17, and the crypt scene with the unlocking of this box in a different crypt for a different god-level power item (in 8.17 it was brainwashing and the angel tablet, and in 7.21 it’s denial and the leviathan tablet, but you can draw a big fat straight line through all of it). And this is just another go-around of all those same themes.

***

DEAN: We raced all the way here, and now I don't know. I can't say I'm fired up to see what's left of the guy. SAM: You think he remembers at all? DEAN: That, and I'm guessing whatever kind of hell baggage he lifted off of your plate. It's not gonna be pretty.

Oh remember this? Previously on Supernatural, this was owie, but now it’s been weaponized with new context from s15, with this endless cycle of guilt and blame laid on the table between Dean and Cas. He couldn’t look at Cas, was terrified to see what had become of Cas because of ALL of this. Because of everything that began in s6 and culminated with them finally cracking the Word of God. Or at least A word of god, since we know now that this wasn’t the only thing Chuck wrote, you know? And we’re still due to progress through Metatron’s hackneyed retelling, too. But even back then, Dean’s feelings of guilt, blame, and loss were all tangled up together regarding Cas, and infused with a confusing dollop of friendship, need, and (dare I suggest) love. Because the kind of stuff Dean (and Sam) have forgiven Cas for over the years? Even if it was only in knowing the underlying good intentions and wondering about all of Cas’s motivations, this isn’t the kind of thing you forgive someone for unless you truly care about them, deep down. The only ones who truly have the power to break you like this are the ones you love.

***

After Cas’s unsettling attempt at a “joke,” (pull my finger *lights explode* *disturbing chortling*), Dean needs information, and needs it from Cas.

DEAN: Okay, just hang on, Cas. Wait. Let us catch up to you for a second. SAM: So, you're saying you remember who you are, what you are. CASTIEL: Yes. Of course. Oh. Outside today, in the garden, I followed a honeybee. I saw the route of flowers. It's all right there, the whole plan. There's nothing to add. SAM: You might want to add a little Thorazine. MEG: Right? He's been like the naked guy at the rave ever since he woke up. Totally useless.

Let’s start at the end of this mess and work our way back to the start. Meg declares Cas “totally useless.” Because in his current state (I don’t fight, I watch the bees), he literally can’t be the weapon she hoped he’d be for her own personal needs. Like Belphegor in s15, it took some chipping away before Cas could even remotely be “useful” to him. Cas couldn’t even look at him, and he certainly would never agree to fight for him (the muscle).

Next let’s tackle Cas’s perception of creation, as told in metaphor between his observation on the micro-level scale of the “route of flowers,” which he directly compared to the macro-level scale of “the whole plan.” As if there was a “whole plan” to the universe. I could write a doctoral thesis on just this statement alone, of how Cas’s observation of the plan inherently altered it, how his presence in the garden as observer watching the bees do their thing, following them along their paths to the flowers irrevocably inserted him into the “whole plan,” and whether he or the bees realized it or not, those bees by necessity altered their paths to accommodate Cas’s presence in their daily routine. Did this make their lives easier? More difficult? Regardless, it had to affect their choices, which flowers to visit, which paths to fly, because Cas’s mere presence provided an obstacle to their routes. They couldn’t fly through him, you know? Left or right, over and around, He became something the “whole plan” needed to work around. And isn’t that what Chuck’s been doing since the start? And on an entirely different level, Chuck’s done it all with intent, because “the whole plan” had been his creation from the beginning.

And then, both first and last depending on your perspective, is Dean, asking Cas to stop just long enough for him to finally catch up. Asking Cas to wait. Because Dean feels like he’s the one who’s fallen behind.

Okay, everyone take five to have a good cry *passes out tissues*

***

CASTIEL: Will you look at her? My caretaker. All of that thorny pain. So beautiful. MEG: We've been over this. I don't like poetry. Put up or shut up.

Ah, Cas and “poetry.” He’s temporarily given up on seeking Free Will, temporarily abandoned the attempt to “teach poetry to fish,” as he’d said in 6.20. And Meg doesn’t like poetry either. She just wants Cas to suck it up and do what she needs him to-- be her personal hammer. She doesn’t care about him, but only what he can do for her. Put up or shut up.

***

CASTIEL: Oh. Of course. Now I understand. SAM: Understand what? CASTIEL: You were the ones. Well... I guess that makes sense. DEAN: What makes sense? CASTIEL: If someone was going to free the Word from the vault of the earth, it would end up being you two. Oh, I love you guys. CASTIEL pulls DEAN and SAM into a hug.

Of course The Winchesters would be the Disruptors™ to the natural order, right? Even though Sam and Dean had only stumbled across the word of God by accident, while trying to clean up the planet-wide epidemic of cosmic Goo left behind after Cas’s attempt to rewrite the story and play god. But still, of course it would be Sam and Dean, because it’s always Sam and Dean, right? I mean, Cas already hung a lampshade on “The Whole Plan” being right there for anyone to see, in everything from the path of the flowers right up to the unearthing of the Word.

Chalk another one up to the spiral narrative as everything.

***

Cas mutters something about cat penises, and females not being consulted on that terrible bit of creation. Chuck, man. Throwing barbed penises around with zero consideration for the ladies. Ow. But on to the bigger things:

DEAN: Cas, please, we're losing ground out there, okay? We need your help. Can you not see that? CASTIEL: This is the handwriting of Metatron. SAM: Metatron? You saying a Transformer wrote that? DEAN: No. That's Megatron. SAM: What? DEAN: The Transformer – it's Megatron. SAM: What? CASTIEL: Metatron. He's an angel. He's the scribe of God. He took down dictation when creation was being formed. SAM: And that's the Word of God? CASTIEL: One of them, yes.

They’ve been drowning in goo for months, and Cas coming back had represented a beacon of hope in the darkness. But the reality of the whole situation at hand wasn’t something Cas could deal with. He was so burdened with personal guilt that he chose to ignore the mess, reacting with anger (and by disappearing) with directly confronted with it. In s15, Dean... can’t just disappear, even though he’s the one drowning now.

A... Transformer. A misinterpreted word that changes the meaning, creating a baffling misunderstanding that requires a re-translation and correction before understanding can occur. That’s so meta I could cry. “I always get the words right.” Cas had no idea what “Megatron” or “Transformers” were, but saw that Sam and Dean were literally “speaking language he didn’t understand,” but that they’d come to a satisfactory conclusion that seemed irrelevant to their current conversation anyway, and just... continued on as if the disruption had never occurred. An entire loop of conversation just flew right over his head. He might not get words wrong, but sometimes he just doesn’t get them at all, you know? Nor does Dean always understand what the intent behind Cas’s words are. They need a translator. Or they need to stop speaking in references and metaphor, and speak clearly in unmistakable language. And all of this is wrapped up in the parallel to the indecipherable Word of God, which will require a unique translator to interpret.

Author to Scribe to Prophet, because the knowledge within is not meant for angels. It’s not even meant for humans. It’s just another randomly-scattered puzzle left by Chuck to be simultaneously helpful and dangerous. Choices and drama.

***

CASTIEL: Don't like conflict. CASTIEL disappears and the stone tablet drops to the floor, breaking into three pieces.

Aah, the conflict, that Meg attempts to blame on Dean, when she was the one who (I mean, understandably she was curious, but she’s still a demon that Dean still doesn’t trust, who once possessed Sam and tried to force Dean to kill him, so... she’s not actually their friend, she was “mutually assured destruction” in case things with Cas went sideways while Sam and Dean were running around trying to clean up the Leviathan mess...). Cas’s reaction to conflict back then had been to drop the Word like a hot potato, smashing it to pieces on the floor. Even when he isn’t trying, he’s tearing up pages and altering the shape of Chuck’s story. Bless him. But he’s still... actively avoiding doing anything, including acknowledging his own role in the events that have brought them to this point, and to everything Dean had been fighting almost on his own (Sam’s been “in the bell jar” most of s7 fighting the Hallucifers) and basically surviving with whiskey, denial, and pasting a fake smile on and pushing through trauma after trauma without Cas (or... pretty much anyone else in any measurably reliable way). But we all know this isn’t how DEAN reacts to trauma, right? He pushes people away, by manufacturing conflict when he runs out of organic conflict.

***

DEAN: All right, I'll go handle Cas. Sam, will you please pick up the Word of God?

Dean, delegating responsibilities. He’ll take the broken angel, and Sam will take the broken Word.

***

MEG: We both call, who do you think Cas will come to? I'm guessing me. You heard him – thorny beauty, blah, blah. I'm the saint who stayed with him. He owes me. His words. SAM: Yeah, what about what he owes us? MEG: Well, work on him a little. Maybe he'll start crushing on you, too, hot stuff. SAM: What are you gonna do with a broken angel? Don't be stupid. MEG: I'll take power where I can get it. I've got myself to look out for.

Unlike Belphegor, Meg never even attempted to disguise her motives. She wanted Cas for his power, broken or not. She’d find a way to manipulate him to defend her-- despite his insistence that he doesn’t fight. And it’s interesting it’s Sam who’s given the line “what about what he owes us?” While Dean’s discussion with Cas is far more personal.

***

DEAN: You realize you just broke God's Word? CASTIEL looks away and DEAN sits down at the table opposite him. DEAN: It's Sam's thing, isn't it? You taking on his, uh, cage-match scars. I'm guessing that's what broke your bank, right? CASTIEL: Well, it took... everything to get me here. DEAN: What are you talking about, man? CASTIEL: Dean, I know you want different answers. DEAN: No, I want you to button up your coat and help us take down Leviathans. Do you remember what you did? CASTIEL holds up the board game “Sorry!” He shakes it once and the board and pieces appear on the table, set up ready to play. CASTIEL sets the box aside. CASTIEL: Do you want to go first?

Dean’s still kind of in awe at the notion of directly defying God’s Word, and Cas just... doesn’t even seem bothered. Dean needs to find an explanation for Cas’s avoidance of the Urgent Matter at Hand. He blames it on what Cas suffered after taking on Sam’s Hell trauma, but Cas tries to tell him it’s so much more than that, that his entire experience since the moment he gripped Dean tight and raised him from perdition had led to this moment. But that’s too much for Dean to even wrap his head around, and Cas is just... speaking in riddles anyway. So he presses on and demands a direct answer. Cas continues speaking in riddles.

And pushing for a more direct personal conversation, despite the chasm of misunderstandings separating them. For possibly the first time ever, it’s Cas speaking in metaphors and references that Dean does not understand. And it frustrates the hell out of him. He just wants to get some straight answers out of Cas before the world goes up in flames. Or drowns in dark waters.

He needs Cas to “button up his coat” and help save the world. Save it from the mess he technically made of it. But Cas won’t even engage with what Dean’s saying to him, like in s15 Dean doesn’t even engage with what Cas is saying to him (but Cas is also refusing to button up his coat and do what had to be done in s15, refusing to even look at Belphegor... despite actively assuming another equally important job... he wasn’t avoiding HELPING, just avoiding the specific task Dean had tried to give him... as the one of them most qualified to monitor a demon for ~demonic hinkiness~ or whatever. Sam and Dean would’ve just assumed they were dealing with Jack if Cas hadn’t been the one to tell them it was actually a demon, you know?

