CASTIEL

[ 25+ :: indie :: semi-selective] "It caught me sometimes: that this was okay. Just this. That simple beauty was still bearable barely, and that if I lived moment to moment, garden to stove to the simple act of flying, I could have peace." Peter Heller; The Dog Stars

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     “You’ve done nothing.” He stated, rather flatly. “You’ve never touched me. You aren’t making he flinch. She is.” The second to last word was said like it was poison on his tongue. Disdain and utter hatred dripped from the single syllable, and though he said nothing against her, how he felt was evident in just that one word.

     Cas’s assurance that it was not a test settled him a little, not much, but it was something. His shoulders began to relax, minutely, and he was able to hold the angel’s gaze for a bit longer before he had to break it. He had no trust left, but he also had nothing to lose. If it was a test, and he got caught, perhaps Naomi would punish him so badly that it would finally kill him.

     He reached out, very tentatively, and took the rag from Cas. He simply held it in his hand, didn’t dab at his face or start to clean, still unable to bring himself to clean as of yet.

     “Do you give me your word?”

     “That this is not a test?  Yes.  Unless it is of both of us, and I don’t believe my brother would do that to me.”  Castiel retreated again once Crowley had the rag, though only a pace or two, still watching the demon with something between worry and nervousness.  He had no idea what else to do for Crowley; for that matter, he had no real idea what else to do for himself.

     “There is doubtless food.  I can--”  Well, he’d never had to make food before, but he’d watched humans do it. “--can make something for you.”

     There was no real way to hide that what Castiel did next was retreat, but he hoped the space helped Crowley feel a little safer, too.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     Crowley didn’t expect Cas to push that far away – in fact, seeing him do so surprised the demon. Castiel looked almost as spooked as he was, and that fact made his mind start to whirl again. The angels that worked… played with him never backed up in that way. It was the opposite, really, when he resisted and fought the angels would advance. It gave them more of a reason to punish.

     His eyes went to that rag, studying it, as if he were looking for some smoking gun to seal his fate. There was nothing. After a few long beats Crowley shook his head. “No. You may, though. If you wish. I won’t fight.”

     The demon stood, slowly, on slightly wobbling legs, his chin held slightly higher than it had been. And then he walked, carefully, closing about half the distance between him and Cas. When he stopped, he dropped his gaze once more, studying the shoes that the angel in front of him wore.

     Promises were something that Crowley took seriously. They were built on trust, and nothing more, and if broken – With a slow inhale, the demon took another step, and then one more. He looked up at the angel, jaw set in a hard line.  He had no way of truly knowing other than asking point blank, and then asking for a promise. If Cas was good for his word, Crowley didn’t know. He wanted to trust him, though, and that finally began to win out over his fear. At least enough to ask questions.

     “Is this a test?”

     “I think it would be better if you did it.  I don’t like making you flinch.”  That, and Castiel thought it might be better for Crowley to take charge of at least that much, given his reactions to it all.  If he could wash his face, then maybe he could start to relearn other things.  And Castiel was feeling woefully incompetent right now, to boot; the sensation of possibly causing more damage without ever meaning to looming over him.

     He didn’t retreat further, though, as Crowley slowly came closer.  Just watched as the demon regarded him, the way his gaze went from up to shoes to up again.  It was as heartening as the snarling was, if considerably less startling.

     “Ah-- no.  No test.”  Though Castiel could see how Crowley might think it was.  He wondered a little in his own paranoia if they weren’t both being tested, but he didn’t think that was the case.  Gabriel wouldn’t lie to him, not their Messenger.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     Crowley barely moved, even when Cas leaned forward to begin to dab at his wounds, at the dried blood that was now cracking in the creases of his features. He sat still, yes, but he could feel the panic rising in his chest. It was like a rolling wave of – something that could only be described as a cold heat, making him grip the chair even harder. Cas worked carefully, and Crowley tried to limit his flinching and balking as much as he could, though when the angel’s fingers reached the wounds on his head, it took just about everything he could do.

     Still, Castiel was being tender, and after a few moments it became easier to relax, to not quite be so tense, to release his harsh grip on the poor chair he had chosen to sit in. Cas’s question had Crowley closing his eyes, briefly, tilting his head slightly to give the angel better access to a spot.