***

Meanwhile, back in Cas’s room, Kevin is knitting the Word of God back together, while being simultaneously baffled and terrified by everything that’s going on.

***

DEAN picks up a “Sorry!” card. CASTIEL: You know, we weren't sure at first which monkeys were gonna make it. No offense, but I [DEAN moves a marker on the board] was backing the Neanderthals because their poetry was... just amazing. It's in perfect tune [CASTIEL picks up a card] with the spheres. But in the end, it was you – the [CASTIEL moves a marker] homo sapiens sapiens. You guys ate the apple, invented pants. DEAN: Cas, where can we find this, uh, Metatron? Is he still alive? CASTIEL: I'm sorry. I – I think you have to go back to start. DEAN moves a marker. DEAN: This is important. CASTIEL motions for DEAN to pick up another card. DEAN does and moves another marker. DEAN: I think Metatron could stop a lot of bad. You understand that? CASTIEL picks up another card. CASTIEL: We live in a "sorry" universe. It's engineered to create conflict. I mean, why should I prosper from... your misfortune? [CASTIEL puts down a marker and moves DEAN’s marker back to the start.] But these are the rules. I didn't make them. DEAN: You made some of them. When you tried to become God, when you cut that hole into that wall. CASTIEL: Dean... it's your move. DEAN pounds a fist on the table and swipes the board to the floor. DEAN: Forget the damn game! Forget the game, Cas. CASTIEL: I'm sorry, Dean. DEAN: No. You're playing "Sorry!"

Dean’s still trying to solve their bigger problems, but he’s really trying to play along to appease Cas, trying to speak to him on a level he can understand. Trying to “play his game” and hope that Cas will play by the rules Dean had thought they both understood-- give and take. Mutual contribution to the conversation. But Cas continued talking about things Dean believed were irrelevant in the face of the current crisis. Neanderthals losing out to homo sapiens. And again, Cas talking poetry, and referencing the spiral narrative of creation.

The thing about Sorry! is that the game involves a lot of elements of chance, but also a lot of elements of CHOICE. I know someone’s written meta on this in the past, but really quickly, in Sorry, each player controls a number of different pawns, all of which must eventually be advanced from the starting point to their respective finish line. The playing board itself is the defined and accepted parameters of the world the game will play out on, yet there are multiple different “paths” for each player to take. The players draw cards in turn (the element of Chance) and then decide which of their pieces to advance according to the instructions on the card they selected (the element of Choice).

The thing is, in this game, Cas could’ve chosen to “play a different piece.” He could’ve made the game easier on Dean while still advancing his own position, and yet he chose to strategically remove Dean’s piece from the board. Cas was playing not just to win for himself, but to frustrate Dean’s chances to even get a fair turn to play. Cas was playing by the rules, after all, which encourage competition over teamwork. The name of the game is Sorry! after all, and “sending your opponent back to the start” is half the point of the game. Cas wasn’t going to even play in the spirit of cooperation with Dean. He wasn’t going to provide answers. This was, in a horrific way, Cas’s attempt to revert himself back to the “reprogrammed” Cas that came back from Heaven at the end of 4.20. All under the guise of playing sorry, without having to engage with it in good faith.

Dean wasn’t even asking Cas to fight here. He was trying to respect Cas’s choice to “avoid conflict.” But Cas wouldn’t even TALK to him, wasn’t even engaging with him as if HE was real. And Dean was not unreasonably frustrated.

Dean’s been fighting back against an impossible enemy that can’t be killed and has devised a way to suppress human free will into submission, so that all of humanity will willingly march themselves into the slaughterhouse. It’s horrifically WORSE than the apocalypse to Dean, and he’s desperate and at the end of his rope, and is hoping for even a spark of hope to keep fighting himself... and Cas has nothing but poetry for him.

***

And then the angels show up, prepared to take the Prophet with them, as if Kevin was their property. Kinda raises some questions about how the Prophet Chuck could’ve been unaware of what he was, you know? Almost as if it had literally been a lie...

HESTER: You smote thousands in Heaven. You gave a big, scary speech. Then you were gone. What the hell was that?! CASTIEL: Rude, for one thing. INIAS: Where have you been? CASTIEL: Oh, Inias. Hester, I... I know you want something – answers. I... I wish it could be that… There are still many things I can teach you. I can offer, um, well, perspective. Here. [CASTIEL points a finger at HESTER.] Pull my finger. [HESTER doesn’t move.] Uh... Uh... Meg will – will get another light, and I'll – I'll blow it out again. And, well, this time, it'll be funny, and – and we'll all look back and laugh. HESTER: You're insane. DEAN: Hey. DEAN is standing in the doorway. DEAN: Heads up, Sunshine. DEAN puts his hand in an angel-banishing sigil he’s drawn on the wall outside the room. White light flares and the angels vanish.

Unlike Dean, who’d tried to be patient and understanding with Cas despite everything, Hester simply angrily demanded answers from him. And Cas... was equally evasive with her. She labeled his evasion “insane,” but Cas is 100% sane. He knows exactly what it is he’s avoiding answering for, but he’s paralyzed with fear that anything he does will only add to the problem. And Dean gets rid of the angels before they can start killing everyone (including Cas).

I mean, Cas’s answers are pretty obvious anyway, you know? His guilt, his hubris for believing he was choosing the right thing, in trying to teach the angels a better way-- Free Will and the protection of humanity-- that in the execution he lost his own free will (and his life) and unleashed a horror onto Heaven and Earth that he’s entirely incapable of fixing. It’s not like he doesn’t HAVE answers, they’re just... to much for him to even face. Guilt is a terrible thing.

***

DEAN: That is back in one piece, I see. And you're saying that there's some sort of a "How to punch Dick" recipe in there somewhere? KEVIN: I-I don't know what you're saying, but it seems kind of like an "in case of emergency" note. What did they mean by "prophet"? DEAN: Oh, no. [to SAM] Really? SAM: Yeah. Yeah, that's what the angel said. KEVIN: I don't want to be a prophet. DEAN: No. You don't at all.

Yeah... nobody wants to be a prophet. It’s a terrible job. No free will, no freedom at all, just ensnared into the service to God’s Word. (oh, and poor Kevin will try to resist, will willingly nearly kill himself trying to turn God’s Word around into a weapon he can wield. I can see why Chuck would single him out for specific “punishment” for messing around with his story like that.

***

MEG: Yeah. Yeah, Castiel. It's me. DEAN: Cas? Where? Where is he? MEG: [to DEAN] Shut up. CASTIEL: I’ll stop speaking. MEG: No. No, Cas. You talk. CASTIEL: [audible over MEG’s phone] I’m in a place called Perth. MEG: Perth? DEAN: Perth? As in Australia? MEG: What dogs? [to DEAN] He says he's surrounded by unhappy dogs. CASTIEL: They’re chasing a rabbit around [indistinct]… MEG: Oh. Okay. He's at a dog track in Perth. CASTIEL: I’m surrounded by large unhappy dogs. MEG: Yeah, they're unhappy 'cause the rabbit's fake. Listen, we're on highway 94, north of St. Cloud, Minnesota, just passing mile marker 79. CASTIEL materializes in the back seat between MEG and KEVIN.

Okay, first off, miscommunication. This is just riddled with miscommunication. But the background conversation, Cas is at a dog track surrounded by large, unhappy dogs. Kinda makes interesting light of all the “Dean is a Weird Dog” the show has been hammering on for years-- both literally and metaphorically. But... these dogs at the track are given the runaround. They’re trained to run a specific track for the entertainment of the spectators, running in endless circles chasing after a lure that they can never quite catch before they arrive at the finish line, where even winning the race just means they’ll have to run another round around the track the next day. And the lure? The rabbit they’re trained to follow after? It’s fake. It’s all part of the bigger game the poor dogs can’t escape from. I’d be unhappy, too.

Which is all a tidy metaphor for how Dean feels in s15, but how Cas has seen pretty much everything since way back at this point, if not far earlier.

Hence even more miscommunications, or at the very least each of them not understanding where the other is even coming from, based on these wildly different baseline perspectives. Cas, as an angel, had always been one of the spectators before Dean had pulled him into the race, so to speak. He’s always understood all of existence as a sort of game in this way, but Dean had never even had an inkling of the bigger game they were all part of all along. He’d thought he understood the rules, understood his role in the game, and it took until s15 for him to see that all of it had been a game to Chuck. That even when he’d thought he’d escaped the endless go-around of fake rabbits, it had only put him back at the startling line over and over again to run another race. And Cas... can’t understand Dean’s perspective here any more than Dean can understand Cas’s, despite them each believing they actually understand one another and just don’t care... awful, right?

***

CASTIEL: They're from the Garrison – my old Garrison. Looks like Hester's taken over. We were assigned to watch the earth. Often, it was boring. The wars were very boring and the sex – you know, the repetition. Anyway, I was, uh... I was their captain. Isn't that strange? SAM: Cas, why are they pissed at us now? CASTIEL: [to MEG] You know, those racing dogs were absolutely miserable. They can only think in ovals. DEAN: Cas, don't make me pull this car over! Why are angels after us? CASTIEL: Are you angry? Why are you angry? DEAN: No, I-I'm... Please, can we just stay on target? CASTIEL: There is no reason for anger. They're only following protocol. If the Word of God is revealed, a keeper of the Word will awaken, like this [He touches KEVIN’s nose] hot potato right here.

Observing creation enabled Cas to see the “repetition.” The endless loops. Like the dogs running in ovals. But he’s unable to connect with humanity directly right now, unable to risk feeling. And we’re back to doorways to doubt, and the same “only humans can feel true joy.” But also suffering. As long as he remains at a distance, he can protect himself from feeling all of that, from having to recognize his part in it.

And he doesn’t understand why Dean is angry that he keeps talking in circles.

Dean just wants to know why the angels are angry at THEM, why they’re coming after THEM when they’ve got so many other bigger problems they’re trying to solve.

***

CASTIEL: Anyway, Garrison code dictates you take the keeper to the desert to learn the Word away from men. DEAN: What kind of sense does that make? He has to tell us so that we can use it. CASTIEL: That's God and his shiny red apples.

Cas didn’t expect anything less from God. Dean just wants to stop the Leviathan from eating humanity and destroying life as they knew it, and Cas... doesn’t have anything to give.

***

DEAN: Okay, you know what? Screw the Garrison. We need the tablet to end Sick Roman's "Soylent Us" crap. CASTIEL: If you want the Word, you'll have to duck Hester and her soldiers. SAM: Yeah, you're in our corner, right, Cas? CASTIEL: No, I don't fight anymore. I watch the bees.

see? yet despite that declaration, Cas does try to help how he feels comfortable-- painting sigils to hide them from angels, but leaving off banishing sigils or he himself wouldn’t be able to stay. Kind of a conundrum, right? Sacrificing some of the safety Sam and Dean could’ve worked into the sigils so he himself could remain in the room with them.

***

CASTIEL: You seem troubled. Of course, that's a primary aspect of your personality, so I sometimes ignore it. SAM: Okay. Um... right now I'm just wondering about you. CASTIEL: What about me? You're worried about the burden I lifted from you. SAM: I think I was done for. Do you see Lucifer? CASTIEL: I did at first. But that was... It was a projection of yours, I think, sort of an aftertaste. Now I more see... well, everything. It's funny. I was – I was done for, too. The weight of all my mistakes, all those lives and souls lost, I... I couldn't take it, either. I was… I was lost until I took on your pain. It's strange to think that that helped, but – SAM: I know you never did anything but try to help. I realize that, Cas, and I'm grateful. We're all grateful. And we're gonna help you get better, okay? No matter what it takes. CASTIEL: What do you mean, "better"?

And here we have it. Sam plainly expresses his own guilt and regret over what’s become of Cas. But Cas hasn’t even begun to see how deep he’s buried himself to avoid dealing with his own guilt. Using Sam’s trauma as a sort of penance, he’s using that to “transfer” his own guilt away from himself, the way he shifted Sam’s trauma into himself. As if the second shift washes away the first and he’s wiped the slate clean. As long as he lets himself believe that, he doesn’t have to face what he’s done, and the consequences of his own choices.

Which is... kinda what Dean’s doing in early s15.

***

KEVIN: I am not prepared to factor the supernatural into my [DEAN puts the brown paper bag over KEVIN’s face] world view. DEAN: Okay, there we go. [He pats KEVIN on the back.] That's it. That's it. Just breathe. Take it easy. KEVIN holds onto the bag and breathes into it. DEAN: Oh, I don't know, man. What can I say? You've been chosen. And it sucks. Believe me. There's no use asking "why me?" 'Cause the angels – they don't care. I think maybe they just don't have the equipment to care. Seems like when they try, it just... breaks them apart.

I mean, Dean’s seen what trying to care has done to Cas. And Dean... was the one who pushed Cas to care in the first place.

***

And Meg kills a couple of demons who’d picked up their track, but that also brings the angels back down on them:

MEG: Typical. I save our bacon, and you're sitting here, waiting by a devil's trap. Seriously, I just killed two of Crowley's men. I could have gone the other way on that. CASTIEL: It's true, incidentally. There's other demons' blood on that blade. MEG: Look, I'm simpler than you think. I've figured one thing out about this world – just one, pretty much. You find a cause, and you serve it. Give yourself over, and it orders your life. Lucifer and Yellow Eyes – their mission was it for me. DEAN: So, what? We should trust you because you wanted to free Satan from Hell? MEG: I'm talking "cause," douchebag, as in reason to get up in the morning. Obviously, these things shift over time. We learn, we grow. Now, for me currently, the cause is bringing down the King. And I know we'll need help to do it. DEAN: Crowley ain't the problem this year. MEG: When are you gonna get it? Crowley's always the problem. He's just waiting for the right moment to strike. I know what I'm supposed to do. And it isn't screw with Sam and Dean or lose the only angel who'd go to bat for me. SAM breaks the devil’s trap with his foot. CASTIEL: This is good – harmony and communication. Now our only problem is Hester.

yeah, but they haven’t really communicated anything useful yet. But Cas does know that the angels are about to find them again...

***

HESTER: You took the Prophet from us?! CASTIEL: I'm – I'm sorry? HESTER: You have fallen in every way imaginable. INAIS: Please, Castiel. We have to follow the code. Help us do our work. DEAN: He can't help you. He can't help anybody. HESTER: We don't need his help... or his permission. HESTER nods to INAIS, who nods back. There is the sound of angel wings and INAIS disappears. HESTER: The Keeper goes to the desert tonight. INAIS reappears with KEVIN. DEAN: Whoa, whoa, whoa. Back off. We're actually trying to clean up one of your angel's messes! You know that. CASTIEL: He's right. An angel brought the Leviathan back into this world, and – and they begged him. They begged him not to do it. DEAN: Look, just give us some time, okay? We will take care of your Prophet. HESTER: Why should we give you anything... After everything you have taken from us? The very touch of you corrupts. When Castiel first laid a hand on you in Hell, he was lost! For that, you're going to pay. HESTER walks towards DEAN. CASTIEL: Please. They're the ones we were put here to protect. HESTER: No, Castiel. HESTER backhands CASTIEL and he falls to the ground. INAIS and the other MALE ANGEL each hold up two fingers to stop DEAN and SAM from going to CASTIEL’s aid. HESTER: No more madness! [She punches CASTIEL.] No more promises! [She punches CASTIEL again.] No more new Gods! [She punches CASTIEL repeatedly and then holds up an angel knife.]

I couldn’t decide how to break this up to talk about it, because one thing leads directly into the next, and it all goes to context.

Hester accuses Cas of falling “in every way imaginable.” In the wake of their brush with free will, the remaining angels are attempting to restore the old order to Heaven, because there’s not much left to them than what they’d known before. When the new rules fail, the only thing they know to do is revert to the old rules.

Dean calls them out on it, and Cas even steps in to support Dean’s words. Only Cas can’t even say *I* and *me* here. He talks about himself in the third person, but at least he’s acknowledging what kicked off this mess, even if he’s still not taking direct responsibility for it. Not only that, he acknowledges that Dean had tried to stop him, and that he’d refused to listen. This seems to be a key point again in 15.03. The inability to acknowledge guilt and responsibility, and the refusal to listen. This entire conversation is just a few painful twists away from the Breakup Scene in 15.03.

But Hester lays down The Worst Truth, that Dean himself is at fault for destroying Cas, for just the TOUCH of him “corrupting” Cas, breaking him until he broke the world. To Dean, this was the equivalent confirmation of all his worst fears-- he’s poison, he’s worthless-- that Cas got from Belphegor in 15.03-- that Dean doesn’t care about him beyond his usefulness. But this is something that Dean will carry with him for YEARS, and which Dean will continue to feel in every dealing he has with Cas going forward-- that HE is at fault, that HE is unworthy, that everything that makes Cas “fall” in any way is because of him, because he’s poison. And so he internalizes every mistake that Cas makes, every burden he endures, as his own, because it’s all his fault anyway, right?

But Cas, too, learned a lesson here as Hester beat and prepared to kill him: NO MORE MADNESS. NO MORE NEW GODS. And when confronted with the truth of what Belphegor planned-- to become a new god in the same way that Cas had-- he understood what he had to do. He would not exchange one problem for another, exchange one apocalypse for one that would likely be even worse. It was a terrible choice, and I think this is the root of his decision.

***

Here have some dramatic irony, and the demon saving Cas’s life:

INAIS: Hester! No! [He grabs HESTER’s arm.] Please! There's so few of us left. HESTER punches INAIS in the face with the hand holding the knife. HESTER: [to CASTIEL] You wanted free will. Now I'm making the choices. HESTER raises the knife. White light blazes from her chest and she falls to the ground. MEG has stabbed her. MEG: What? Someone had to.

Hester claimed she was choosing her actions now, using the same excuse of Free Will that Cas himself had claimed as his motivation for swallowing Purgatory in the first place. Even when everything she’d done had been in the name of restoring the Old Order, of following the Rules that angels had always obeyed. Talk about not getting the point of Free Will.

This is what Dean’s struggling with now in s15, with his own long-held understanding of what Free Will even meant, with this new context that Chuck had repeatedly thrown new obstacles in his path, personally. There are no rules left, or so it feels like to him. There’s nothing to revert back to, or hold on to as an ideal, when every choice they make has been engineered to lead them to equally bad outcomes.

***

But Cas... he’s understood this for a very long time:

INAIS: These are strange times. CASTIEL: I think they've always been. INAIS puts a hand on CASTIEL’s arm. INAIS: I wish you'd come with us. CASTIEL: Oh, I'm not part of the Garrison anymore, Inias. I'm sorry.

Sure, he’ll be forced back against his will, but in a way that will help save him eventually. It won’t feel like salvation for years to come, though, but it’s a journey.

***

SAM: Here. “Leviathan cannot be slain but by a bone of a righteous mortal washed in the three bloods of the fallen.” Uh... It says we need to start with the blood of a fallen angel. SAM and DEAN look at CASTIEL. CASTIEL: Well, you know me. [He holds out a small bottle.] I'm always happy to bleed for the Winchesters. CASTIEL hands the bottle, which is filled with blood, to DEAN. DEAN: What are you gonna do, Cas? CASTIEL: I don't know. [He smiles.] Isn't that amazing?

AAAAHAHAHAH. Angel blood, required by Belphegor’s first spell. This scene was directly paralleled in 15.01, and with context, it’s it awful? After refusing to fight for the entire episode, Cas is happy to bleed. To do penance, but not to be burdened with action or responsibility. And with complete freedom to choose his next move, to choose for himself what to do with himself, he... chooses nothing. And heck, I get it, after billions of years of thinking he didn’t have ANY choices, suddenly he’s presented with EVERY OPTION, and is DELIGHTED by that.

But the one thing he WON’T choose? Staying with Dean. Standing by Dean’s side while he fights to clean up Cas’s mess.

Dean’s next line to Sam after Cas leaves? “Well, let’s get to work.”

They can’t rest yet. They can’t stop, because the world’s still ending and they’re still entirely on their own. Only now they’re armed with at least a DIRECTION they can work toward. It’s something, but... it’s still just the two of them alone against the apocalypse. Which is what Cas had spent s6 trying to avoid. And can’t face at all now.

And this is what Dean had long since resigned himself to-- that Cas, given the choice, would leave. So Cas choosing to leave in 15.03? I think Dean was shocked he hadn’t left sooner.

And then of course there’s the angels dying when they return Kevin to his home, only to be deceived by Leviathan and abducted.

He just couldn’t win. And neither could Cas, and neither could Dean and Sam. It was an unwinnable game that would just break them all again.

I could do a post like this for 7.22, and for 7.23, and probably for every other episode from all the episodes between then and now, but this has taken me all day. I really hope y’all are making all the same connections, spotting all the thematic subversions and twists of every turn of the narrative spiral between then and now. But this episode killed me today. And it gives a lot of obvious context to Dean and Cas’s choices and issues in early s15 that led to the Breakup. But hopefully it also lays down the foundation of what they truly need to put out on the table to move past this impasse.

They need to put down something better than Sorry! They need to use real words and actually listen to each other. But the fact that scene in 15.03 directly called out this miscommunication, this refusal to listen (and it’s not just on Dean here, but Cas has refused to listen, too). And now the narrative demands they have that conversation for real. For their own good, but for the good of the world, to break these eternal ovals and finally break free of this endless chasing after the fake rabbit.

[marril96]

The Distance Between Us

Chapter 14: The Scream Queen

Pairing: Rowena x reader

Summary: You decide to introduce Rowena to some new culture.