     “I don’t sleep, if I can help it. At least during consciousness I can try and keep the things in my mind at bay. In sleep, I have no defense. I would prefer not to sleep.” He spoke carefully, opening his eyes to hold Cas’s gaze. And then, the angel began to heal him.

     Crowley’s eyes went wide and he balked, hard, away from the angel, all but falling out of the opposite side of his chair. The demon trembled, hands going up to touch his face, lips pulling back in something like a snarl.

     The only time he had ever been healed was by Naomi, and only when she had brought him to the edge of dying, to going into that sweet embrace of nonexistence, so close to that black nothing that he ached for whenever she broke him to that point. But no, she would never let him tip and fall. She would stop, reach down and touch him, and put him all back together again. She would rebuild him haphazardly, piece by piece… Just to utterly rip him apart again. And again.

     And again.

     “What are you doing?” He hissed, voice low in pitch, the sheer fear in his tone evident more than anything else. “You can’t – Don’t. I didn’t do anything, you took me. I didn’t run.”

     Castiel might have suggested trying to sleep anyway, given Crowley’s wounds and the damage not only to his vessel but his own form bound tight into it, but the reaction to him trying to heal those awful holes left in Crowley’s head had him backpedaling quickly, eyes gone wide again.  He was halfway across the room before Crowley spoke.

      “I took you,” he confirmed, voice gone a bit shaky again. “You didn’t run.  I was just trying to heal those marks.  I’m sorry I frightened you.”

     Castiel couldn’t blame the demon, honestly.  Not after all he had been through.  He wasn’t sure how to prove his own intentions were good, but that didn’t negate him wanting to do what he could to help anyway.  Crowley’s terrified snarling reminded him of some animal in a trap, wounded.  But the angel took some surprising amount of heart that Crowley still had it in him to snarl in the first place.

     “Do you want to finish yourself?” he asked, holding the rag out, despite the fact he was a good eight feet away from Crowley.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     Crowley had barely finished his warding and turned to look at Cas in time to catch the expression on his face just before his eyes rolled back white and he collapsed on the grass. Crowley dropped the stick he had been using to write in the dirt and was at Castiel’s side, cursing under his breath. He should have expected as much, that the angel wouldn’t have been able to keep awake, not with the kind of beating he’d taken, but he didn’t think it would happen this fast.

      “Alright, up you go, you feathery bastard.” With a soft grunt, Crowley had stooped down next to the angel’s broken form, wrapping his arms up under his shoulders and hauling him up and closer, awkwardly scooping his counterpart up in a backwards sort of embrace. And then, once he was sure he had a good hold, he was gone again.

     This time, it was the ruined state of New York, in the little green city of Syracuse. Crowley knew of an old motel, put out of business with the current times, but shelter with beds nonetheless. That was where he drug Cas, into one of the farthest, deepest rooms, breaking the lock on the paint peeling door and hauling the angel’s body onto the bed.

     Crowley still had his abilities, and luckily, warmth was one of them. He had Castiel stripped of the damp, bloody clothes within moments and tucked under a mass of dusty, but warm, blankets; one hand under and in the pocket made by the angel’s body, flared hot in order to keep the temperature up.

     In little bits and pieces, he also began to ward the room from the inside out. He alternated between sitting with his hand pressed up against Cas, and slowly scrawling sigils and spell work on the walls of the room while he waited patiently for the angel to find wakefulness once more.

     It was a fair bit of time before the angel’s wounds started knitting, and when they did, it was a trickle at a time.  In the meantime, he bled on the bed, grace only just keeping up with the loss of blood, and remained unconscious.  But after hours, and the breaking of dawn, he come further up to something more like sleep.

     That didn’t last very long.

     He woke up just as spooked as he had been passed out, though he was in no shape to do any damage.  But sat up in bed, wild-eyed and disoriented, chest heaving, as he took in their surroundings.

     At least this time, calm reasserted itself more quickly.  He still watched Crowley warily -- he heard the demon appeasing to Naomi personally -- but at least he didn’t try to attack or run.  Yet, anyway.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     Fair enough.

     Crowley closed his eyes, only briefly, before opening them to look at the ceiling. He felt very close to shattering, more than he already had; riding that thin edge between coherence and utter ruin.