Editor: @wonderifshelikesroses

Rowena wasn't kidding about hanging out with you publicly. In the weeks that followed, you hung out with her more and more, much to the chagrin of your friends.

"She's a snake! Dug her bloody claws into you and won't let go!" Crowley'd said during one of his signature dramatic rants about his sister and all the different ways she was using you and stealing you from him.

Having run out of arguments ages ago, for nothing you could say would convince him there was no way Rowena was using you as you'd hardly had anything she'd want, you'd simply said, "Snakes don't have claws."

Dean wasn't too happy with the situation, either. Neither was Castiel, but he kept his commentary to himself, while Meg found the whole thing hilarious. The more dramatic Crowley got, the more amused she was. Which usually led to the two of them bickering, something you welcomed as it got attention away from you.

Sam was the only one who supported yours and Rowena's budding friendship. Not that you called it that. For all intents and purposes, the two of you were just acquaintances doing schoolwork in public. And in private. And sometimes telling jokes and laughing instead of doing said schoolwork. As acquaintances did.

As annoying as your friends were, you knew there was no malice to their actions. They were just protective. Especially Crowley, as he knew best how Rowena was and didn't want you to get hurt. But neither he nor the rest of them knew the true her. The one that flashed warm, genuine smiles. The one that spoke in a soft voice as she explained problems over and over, endlessly patient. The one that was sweet and kind and acted more like a friend than an enemy behind closed doors.

You finally understood why Sam was friends with her. He'd been the first one to get to know that side of her. Now that you got the privilege, you could see why they understood each other so well. What made their friendship work so well despite their differences in social standing.

Having his support meant the world to you.

"Your taste in movies sucks," you said one late November evening, looking over Rowena's DVD collection instead of studying. All classics. The majority black and white.

Rowena put her phone down and huffed. "As if yours is better."

You flashed her a grin. "Mine's fun."

"Mine is cultured," she retorted smugly.

You snorted. "I'm pretty sure culture existed after…" You looked for the latest release in her collection. "1975."

She shrugged. "I prefer the classics."

"I can see that." An idea dawned on you like a light bulb flashing on. "We should get you up to date."

Rowena raised her eyebrow. "Excuse me?"

"Yeah," you said, confident. Decisive. "We should go to the movies. Watch something new."

"You must be joking!"

"Nope. Gotta introduce you to some new culture."

She raised an eyebrow. Curious. Suspicious. "And what exactly would we be watching?"

"The Slashing."

It was a horror movie that had recently hit theaters. Most popular horror reviewers raved about it; you couldn't wait to see magnificence for yourself.

Rowena made the same face she'd made when Miss Hanscum had offered her donuts. Disgusted. As if someone had murdered her entire family. "I am not watching a movie called The Slashing."

"It's a good movie," you argued.

"If nudity and gratuitous violence falls under your definition of good."

As a matter of fact, they did.

"Reviews say there's not that much nudity."

She scoffed. "Is that supposed to convince me?"

"There's shirtless guys," you said with a shrug.

Covered in blood and most likely getting violently murdered. But hey, shirtless guys were shirtless guys.

"Now you're really grasping at straws."

Guilty as charged.

"Please? I've been wanting to see it for ages," you said.

"Nothing's stopping you."

"I don't wanna see it alone."

"Take Fergus."

"I don't like going to the movies with him. He always talks, and he insults the characters."

"Then you're out of luck."

Hopefully not.

"Can't you go with me?"

"Sorry, love. Horror is not my genre."

"You might like it."

She fixed you with a stare. Narrowed her eyes in curiosity. "Why do you want me to go?"

"Because."

Because I think we're becoming friends.

Because I think it'd be nice to spend some time with you in the dark, high on adrenaline, far away from math and black and white classics.

Because you're a mystery and I want to solve you. I want to know who you truly are. Because…

I think I like what I see.

You shrugged, adding, "It'd be fun to hang out. Now that we're not hiding in your room all the time."

Rowena thought it over, eyes never leaving you. Did she see what you saw? Was she having as much fun as you did? Or was this all strictly business Principal Shurley had imposed on her?

She seemed to genuinely enjoy your time together, but for all you know it could have been a mask. Rowena was different from most people. She hid her feelings — her entire self — well. Had built up a wall around herself to keep everyone at a distance. It was hard to tell who she really was.

One thing you were one hundred percent certain of was that she wasn't the mean girl she presented herself as at school.

But who she actually was was a mystery.

"If I accept, then you have to accompany me to a place of my choosing," she said after a few moments on contemplation.

"Is this blackmail?" you asked, quirking up an eyebrow.

"A trade," she said simply.

Fair.

You could live with that.

"Sounds good to me."

Her mouth widened into a smile. "Excellent! In that case, I will go with you to see The Slashing." Her face scrunched up at the mention of the title. A cute little expression. "But if I don't like it, I will walk out."

"You a scaredy cat?" you teased.

She blushed scarlet as her hair and turned her head. "No."

"Sure you're not."

"I am not scared!"

Of course she wasn't.

"Whatever you say." Before she could utter a retort, you said, "It's a deal. If it'd bad, we leave."

This was going to be fun.

*****

It was the last day of November and it was cold as hell itself. The ice in the air bit at your exposed skin; even through thick layers of clothes and a scarf covering your neck and mouth, you were shivering as if under a fever.

Maybe going to the movies, in this weather no less, was a mistake. Maybe you should've waited a few more weeks and pirated the damn movie like a normal person instead of freezing your ass off in below zero weather for an hour and a half of half-naked teenagers getting murdered on big screen.

One look at Rowena, in her maroon coat and knee-length red boots, told you it was worth it.

It wasn't every day that you got to take her to the movies.

Loser girls and popular girls didn't do that sort of thing together. As per the unwritten rules of your school's social hierarchy, their worlds didn't mesh together. They didn't mesh together.

And yet, here you both were.

Freezing, but close to your destination. Determined. Stubborn despite the awful weather.

"I bloody hate winter," Rowena commented as soon as you stepped into the theatre.

It was warm inside, pleasant, comforting, and you let out a breath of relief as the cold in you started melting.

You never wanted to go outside again.

"Technically, it's still Fall," you said.

Rowena glared, not in the mood for technicalities. "It's cold."

You shrugged. "No argument there."

Despite the horrid weather, there were still plenty of people around. Parents with overly excited children. Tired people just getting off work, eager to relax after a day of hardship. Groups of high schoolers giggling. Couples holding hands and popcorn.

You and Rowena oddly fit in.

Did you look like a couple to observers? Granted, you weren't holding hands, but you'd gotten here together, and you'd exchanged banter.

Friends, people would think. Definitely friends.

A feeling much alike disappointment swept over you. You pushed it down, ignored it. You and Rowena were sort-of-friends. And that was how it would stay.

You cared about her as a friend.

Nothing more and nothing less.

Just friends, you reminded yourself. Just friends.

You paid for the tickets, prompting Rowena to raise her eyebrows in surprise, bought some popcorn, and the two of you went to take your seats. The theater was packed, mostly with teenagers and young adults. Thankfully, none of the faces you saw looked familiar. If they went to your school, you didn't know them.

Not that you were ashamed to be seen with Rowena. But there were some things that felt more private, more intimate. Things that were too special to be spread around school in the form of rumors riddled with half-truths and blatant lies.

Things like watching a movie with a friend. In the dark. Far away from wandering eyes and cruel whispers. From blond, blue-eyed assholes' stares and nasty bitches' glares.

"Treating me, are you?" Rowena said.

"I invited you," you replied. It was only fair that you paid.

"Fair point," she conceded. With a teasing note in her tone, she said, "I take it this is a date, then."

A rush of heat spilled over you, burning at your cheeks. A lump formed in your throat, hard to swallow.

"A total date," you said with as much sarcasm as you could, praying to all deities you could think of that it was convincing enough. Thankfully, the room was dark enough to hide your flushed cheeks, but your voice, your rushed breathing and racing heart were all yours to deal with.

Traitors.

What was wrong with you?

You liked Rowena, but she was still a mean girl. She was still friends with bullies and in a relationship with a jackass. Even if she was single, you would never go out on a date with someone like her.

You only liked her as a friend.

Right?

Right?!

Rowena chuckled. If she noticed you were flustered, she didn't comment on it. "A bit too cheap for my taste," she teased.

"My sincerest apologies, madam. I wasn't aware of your price demands."

"Aye." Her shoulder brushed against yours as she shrugged. "I'm a restaurant girl."

"High end, I take it?"

"What else?"

You had to laugh. "Unfortunately, I don't think there are movies here that'd fit your standards. You'll have to live with it."

She laughed along. "I suppose I will."

"We got popcorn." You offered her the tub. "It's close enough."

She made a disgusted face. "No, thank you."

"Your loss," you said with a shrug and shoved a handful in your mouth.

"You are a pig," she said, not really meaning it. A mock insult from one friend to another.

You playfully elbowed her shoulder. "You're on a 'date' with said pig."

"Starting to regret it."

"If it makes you feel any better, we can blame this all on Principal Shurley. He's the one who made you tutor me."

"Bloody bampot," Rowena said in agreement.

You raised the popcorn up like a glass of champagne about to click against another. "Amen to that."

As soon as the movie started, the murmur of voices quieted down. Your eyes were glued to the screen, adrenaline pumping through you as the characters screamed and ran for their lives. There was beauty in horror; danger that wasn't real but still felt so vivid, fear that made your skin crawl and your heart race in excitement, blood that looked so fresh and bright on the big screen. Not many people understood that. But here, in this room, it seemed like everyone did.

Every now and then your glance would wander to Rowena. This wasn't her scene, but despite clear distaste on her face, she still watched. She took everything in. Every deathly scream. Every shift in music. Every splash of blood. Her body twitched, and you could tell it took everything in her to contain her screams. But, like the strong girl she was, she still watched.

She didn't leave. Didn't even go to the bathroom to get away from it all. She was scared, but she still stayed.

You admired that. Admired the dedication. The stubbornness.

She wanted to be here with you. Wanted to hang out with you.

A pang of regret pulled at your heart.

You never should have doubted her.

A piercing scream suddenly echoed through the room as the killer jumped out from behind one of the few remaining characters. It died down along with the girl as the knife bit into her flesh, slashed her up from the inside out.

A few people screamed along with her.

A giddy smile spilled over your mouth as excitement rushed through you like a potent drug.

And, as if on cue, a hand covered yours, tiny fingers squeezing for dear life.

You looked down, surprised to find Rowena's pale hand in yours, pink nails glittering in the dim light from the screen.

Her eyes were on the movie. Mouth pressed into a firm line.

An involuntary reaction.

You smiled, squeezing back. Her skin was warm on yours. Comforting. Right.

Your hands remained linked for the rest of the movie. Every time a jump scare would pop up, Rowena's fingers would tighten around yours. You would return the gesture. A wordless promise that you were there, that nothing would happen to her. That she was safe despite her fear.

As soon as the credits started rolling, the two of you parted. Neither said a word about what happened. Acknowledged it in any way.

No comments were necessary.

You'd held hands.

Longer than was necessary.

Tighter than was friendly.

And it felt so right.

Like it was the way it was supposed to be.

*****

Tags: @werewolfbarbie @oswinthestrange @songofthecagedmoose @apurdyfulmind @getthesalt-sam @metallihca @salembitchtrials @jay-eris @hellsmother @elizabeth-effie @victoriasagittariablack @rowenaswife @wonderifshelikesroses @xfireandsin @liddell-alien @hotdiggitydammit @lae-lae @darkhumorsblog @gaysnakess @angel7376 @cherrypierowena @ruthieconnells @evil-regal-vampiress @collectorofsecretsandsouls @angel-e-v-a @tasyahilker @a-queen-and-her-throne

[analyzingdestiel]

DESTIEL REVIEW OF 7X21: READING IS FUNDAMENTAL

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SCENE 1

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SAM’s phone rings.

SAM It's Meg.

SAM answers the phone. The scene switches between SAM and DEAN in the abandoned building and MEG in the hospital.

SAM What?

MEG What up, Bullwinkle? Just a little FYI call. Your boy's awake.

SAM What? [to DEAN] Cas is awake.

DEAN When? [SAM puts the phone on speaker and holds it out.] When?

MEG Last night about eight.

DEAN And you waited till now to call us?

MEG I've been busy with Cas. He's just a tad different than when he dozed off, 'kay?

DEAN What do you mean, different?

MEG Hey, Seacrest, guess what – not a nurse. Just playing one on TV. Want answers? Start driving.

MEG hangs up. ________________________________________________

So in this scene we see that Castiel has woken up, he'd been in a sort of catatonic state until this moment. Dean shows obvious concern, as does Sam. It shows us that Dean does still care for Castiel despite all that has happened between them. ________________________________________________

SCENE 2

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CASTIEL walks over to DEAN and points a finger at him.

CASTIEL Pull my finger.

DEAN What?

CASTIEL My finger – pull it.

DEAN does so. There is a crash, the lights go out and window and light fixture shatter. CASTIEL laughs. MEG turns on a lamp. ________________________________________________

We come to find out that Castiel is not mentally well after having taken on Sam's traumas and pain from his time spent in Hell. Castiel is behaving very differently than his usual self and is acting somewhat insanely. ________________________________________________

DEAN Okay, just hang on, Cas. Wait. Let us catch up to you for a second.

SAM So, you're saying you remember who you are, what you are.

CASTIEL Yes. Of course. Oh. Outside today, in the garden, I followed a honeybee. I saw the route of flowers. It's all right there, the whole plan. There's nothing to add.

SAM You might want to add a little Thorazine.

MEG Right? He's been like the naked guy at the rave ever since he woke up. Totally useless.

CASTIEL Will you look at her? My caretaker. All of that thorny pain. So beautiful. ________________________________________________

Castiel seems to have developed some feelings for Meg due to the fact that she stayed with him during this time. Though her reasons were not out of love for Castiel, but rather, because she wanted to use him. Castiel is not aware of this and because of her having stayed beside him, he seems to feel that she is someone he can trust.

There are reasons as to why this could be against Destiel and reasons why it wouldn't make much of a difference.

The main reason this is obviously against Destiel is because Castiel is showing these feelings toward Meg rather than Dean.

Though the reasons it doesn't make much of a difference is because, for one, Castiel is not himself and is in fact somewhat mental. The idea at this point is that he's not himself; they are making this very clear.

Though despite not being himself, he does still remember Dean. So I wonder, why does it feel that Dean is no longer #1 for Castiel (despite what could possibly just be having his brains scrambled)? One could say that he may feel that he doesn't deserve Dean because of what he had done (with the Crowley/God issue). Or perhaps he feels that he was indeed abandoned by Dean. ________________________________________________

CASTIEL If someone was going to free the Word from the vault of the earth, it would end up being you two. Oh, I love you guys.

CASTIEL pulls DEAN and SAM into a hug.

DEAN Oh. Uck. Okay. All right. Okay. ________________________________________________

I feel Castiel's "I love you guys" could almost be equivalent to a drunk friend. There is the feeling that Castiel felt similarly for both men and that Dean in particular was not being singled out. Castiel's actions are very unlike Castiel and I do certainly feel a sort of separation between he and Dean. This version of Castiel reminds me somewhat of the "The End" version and obviously won't last because this would be an entirely different character.

Dean's reaction to Castiel's hug is to be expected. Dean is not one who enjoys this sort of "chick flick" sentimentality. He often tries to avoid it in fact. Except when things get "real". Dean always has these walls up; he's acted similarly when Sam was drugged and became sentimental. This isn't proof against him loving Castiel considering he's reacted the same way with Sam who he loves more than anything; this is more related to Dean's personality. ________________________________________________

SCENE 3

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MEG We both call, who do you think Cas will come to? I'm guessing me. You heard him – thorny beauty, blah, blah. I'm the saint who stayed with him. He owes me. His words. ________________________________________________

Here we are given proof that Castiel's feelings for Meg are indeed related to the fact that she stayed by him while Dean and Sam did not. I feel that the writers are trying to tell us that Castiel is currently favoring Meg because she didn't leave him and they did. Although this is a different version of Castiel that we are working with and a part of me feels almost as if this analyzation would belong in a folder of it's own, titled "warped Castiel". He is not currently OUR Castiel. Though there are still points and assumptions we can make despite that fact which is why I feel it's still worth analyzing. ________________________________________________

SCENE 4

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DEAN No, I want you to button up your coat and help us take down Leviathans. Do you remember what you did?

CASTIEL holds up the board game “Sorry!” He shakes it once and the board and pieces appear on the table, set up ready to play. CASTIEL sets the box aside.

CASTIEL Do you want to go first? ________________________________________________

This scene was very interesting. They were putting a lot of emphasis on this game. Castiel holding it up right after Dean asking if he remembered what he did seemed deliberate. If not on Castiel's part, then on the writers' part. I can't tell whether or not we are supposed to feel that Castiel is aware of what he is doing or not.

Though the way I perceived it was that Castiel used the box to say "sorry" and then asked Dean if he "wanted to go first". I felt almost that that was his way of asking if Dean wanted to apologize to him first, considering they are playing the "sorry game". Is this relating to Dean having abandoned him? ________________________________________________

CASTIEL We live in a "sorry" universe. It's engineered to create conflict. I mean, why should I prosper from... your misfortune? [CASTIEL puts down a marker and moves DEAN’s marker back to the start.] But these are the rules. I didn't make them.

DEAN You made some of them. When you tried to become God, when you cut that hole into that wall.

CASTIEL Dean... it's your move.

DEAN pounds a fist on the table and swipes the board to the floor.

DEAN Forget the damn game! Forget the game, Cas.

CASTIEL I'm sorry, Dean.

DEAN No. You're playing "Sorry!" ________________________________________________

Despite Castiel having saved Sam by taking away his traumas, Dean still doesn't forgive him (perhaps because Dean feels it was his fault in the first place). I feel that Dean wants to attack the true Castiel, to vent his frustrations at the usual version of Castiel. I also feel that a part of Dean wants to hurt Castiel because Castiel hurt him. Dean is still very angry and we can see that he still feels betrayed. Dean is not letting this go easily at all; as he said in a previous episode, that he usually is able to let things go, but that he's unable to shake this off. It seems to be very true and I feel it's related to the fact that he had put his trust in Castiel. Perhaps Castiel for Dean was a symbol of faith, considering he was the angel that rescued him from Hell, and now that Castiel has betrayed him, he wonders "if I can't trust Castiel, who can I trust?" and feels the answer is "nobody". He may feel that Castiel destroyed all hope and faith he's ever had. Which is somewhat true, if you take what he said in some episode previous to this. "Ever since Cas, I'm having a hard time trusting anybody these days".

I sense that Dean is not only irritated because of his pent up anger and hurt over the situation. But I feel that he may also be somewhat scared over Castiel's current state and is reacting aggressively instead of fearfully. Dean has a way of taking his emotions and expressing them in more aggressive ways because it's easier to be angry than to be sad, or easier to be angry than to be afraid.

So generally I feel that Dean is unhappy with Castiel. Though the fact that he feels as much as he is feeling shows us that he does care. ________________________________________________

SCENE 5

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CASTIEL Meg, are you hurt?

MEG Shut up. ________________________________________________

Castiel is certainly showing that he cares for Meg's safety. I feel I should analyze particular scenes of Castiel with Meg, just as I analyzed some of Dean's scenes with Lisa. Considering I am determining whether or not Destiel is a believable pairing, I do feel it's important that I analyze the scenes between THEM but also the scenes where they interact with specific others so that it can be used in comparison. Although the issue in this case is that Castiel isn't himself and so I do question whether or not it should be used in comparison. I suppose later on we'll find out if it will be of use.

And as I've said before, polygamy is a thing and even if both Dean and Castiel show an interest in someone outside of each other, that doesn't make Destiel any less believable. Especially if you take "The End's" version of Castiel into consideration; partaking in orgies. Just as that version of Castiel was warped, so is this one, and perhaps a warped Castiel does not look down upon polygamy. In fact, our usual Castiel may not look down on it either, although it seems for the most part that our usual Castiel doesn't feel the need to become involved with anyone outside of Dean (and Sam).

(I put "and Sam" in paranthesis only because he is secondary for Castiel. Dean is the one who drives Castiel.)

Honestly, even when their relationship is in the state it's currently in, Destiel is still not entirely unbelievable because it is only damaged at the moment due to hurt feelings. "Feelings" being the key word, here. Both Dean and Castiel feel a great deal for one another, there is no doubting that. Their relationship at this point is playing out like two lovers who feel they've been betrayed; the usual "I trusted you" issue. If anything this sort of issue might be proof towards Destiel; I am not looking to determine whether their relationship is perfectly happy or not, but whether or not they are in love with one another.

With great love comes great pain.

Although, yes, at this point, we see that Castiel is particularly focused on Meg, like a patient who's become obsessed over his caretaker. Castiel knows Dean is upset with him and I think that he felt the separation between them just as I have, especially after Dean abandoned him. I almost feel that he has, at this point, taken what he feels for Dean and instead directed it at Meg, because she was not only there for him but also because she doesn't hate him and perhaps he feels that Dean does. It's hard to say what Castiel is capable of understanding at this point but either way he does seem to be particularly focused on Meg, where as usually his primary focus is Dean. ________________________________________________

CASTIEL They're from the Garrison – my old Garrison. Looks like Hester's taken over. We were assigned to watch the earth. Often, it was boring. The wars were very boring and the sex – you know, the repetition. Anyway, I was, uh... I was their captain. Isn't that strange? ________________________________________________

I find it interesting that Castiel has in fact witnessed sex between humans before yet he seems to be so naive about it. Perhaps he's not naive so much toward the act but just the phrases used. Or perhaps he's not used to witnessing the "kinky" sex he'd seen on that one p0rno with the pizza man considering he'd not been on Earth in 2000 years (he mentions this in 4x2). I am honestly confused myself as I've been under the impression this entire time that sex was a mystery to Castiel but instead he's been seeing it since being assigned to watch the Earth, which is quite a long time. If anything, wouldn't he be a sex expert by this point? Perhaps it's just that he hadn't felt anything related to it and actually living life in a human vessel makes it more real, thus making things more confusing.