     When Cas asked him if he wanted him to wash his face, Crowley’s features drew together in confusion. No one had asked if he wanted something in – well, for just about as far back as he could remember. The question baffled him so much and caught him off guard that it actually scared him. Asking him what he wanted. If he answered, he would be caught. That must be the test.

     He shook his head, quickly, instantly regretting that motion, his hands moving to white knuckle the arm rests soon after. The wave of pain and something like nausea stilled him, dull eyes still locked on Castiel’s face.

     “Do what you wish. Its not my choice to make.”

     Castiel could grasp a need for order; for things to not be so much of a choice.  But he was also entirely nervous about putting his hands anywhere near Crowley’s.  Still, he doubted that the demon would want to wander around with blood on his face and head, and so after a moment, he reached forward very gingerly with that rag and started cleaning.

     It was a soothing motion, at least to the angel.  Once he bent his head and put his hands to the task, it became far easier for him, though every time Crowley flinched, he stuttered himself and moved somewhere less nerve wracking.  Still, he was getting it.

     “I don’t know if you sleep now.  But you should, if you need to,” he said, voice a little rough and still a touch nervous, though improving for the task.  Carefully -- very carefully -- he added a touch of healing to his cleaning, enough to close the wounds, being incredibly mindful not to allow his power to touch the demon himself, but only his borrowed form.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     That drew a soft little huff of a breath from Crowley, almost a chuckle. Almost.

     “I just don’t understand.” Was all he said, head bowing momentarily to look at his lap. He was trapped between wanting to believe Cas and knowing for certain that this was a trap. It tore him apart, slowly, and he didn’t know which way to lean. He wanted to trust, of course, but everything screamed against it.

     Cas’s hands working that rag kept pulling his attention, and after a moment he slowly lifted a hand, moving it to rest on top of the angel’s. “If you plan to use that, wringing it like that will do nothing but dry it out.” Crowley wasn’t going to clean himself, he wasn’t worth the effort, but if Cas wanted to get the blood off to help erase some of the reminder of the horror of what had just happened, he wasn’t going to stop him.

     He withdrew that hand, back to his lap again, and stiffly moved to sit up straight, and then lean back, tipping his head back to gingerly rest against the back of the chair he sat in, obediently turning it toward the angel who sat in front of him. “Now that you’ve gotten me away… What do you plan to do?”     

     If Castiel knew that, he would probably not be so anxious.  But he didn’t; it was a big, foggy blank, the idea of what came next.  He hadn’t even known an hour ago that he was defecting for certainty, and now, he was not only defected, but defected with Crowley.  He looked back blankly at that question, uncertainty written all across his brow, and told the truth: “I don’t know.”

     Obviously, Crowley wasn’t in any shape to fight.  And Castiel didn’t think it wise to leave him here alone.  And he wasn’t sure if he, himself, was in any shape to leap into the fray.  Castiel certainly didn’t feel equal to it.

     “Ah-- do-- do you want me to wash your face?” he asked, doing his best to still the restless motion of his hands.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

    Crowley looked at the rag that Castiel offered, studying it for a minute with that same dull gaze. He took in every little detail of it, and then of Castiel’s hands, which made him incredibly nervous after a moment. It wasn’t Cas, not at all, but hands. Hands that could do so much damage with so little work. Almost all of his damage had been done by hands. 

     The demon looked up at the angel’s face again. He didn’t take the rag.

     “You know as well as I that it makes it harder. Alone, you’d be hunted, yes. But not like you will be with me. You took your sister’s favorite pet.” He said the words without flinching, he knew what he was; he was nothing but a plaything. It wasn’t a reach for pity or for Cas to disagree, he was simply stating fact. “And you took me because you say that you couldn’t stand what they were doing, to listen to me scream.” 

     He simply didn’t understand. He didn’t understand that perhaps Cas really was saving him; that he knew on some subconscious level what he was going through and wanted to free him from this endless loop – this hell worse than Hell. All Crowley could think about was how this was going to ruin him, how this was going to bite him in the end, as soon as he did anything that even hinted toward his want to escape.