I may also be looking too deeply into it. I can't expect the writers to be 100% consistent; there are many episodes and many writers, and some may have THIS idea while others have THAT idea. It can be overwhelming, I'm sure. Though it does make analyzing at times somewhat difficult. At this point I am simply assuming that watching sex for Castiel was very different outside of a vessel, during a time before he had began to "feel" and so this is where his confusion comes from. ________________________________________________

SCENE 6

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DEAN Oh, I don't know, man. What can I say? You've been chosen. And it sucks. Believe me. There's no use asking "why me?" 'Cause the angels – they don't care. I think maybe they just don't have the equipment to care. Seems like when they try, it just... breaks them apart. ________________________________________________

Dean seems to be speaking about Castiel here. What he's really saying is: "Castiel doesn't care. I think maybe he just doesn't have the equipment to care. Seems like when he tried, it just... broke him apart."

I find it interesting that Dean says this. He feels that Castiel trying to care is what broke him apart. Though that's not what broke Castiel apart; taking Sam's pain did. Although Dean may be referring to a time sooner. He may be referring to Castiel's working with Crowley and the issue with Purgatory. Maybe he considers these bad decisions to be Castiel "breaking". Maybe Dean realizes that Castiel did this for him (as Castiel stated in 6x21). Maybe Dean feels he is partly to blame for it because he's the one who got Castiel feeling in the first place. Perhaps that's why he's unable to shake this one off, because he doesn't only blame Castiel, but blames himself (and Dean never forgives himself).

Or perhaps I'm looking too deeply into it and this is just Dean hurt and feeling that what he expected from Castiel was too much. Maybe disappointed that he thought Castiel was capable of more. He may feel that he never should have expected anything from an angel and is beating himself up over having put his trust and faith in Castiel. For having had any feelings for Castiel.

Though Dean is wrong about Castiel, and what Castiel did was in fact very human (making a mistake in an attempt to help the one you love), I am not here to judge Dean based on his opinions but rather to analyze what he feels. ________________________________________________

SCENE 7

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DEAN Whoa, whoa, whoa. Back off. We're actually trying to clean up one of your angel's messes! You know that.

CASTIEL He's right. An angel brought the Leviathan back into this world, and – and they begged him. They begged him not to do it.

DEAN Look, just give us some time, okay? We will take care of your Prophet.

HESTER Why should we give you anything... After everything you have taken from us? The very touch of you corrupts. When Castiel first laid a hand on you in Hell, he was lost! For that, you're going to pay. ________________________________________________

There is something very romantic about the way Hester stated this. "When Castiel first laid a hand on you in Hell, he was lost!" She basically is saying that Dean is the reason that Castiel fell and the reason that Castiel rebelled. The reason that he is going against them now, and that is not saying anything small. Castiel has admitted to this as well but her saying it, as well, reminds us of just how they perceive it. They realize that it was DEAN that created the change in Castiel. It truly is profound.

This also backs up my theory that Dean may in fact blame not only Castiel but himself for what Castiel has done because he's the reason that Castiel ever does anything. ________________________________________________

SCENE 8

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Here. “Leviathan cannot be slain but by a bone of a righteous mortal washed in the three bloods of the fallen.” Uh... It says we need to start with the blood of a fallen angel.

SAM and DEAN look at CASTIEL.

CASTIEL Well, you know me. [He holds out a small bottle.] I'm always happy to bleed for the Winchesters.

CASTIEL hands the bottle, which is filled with blood, to DEAN. ________________________________________________

Despite it all, Castiel still does whatever he can for Dean and Sam. He is loyal to them to a fault; Dean in particular. ________________________________________________

The rating doesn’t go up or down with this one.

DESTIEL RATING AFTER EPISODE (BASED ON HOW BELIEVABLE): 4.7/10

[thursdays-fallen-angel]

prompt: cas is invited to a "book club" but when he shows up, it turns out that book club was actually code for "orgy", but he really just wants to talk about the book he was told to read, and lucky him, dean is there and wants the same thing. ◕‿◕

Believe it or not, except for mentions of nudity and orgies, this is mostly SFW. 

1.1k

Castiel should have known from the minute Balthazar cornered him in the dining hall that something wasn’t quite right. He should have known from his friend’s suggestive grin and leering innuendos—but he didn’t, because Castiel is an idiot.

Balthazar was acting just as he always does, how was Castiel to know?

Except, that same evidence probably should have been his clue.

Needless to say, when Balthazar invited Castiel to his weekly book club, Castiel was only mildly flattered, and didn’t otherwise think twice about it. Balthazar had frequently told him about the book club, after all, raving about it for days surrounding each meeting; it was clearly the ‘place to be’, and a new member recruitment drive—as Balthazar called it—seemed like the perfect excuse to finally join in.

“What’s the book?” Castiel had asked, and Balthazar laughed like it was one of the funniest questions he’d ever received.

And then he’d answered, that grin of his back in full force, “Crime and Punishment.”

And so Castiel had agreed, rented a copy of the novel from the library (he had heard about it but never actually read it, making the book club a great excuse), and busied himself with reading between bouts of homework to prepare. He didn’t so much as think twice about any of it.

The reality of his mistake hits him like a punch to the face the instant he is admitted into Balthazar’s off-campus apartment.

And immediately gets an eyeful his friend’s dick.

He practically short-circuits.

There are a handful of other people already milling around the apartment, but none of them match Balthazar’s state of complete undress. There’s a couple making out on the arm of the sofa and another propped against the table, rutting against each other like no one is watching, all while the other book club attendees chat and smile at one another and trade intimate touches and peel away layers of clothing.

Except.

Not a book club.

Not a book club at all.

Balthazar returns, then, and lays a hand on Castiel’s shoulder. He yelps in surprise and holds his copy of Crime and Punishment tighter to his chest, earning a low chuckle from his friend.

“Cassie, did you really bring a prop?”

A blush scorches Castiel’s cheeks. “You didn’t tell me this was an—an orgy!”

For a moment, Balthazar actually looks confused, then he arches an eyebrow. “I thought I was being rather clear. I know I’ve told you about this, and why we use the code?” Castiel continues to stare at him, wide-eyed and betrayed, so Balthazar buffs and explains, “Cassie, it’s like when primary school teachers talk about ‘choir practice’ in front of their students. Everyone knows it’s code for going to the bar. Who actually has a book club in college? Crime and Punishment was our theme for this meeting.”

“Jesus, Balthazar.” Castiel groans and presses the heels of his hands against his eyes. Everything about this is so awful, and he can’t keep looking at his friend while stark naked to boot. He tends to keep himself separate from this sort of crowd for a reason, damnit, so how did he end up tangled up in this so quickly?

Balthazar laughs again, and claps him on the shoulder. “Relax. There’s some wonderful people here, you can have a great time if you let yourself.”

Castiel doesn’t bother to answer him. Thankfully, he doesn’t have to; the front door opens to admit a new throng of people, and with his attention captured, Balthazar is swept away. The party swinging into action gets a little bit louder, and someone, somewhere, lets out an obscene moan.

“Um…”

The sound of a new voice, someone both close to him and sounding extremely uncertain, instantly catches Castiel’s attention. His head snaps up, and he finds himself staring at the man standing just inside the apartment door. The horror in his eyes mirrors what Castiel feels, which, if nothing else, gives him the reassurance that he wasn’t the only person fooled by the ‘cover story’.

Even better, though, is the copy of Crime and Punishment in the man’s hand.

Castiel shuffles a bit closer to him, drawn in by a need for solidarity. “So.” He clears his throat, hastily averting his gaze when a pair of green eyes fly over to him. “Raskolnikov is kind of an idiot, isn’t he?”

The man blinks. Castiel can practically see him struggling to switch gears, but once he does, he breaks out into a grin that has all of the air leaving Castiel’s lungs. “Kind of shows the problem with living in your own bubble all the time, doesn’t it?”

Castiel nods. “Absolutely. He should have listened to Sonya far sooner than he did, too. He already had a guilty conscience, and he knew he made a mistake. Whether someone had already taken the fall for the murder or not, his guilt alone gave his experiment the result it needed.”

“I couldn’t agree with you more,” the guy says, and he beams at Castiel for another extended moment before holding out his free hand in greeting. “I’m Dean.”

He takes Dean’s hand without hesitation. “Castiel.”

“Castiel,” Dean repeats, rolling the name across his tongue. His eyes are bright, and Castiel likes it—though he likes it a bit less when another moan from an orgy participant pulls those bright eyes away from him. It reminds Castiel a bit too much of just where they are, and what they are expected to be doing.

Even through his flannel overshirt and plain jeans, it’s clear that Dean is attractive in just about every way. So maybe, with him there… If Castiel can manage to stick by him…

“…Cas?”

Castiel blinks, only then realizing that Dean is waving his hand in front of his face. “Sorry, what?”

Dean’s smile turns sheepish, and he rubs a hand across the back of his neck. “I said, do you want to get out of here? With me? Maybe we can talk about this book somewhere that isn’t an orgy, where we’re not going to get genital herpes from the proximity alone?”

“Oh.” Castiel wets his lips and glances as their surroundings. The orgy is beginning to become graphic (meaning, Balthazar is no longer the only one naked), but no one seems to be paying attention to the two outliers. Despite his brief thoughts pertaining to Dean, Castiel still doesn’t have much desire to join in. And that’s what makes it easy for nod and return Dean’s smile. “Yes. Let’s go, then.”

No one pays them any mind as they leave, which means there’s no one to give them a hard time for choosing to go to a coffee shop instead of an orgy. A coffee shop where, of course, they sit until closing, talking about their books, then school, then life in general. It’s the easiest start of a relationship imaginable.

And the best part is, even years later when they’re getting married, no one thinks there’s anything unusual about them having met at book club.

[woods2006gal]

Chapter 22 — Reading is Fundamental

Addison follows the boys into the abandoned warehouse they were squatting in for the night. Sam sets the case they had stolen from Dick Roman on a table while Dean places a duffle bag on the floor. Addison drops a duffle she had been carrying and Dean shoots her an annoyed look when it lands with a thud. “What,” she questions. He shakes his head and walks out of the room.

Sam sets up his laptop next to the case. Addison joins him as he opens the case and takes out the cloth wrapped chunk of clay. “That’s a lot of fuss over a caveman Lego,” Dean says, rejoining them with a toolbox in hand.

“Yeah. Well, whatever Dick wants is bricked up inside that,” Sam replies.

“All right.” Dean takes a mallet out of the toolbox. Each of them pulls on a pair of safety goggles. Dean glances at them, then hits the clay chunk. A thunder boom echoes around them. He hits it once more and lightning flashes with the thunder. “That sound like somebody saying ‘No, wait, stop’ to either of you?”