     Which was there. Of course it was. As broken as he was, he didn’t like this. He never had. Naomi might have utterly destroyed him, but he didn’t want to stay. He just couldn’t be sure that this wasn’t a trap.

     “The entire Host has listened to what they’ve done to us since we were captured. What they’ve done to me. I don’t understand, Castiel, why you’ve saddled yourself with me when you could have certain freedom without. I’ve never done anything for you, you have no debt to me, no favor to repay. I have nothing to give you.”

     “I have no more or less freedom with you than without,” Castiel answered, drawing the rag back and wringing it between his hands, some nervous tick his vessel might have remembered, some expression to the turmoil going on.  His own life was now quite uncertain, possibly quite dangerous, and Castiel didn’t think it would be any more dangerous with Crowley than without.

     That might have been naive, admittedly.

     “I didn’t like what they were doing,” he reiterated, not able to give Crowley much more than that.  Castiel had never been very articulate when it came to feelings, especially after some six thousand years of being forbidden from even having them, let alone daring to express them.  Any which way, angels torturing Crowley -- Naomi torturing Crowley -- sat unbelievably wrong with this particular angel.

     “I couldn’t stop them from doing it, but I could get you away,” he concluded, fingers working over the rag as he watched, some expression on his face between earnest honesty and stark fear.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     His eyes narrowed faintly, taking in Cas’s body language. It was confusing, this entire debacle. Crowley’s mind was still back in that room, struggling to catch up with the whirlwind escape that just happened. After a moment, he pulled his gaze away in order to look around, dull eyes taking in their surroundings.

     “You couldn’t – listen.” He said carefully, inspecting one of the window panes, the architecture of it. “You could have left me there. You wouldn’t be able to hear me from here.” Crowley stole a quick sidelong glance, his outward appearance entirely calm. His hands were folded in his lap, his face still streaked with blood, from the corners of his eyes and the evenly spaced holes in his skull. 

     Despite all of the evidence, Crowley didn’t trust this. He didn’t trust any of it. He was waiting for Naomi to appear, to drag him back to that chair, to punish him for the unavoidable set up she had orchestrated. The demon turned back to Cas once more, folding his hands solemnly in his lap. “Why did you take me? I am of no use to you; I will do nothing but make this – escape – more difficult. Why?”

     The concept baffled Castiel, and that no doubt showed on his face as well.  He looked a bit dazed and beleaguered beyond the confusion over the question, but the fact was, it didn’t even really occur to him.  After a moment of fidgeting there, he slipped back to the kitchen tucked under the loft, getting a rag and wetting it carefully.

     “I didn’t like what was happening to you, so I took you with me.”  It was obvious to the angel, anyway.  He carefully wrung the rag out and walked back with it, offering it out to Crowley; it was warm, too, so apparently Gabriel had thought of everything, right down to the hot water heater. “I don’t want captured and you don’t want captured, so why would you make it any harder?”

     Castiel didn’t think Crowley would.  Neither of them wanted to go back to that place.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

Crowley stood, still and silent, through it all, even when Cas began to direct him to the porch. His eyes were heavy; his body ached fiercely from his most recent session with Naomi, and he felt very nearly close to simply crumpling to the green grass below them.

Oh. It was wood planking, now, it seemed.

The demon flinched when Cas began to steer him inside, the other’s hands, although gentle, stirring up that now seemingly primal instinct to recoil away from them. He obeyed, though, walking through the doorway into the warm little cabin.

In his day, he would have appreciated it. It was a lovely thing, that Gabriel whipped up, cozy and homey. Crowley would have complimented the arch angel on his taste in décor, if he could (or had the mind to), but everything was over so fast that he and Cas were left alone before it all could fully process.

His steps were slow, careful, his gaze still mostly directed down, though he did sneak a few looks around. There were a multitude of seating options, and so he took the one that was closest; a modest little plaid chair that was much more comfortable than anything he’d been in for quite some time.

It wasn’t until then that he finally lifted his gaze, finding Castiel’s this time, something he hadn’t done since he’d been broken.

“What are you doing?”

     The truth be told, Castiel didn’t know.

     It wasn’t a spur of the moment decision, exactly.  He had someday wanted to defect.  But the possibility of what would happen to him if he was caught in the act scared him out of it before now.  It was a long time ago, it felt like, when Castiel wasn’t afraid.  When he could charge a battlefield and fight without any fear.  Now, it was his constant companion.