“A little,” Addison answers.

“Yeah.” Dean shrugs and raises the mallet. “Oh well.” As he hammers away, the lightning and thunder continued. With the clay finally broken, Dean brushes it away to reveal a dark granite stone. It was carved with a series of etchings that none of them recognized. He gingerly picks it up. The etching was on one side of the stone. He sets the stone on the table and looks between Sam and Addison. They each shrug and a silence settles over them. ~*~ Addison runs a hand through her hair as she sits at the table the next morning. Sam was sitting across from her, the news playing on his laptop. Dean stands up, running a hand over his face as he moves to the kitchen. Addison turns her attention back to her MacBook. Dean rinses his face off and the metal cup on the counter moves. “Bobby,” Dean calls. “Bobby, that you?”

Sam holds up the EMF meter. “Think so. But that whole adventure at Roman’s seems to have drained his batteries.”

“So, what? We start the storm heard round the world?”

“Apparently when we broke up open that thing last night, every maternity ward with a hundred mile radius filled up because any woman in that radius that was in the last month of pregnancy went into labor,” Addison tells him.

Dean picks up the table. “Hmm. This one goes out to all the ladies. So, heavyweight signs, omens. What do we got?”

“I assume it’s writing. But we’ve never seen anything like it, ever,” Sam replies. “And it doesn’t match anything in any book or online.”

“All right, so big daddy chopper lands here, he grabs himself some Dick…and then he starts secretly underwriting university departments, pouring money into digs…all for this. Why?”

“No fucking idea,” Addison says. “What we do know is that Dick will be tearing new ones until he gets it back though. We need to find somewhere safe until we figure out what the hell we got.”

“Rufus’ cabin, then?”

“Yep.”

Dean looks at Sam. “This time, I’m doing the shopping.”

Sam’s phone starts ringing. He grabs it off the table. “It’s Meg,” he says, before answering. “What? What?” He turns to them. “Cas is awake.”

“When,” Dean asks as Sam sets his phone on the table and puts it on speaker. “When?”

“Last night about eight,” Meg answers.

“And you waited till now to call us?”

“I’ve been busy with Cas. He’s just a tad different than when he dozed off, okay?”

“What do you mean different?”

“Hey, Seacrest, guess what, not a nurse. Just playing one on TV. Want answers? Start driving.”

Meg hangs up causing Sam’s phone to go to the main menu. “Great,” Sam says, leaning back in his seat. “So, Indiana?”
 “Yeah,” Dean replies. “Eight o’clock last night.”

“That’s the same time we broke open that brick,” Addison reminds.

Dean nods, standing up. “Pack up.” He starts to walk out of the room, but stops at the last minute and turns to Addison. “You feeling okay?”

Addison stares at him. “I’m fine.” ~*~ “We raced all the way here, and now I don’t know. I can’t say I’m fired up to see what’s left of the guy,” Dean says as they walk down the empty hospital corridor towards Castiel’s room.

“Do you think he remembers anything,” Addison asks.

“That. And I’m guessing whatever kind of hell baggage he lifted off of your plate. It’s not gonna be pretty.”

“Hey. Excuse me, folks,” an orderly says, walking towards them. “But it’s way past visiting hours.”

“It’s okay, Abel,” Meg says, walking up behind him. “I’ve been expecting them. Hello, boys, Addison.”

Meg leads them into a nearby room. They enter the hospital room to find Castiel standing by the window, looking out over the dark courtyard. “Hey, Cas,” Dean greets.

“Hello, Dean, Sam, Addison,” Castiel replies, turning around to face them.

“Look at you, walkin’ and talkin’. That’s…that’s great, right?”

Castiel walks over to the trio. He points a finger at Dean. “Pull my finger.”

Dean stares at his friend. “What?”

“My finger. Pull it.”

Dean reluctantly pulls his friend’s finger. There’s a loud crash. The lights go out and windows shatter. Castiel laughs. Addison shakes her head in disbelief as Meg turns on a nearby lamp. “Okay. Just hang on, Cas. Wait,” Dean tells the angel. “Let us catch up to you for a second.”

“So, you’re saying you remember who you are, what you are,” Sam questions.

“Yes, of course,” Castiel answers. “Oh. Outside today, in the garden, I followed a honeybee. I saw the route of flowers. It’s all right there, the whole plan. There’s nothing to add.”

“Think you might want to add a bit of Thorazine,” Addison quietly says to Meg.

“Right? He’s been like the naked guy at the rave ever since he woke up. Totally useless,” Meg explains.

“Will you look at her,” Castiel says, motioning to Meg. “My caretake. All of that thorny pain. So beautiful.”

“We’ve been over this. I don’t like poetry. Put up or shut up.”

“Okay. So, Cas, you said you woke up last night,” Sam asks the angel.

“Yes. I heard a ping that pierced me, and well, you wouldn’t have heard it unless you were an angel at the time,” Castiel replies.

Sam pulls out the stone tablet and hands it the angel. “That’s also when we opened this.”

“Oh.” Castiel examines the tablet. “Of course. Now I understand.”

“Understand what?”

“You were the ones. Well…I guess that makes sense.”

“What makes sense,” Dean questions.

“If someone was going to free the Word from the vault of the earth, it would end up being you three. Oh, I love you guys.”

Castiel wraps an arm around Sam and Dean, pulling them into a three way hug. “Okay. All right,” Dean says, pushing the angel way.

Sam awkwardly pats Castiel on the back. “Yeah, yeah. You…you said something about ‘The Word.’ Is that what’s written on there?”

“Did you know that a cat’s penis is sharply barbed along its shaft? I know for a fact the females were not consulted about that,” Castiel tells them.

“Cas, please, we’re losing ground out there, okay,” Dean pleads. “We need your help. Can you not see that?”

“This is the handwriting of Metatron.”

“Metatron,” Addison disbelievingly repeats. “Are you saying that damn Transformer wrote that?”

“No, that’s Megatron,” Dean corrects. Addison stares at him. “The Transformer. It’s Megatron.”

“Seriously?!”

“Metatron. He’s an angel. He’s the scribe of God. He took down dictation when creation was being formed.”

“And that’s the Word of God,” Sam asks, motioning to the tablet.

“One of them, yes.”

“Well, what’s it say, then?”

“Uh…Tree? Horse? Fiddler crab? I can’t read it. It wasn’t meant for angels.”

“Okay, this all sounds bad,” Meg says. “What are you three jackasses doing with the Word of God? Let me that thing.”

“Back off, Meg,” Dean snaps.

“Come on, it’s my ass too.”

“Back off.”

“Damn it! Enough of this ‘demons are second class citizens’ shit!”

“Don’t like conflict,” Castiel says, then vanishes. The tablet falls to the ground, breaking into three pieces.

“What the fuck was that,” Dean asks, turning to Meg.

“You heard him,” the demon replies. “He doesn’t like conflict. He’s down in the dayroom now. I guarantee it.”

“All right, I’ll go handle Cas. Sam, Ads, will you please pick up the Word of God?”

“Sure,” Addison nods, grabbing the bag and kneeling down to the ground.

“What are you three caught up in now,” Meg asks, looking between Sam and Addison. Neither of them respond. “I deserve to know, Sam.” Silence. “Okay. Fine. I’ll hit the road, then. Let me just go get my angel.” Meg walks out of the room and Sam goes after her.

Addison rolls her eyes. “Yeah, no worries, Sam. I totally can clean this shit up,” she mutters to herself. She zips up the bag and stands up. Turning around, Addison raises an eyebrow upon seeing a teenage boy standing in the doorway. He had longish black hair. “I think you got the wrong room, kid.” The teenager remains silent. Then he lunge for the bag in Addison’s arms. She quickly spins away from him. He lunges for it once more, but she drops the bag and grabs his arm. She twists it behind his back and slams him against the wall. “What the hell are you?”

“I’m a…Kevin Tran,” he nervously answers. “I’m in advanced placement. Please don’t kill me.”

“I’m not going to kill you,” Addison reassures, releasing some pressure off of him. “But why the hell do you want what’s in my bag?”

“I’m sorry. I…I don’t know. I…I just need it.”

“What do you mean?”

“All I know is that last night was I going to start writing my college admissions letter and next thing was that I needed to have that,” Kevin explains, motioning to the bag in her hand.

Addison lets go of Kevin as Sam and Meg reenter the room. She hands the bag to Kevin. “Ads,” Sam begins.

“Shut up,” Addison tells him. “Kevin, what else do you feel your instincts telling you?”

Kevin sighs, cradling the bag. “Look all I know is, this is…it’s for me. I’m supposed to keep it.”

“Good luck,” Meg mutters.

Addison shoots her a glare. “Do you know what it is?” Kevin shakes his head. “Open it.”

Kevin unzips the bag. He pulls out the broken pieces of the table. He puts its back together and a flash of light emits. The tablet is back in one piece. His hands are shaking as he stares at it. “It’s writing.”

“Yeah,” Sam replies. “Yeah, we get that.”

“What’s Leviathan?”

Addison and Sam exchange a look. “You can read it,” she asks. “That’s what it says?”

“Sort of. It hurts a little. Like looking through somebody else’s glasses, but I think it…it’s about Leviathan, how it came to be. God locked him up far away, right? Like in jail…because they’re so…they’re…they’re real, aren’t they?”

“Yeah, they’re real, Kevin,” Addison replies. “Does it say anything how to kill them? Cause that’s the problem we got right now. Well, one of the many problems we have.”

“I don’t know. It’s not like reading reading. It…it’s hard to focus on it too long.”

“Something’s up,” Meg says, her eyes going black. The lights flicker.

“What,” Sam questions.

Kevin screams and backs up against the wall upon seeing Meg’s eyes. “Kevin, it’s okay,” Addison tells him. “Meg is on our side. Mostly.”

A lampshade shatters and they turn to see a woman standing the doorway. A fluttering signals the arrival of another angel. The woman raises a hand and Meg goes flying into the wall.

“A demon whore, a Winchester, and the last descendant…again,” the female angel says. Addison takes a step towards Kevin. “Step away from the Prophet!”

“Who, me,” Kevin says, looking between the female angel and Addison with a confused look.

“Sole keeper of the word on earth. We are here to take you.”

“What do you mean, take?”

“Kill the demon and her lovers,” the female angel orders.

“That's not how it…we’re not—” Meg tries to argue. The male angel moves towards her and Meg slashes him with an angel blade.

“Where did you get that?!”

A fluttering of wings causes the angel to turn to find Castiel. “Castiel?”

Castiel smiles. “Hi.”

“You’re alive?”

The female angel glares. “You.”

“Hello, Hester.”

“You smote thousands in Heaven. You gave a big, scary speech. Then you were gone. What the hell was that?!”

“Rude, for one thing.”

“Where have you been?”

“Oh, Inias. Hester. I…I know you want something, answers. I-I wish it could be that…There are still many things I can teach you. I can offer, um, well, perspective. Here.” He holds out a finger to Hester. “Pull my finger.” Hester stares at him. “Uh, Meg will…will get another light and I’ll - I’ll blow it out again. And, well, this time, it’ll be funny and - and we’ll all look back and laugh.”

“You’re insane,” Hester states.

“Hey.” The group turns to where Dean is standing in the doorway. “Heads up, Sunshine.” Dean slams his hand on the angel banishing sigil he had drawn outside of the room. A bright light flashes and the angels vanish. “All angels blown back to their corners. We got like three, four hours tops.”

“Meg, where did you get that,” Sam asks, motioning to the angel blade in the demon’s hand.

“A lot of angels died this year,” Meg states.

“What’s happening,” Kevin exclaims, looking between the three hunters. “What’s happening?!”

“What is that,” Dean asks.

Addison awkwardly smiles. “This is Kevin Tran. He’s in advanced placement classes and he’s a prophet.”

“So, these Leviathans - these monsters are real. And angels with wings,” Kevin asks.

“They’re not angels,” Addison explains. “They don’t have wings.”

“No junk. Junkless,” Dean adds. “So, Kevin, you can, uh, read the chicken scratch on the God rock, huh?”

“Uh, I…” Kevin trails off.

“That is back in one piece, I see. And you’re saying that there’s some sort of a ‘How to punch Dick’ recipe in there somewhere?”

“I-I don’t know what you’re saying, but it seems kind of like an ‘in case of emergency’ note. What did they mean by ‘prophet’?”

“Oh no. Really.”

Addison shrugs. “That’s what that one angel said.”

Kevin’s eyes go wide. “I don’t want to be a prophet.”

“No. You don’t at all,” Dean replies.

“Guys, we’ve got to start running and hiding. Or do you want to tangle with those wing nuts twice,” Meg tells them.

“I’m sorry. Did you say ‘we’?”

“I’m on the angels’ radar now. You think I don’t need a little safety in numbers?”

Dean sighs. “All right, we’ll go to Rufus’ cabin. Kid can do his book report there.” ~*~ Addison wipes her hands on her jeans after she closes the gas station bathroom door. Her phone rings and she pulls it out of her pocket to find Sarah’s name on the screen. “Please don’t tell me you guys found a word of God,” Sarah immediately says, not giving Addison a chance to say anything.

“We did,” Addison cautiously answers.

“Shit. Please then tell me that you didn’t happen to find a prophet.”

“Well, technically he found us.”

“Shit. Shit.”

“Sarah, why would finding a word of God about the leviathans be upsetting to you?”

“It’s about leviathans?”

“Uh, yeah.”

“Oh thank God. You don’t know how relieved I am to hear that.”

Addison glances around and finds that no one is near her. “You need to fill in on what the fuck you are talking about?”

“There’s more than one word of God. There’s one about demons, one about angels, one about us.”

“Us?”

“Me. My powers. You. Your powers.”

“I don’t have any powers.”

“The tablet has a spell that activates your powers.”

Addison stares in disbelief. “Why do they have to be activated?”

Sarah sighs. “It’s a long complicated story, Addison. And I promise to tell you all about it.”

“Did Dad know?”

“No.”

Addison runs a hand over her face. She sees the others gathering by the Impala. “I have to go. I’ll call you later.” ~*~ Addison stares out the window as the piece of junk car speeds down the dark highway. Kevin was sitting in between her and Meg in the back seat. Kevin jumps and she glances over at him. “Oh God,” he says, looking away from Meg.

“What,” the demon asks him.

“Nothing. Nothing. Just…my life, my future, my girlfriend, my mom’s car,” Kevin rambles as Meg’s phone rings.

Meg pulls her phone out of her jacket. “Yeah. Yeah, Castiel. It’s me.”

“Cas,” Dean questions. “Where? Where is he?”

Meg glares at Dean. “Shut up.” She rolls her eyes. “No. No, Cas. You talk. Perth?”

Addison raises an eyebrow. “Australia?”

“What dogs? He says he’s surrounded by unhappy dogs. Oh. Okay. He’s at a dog track in Perth. Yeah, they’re unhappy cause the rabbit’s fake. Listen, we’re on highway 94, north of St. Cloud, Minnesota. Just passing mile marker 79.”

Kevin lets out a surprised scream as Castiel appears in the car. Addison lets out a groan since the angel decided to appear on her lap. “Get off,” she angrily says, pushing at the angel. Castiel light touches Addison’s nose and if looks could kill, the angel would’ve been a pile of ash.

“Kevin, this is Castiel,” Meg informs.

“You’re one of the angels,” Kevin questions.

Castiel touches Kevin’s nose. “Boop. Meg, are you hurt?”

“Shut up,” Meg snaps.

“Cas, what happened back there,” Dean asks. “Who were those guys?”

“They’re from the Garrison, my old Garrison. Looks like Hester’s taken over. We were assigned to watch the earth. Often, it was boring. The wars were very boring and the sex…you know, the repetition. Anyway, I was, uh…I was their captain. Isn’t that strange?”

“Cas, why are they pissed at us now,” Sam questions.

Castiel looks at Meg. “You know, those racing dogs were absolutely miserable. They can only think in ovals.”

Dean glares in the rearview mirror. He ignores the annoyed look Addison shoots him. “Cas, don’t make me pull this car over! Why are angels after us?”

“Are you angry? Why are you angry?”

“No, I - I’m…please, can we just stay on target?”

“There is no reason for anger. They’re only following protocol. If the Word of God is revealed, a keeper of the Word will awaken, like this…” Castiel trails off as he touches Kevin’s nose once more. “Hot potato right here.”

“Please stop that,” Kevin pleads, pushing Castiel’s hand away.

“Anyway, Garrison code dictates you take the keeper to the desert to learn the Word away from men.”

“What kind of sense does that make,” Dean argues. “He has to tell us so that we can use it.”

“That’s God and his shiny red apples.”

“I can’t live in the desert. I’m applying to Princeton,” Kevin exclaims.

“Okay, you know what,” Dean begins. “Fuck the Garrison. We the table to end Dick Roman’s Soylent Us shit.”

“If you want the Word, you’ll have to duck Hester and her soldiers,” Castiel reminds.

“But you’re on our side, right,” Addison asks.

“No, I don’t fight anymore. I watch the bees.” ~*~ Addison stares at the stack of books she had taken from Patrick’s apartment after he passed away. The books he had gathered on the bloodline, trying to learn what he could. She felt like they were mocking her. The information from Sarah had been on her mind ever since hanging up. She knew that eventually the boys, especially Dean, would start to question her. “Ads.” She looks up to find the boys standing in the doorway. “Have you seen Meg,” Dean asks.

“I thought she was with one of you,” Addison replies, standing up. Dean and Sam exchange a look before walking out of the room.

The trio sets up precautions in case Meg came back, which included painting a devil’s trap on the ceiling. Their preparation pays off that night when the demon does come back. Meg is trapped by the door under the devil’s trap. “Didn’t expect to see you back,” Sam greets, turning on the lights.

“Yeah, not without the King’s army,” Dean says, holding out a hand. “Knife.”

Meg glares as she hands the angel blade to Dean. “Typical. I save our bacon and you’re sitting here, waiting by a devil’s trap. Seriously, I just killed two of Crowley’s men. I could have gone the other way on that.”

“It’s true, incidentally,” Castiel says, appearing in the living room. “There’s other demons’ blood on that blade.”

“Look, I’m simpler than you think. I’ve figured one thing out about this world - just one, pretty much. You find a cause and you serve it. Give yourself over and it orders your life. Lucifer and Yellow Eyes - their mission was it for me.”

Dean scoffs. “So, what? We should trust you because you wanted to free Satan from Hell?”

“I’m talking ‘cause,’ douchebag, as in reason to get up in the morning. Obviously, these things shift over time. We learn, we grow. Now, for me currently, the cause is bringing down the King. And I know we’ll need help to do it.”

“Crowley ain’t the problem this year.”

“When are you gonna get it? Crowley’s always the problem. He’s just waiting for the right moment to strike. I know what I’m supposed to do. And it isn’t screw with Sam, Dean, and Addison or lose the only angel who’d go to bat for me.”

The trio exchanges a look, then Sam breaks the devil’s trap releasing Meg. “This is good,” Castiel says. “Harmony and communication. Now our only problem is Hester.”

“What?”

“Well, here, we’re hidden from the Garrison, but when you killed a demon, you put out a pretty clear beacon.”

“We need better angel proofing now.”

The door flies open and the group turns to see Hester standing there with a couple of other angels. “You took the Prophet from us,” Hester angrily exclaims.

“I’m - I’m sorry,” Castiel says.

“You have failed in every way imaginable.”

“Please, Castiel. We have to follow the code. Help us do our work,” one of the angels pleads.

“He can’t help you,” Dean reminds. “He can’t help anybody.”

“We don’t need his help or his permission,” Hester says, nodding at the other angels. One of the angels disappears. “The keeper goes to the desert tonight.”

The angel reappears with Kevin. “Back the fuck off,” Addison snaps, glaring at the angels. “We’re trying to clean one of your  angel’s fucking mess. And you fucking know that!”

“She’s right,” Castiel says. “An angel brought the Leviathan back into this world and — and they begged him. They begged him not to do it.”

“Look, just give us some time, okay,” Dean asks. “We will take care of your prophet.”

“Why should we give you anything,” Hester argues. “After everything you have taken from us? The very touch of you corrupts. When Castiel first laid a hand on you in Hell, he was lost! Fro that, you’re going to pay.”

Hester starts to Dean, but Castiel steps in between them. “Please. They’re the ones we were put here to protect,” Castiel reminds.

“No, Castiel.” Hester backhands Castiel and he falls to the ground. The other angels hold up fingers, stopping the boys from helping Castiel. “No more madness!” Hester bends over and punches Castiel. “No more promises! No more new Gods!” She keeps punching Castiel, before stopping and pulling out an angel blade.

“Hester! No,” one of the angels shouts. He grabs her arm. “Please! There’s so few of us left.”

Hester punches the angel and turns back to Castiel. “You wanted free will. Now I’m making the choices.”

Hester raises her arm. A bright light emits from her chest and she falls to the ground, dead. Meg was standing behind her, angel blade in hand. “What? Some had to.” ~*~ Addison smiles when a bird lands on the railing of the back porch. She was standing out there, enjoying the peace. The angels had taken Kevin back home but not before the prophet had given them what he had translated of the tablet. Meg had vanished and Castiel had left to go whatever he wanted. “Hey.” She glances over her shoulder to find Dean making his way towards her. He holds out a beer and she takes it. “You doing okay?”

“I’m fine,” Addison softly says, shooting him a soft smile. “Just thinking. Things seem to be finally going our way for once.”

“For now. Sam’s fine. And we finally got a way to kill Dick. The only thing left would be to figure out whatever the bloodline is.”

Addison sighs. “What if I don’t want to know about the bloodline?”

“Ads—”

“Hear me out, Dean. Nothing has really happened since my birthday. I got the flu. That’s it. Do we really need to go digging into something that doesn’t need to be dug into?”

“Alright. We won’t dig into it.”