     Gabriel was good for his word, though.  Bending molecules to create this place.  It was no trickster-style illusion; Gabriel simply willed it into being using the power of creation he had been gifted with above the other archangels.

     Still, he didn’t quite know how to answer Crowley’s question.  His hands fidgeted in an almost human bit of anxiety, as he looked back at the broken demon.  Finally, he just told the truth, “I don’t know.  I couldn’t listen to her hurt you anymore.  Gabriel asked me to run before now, but I was too-- too--” Terrified. “--but I didn’t, until now.”

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     Crowley found himself leaning hard against Castiel, his shoes scuffing the ground even as they landed in a place that he really had no recollection of. Of course, Crowley hadn’t seen much of anything since his capture, and didn’t have much to go on if he had cared to at the moment.

     He had stopped his struggles, Cas’s firm hold on him enough to quell at least some of the panic – which was odd, usually any sort of restraint made him want to thrash like a caged animal – and simply stood, head hung low and shoulders sagged in defeat.

     Gabriel’s presence was enough to make even his currently splintered psyche start to connect a few dots. Crowley might have been a slave, yes, but that didn’t mean that he didn’t listen. He was aware of that underground movement, or at least rumors of it, it was something that had the higher ups (his owner included) getting their feathers all in a ruffle. It was a topic that frequented private discussions, and a concern to those that Crowley despised.

     Was Castiel actually rescuing him?

     Crowley turned his gaze up at the angel that still held him, brows furrowed in confusion. He quickly rethought that, backpedaling hard and averting his eyes away from both Cas and the arch angel, even as they relocated once more. The quick snap of his head and the speed of their movement made him want to heave over and vomit – but he knew it would do nothing. It was never anything; just blood and dry heaves. He couldn’t expel himself, even when he was blown apart into so many pieces that, had the brand not been there, would have allowed him to simply bleed out in thick crimson smoke.

     He held himself up, not for the sake of being strong, that wasn’t on his mind anymore, but for the sole reason of trying to stay at least partially aware of the situation, should it take another twist.

     Crowley said nothing during both exchanges, eyes on the ground, simply waiting to be addressed and to be given some sort of order or to be told his fate.

     Negotiations were brief.  Gabriel had enough power to make a cabin for them to live in -- a far cry from what humanity had been reduced to in ‘paradise’ -- and made sure it was stocked with food and everything else.  Their little hide-away was in the woods did exist in the real world, was even a part of it, but doubled underneath the layer visible to the Host.

     At least for ten square miles.

     Castiel was just as lost as Crowley no doubt was, when Gabriel left them standing on the porch. There was a television, but no stations; a stack of DVDs of family films co-mingled with something called Casa Erotica.  There was a wood stove and some firewood stacked.  It looked warm and inviting, but Castiel had never kept house before.

     “Ah-- we should go in.  I think you should sit down,” he said, sounding (and doubtless looking) a bit shell-shocked as he went to open the door and steer the likewise pole-axed demon inside.

[beyond-the-nights-world]

Misha Comic Con Livestream

SDCC 2016 Part1

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     Crowley didn’t trust even himself. The flutter of wings went almost unheard by the demon, the blood pounding in his ears almost enough to mask it. Almost. The fact that he was no longer alone made him jolt, the terror of the prospect that this might not be over taking control of his broken form and making him react. He was like a beaten dog, recoiling back into the seat with averted eyes and ducked head, the heels of the shoes he’d been dressed in scraping futility against the foot rest. He wasn’t trying to fight, but trying to simply not exist; to slink back and away from whoever it was that had come to bring more harm.

     When it was Castiel’s hands that found the buckles of his restraints, even Crowley was forced to look up. This was nothing that he could have seen coming, even if he had tried. Castiel, the angel’s name that had been on the lips of so many, bent over him and freeing him from his bonds.

     And Crowley trusted none of it.

     “No.” Was the only word that raked over his vocal chords, even as he put up no other fight. Had he been more aware, he would have noted the trembling of Castiel’s hands, the terror in his eyes, the hurriedness of his actions. But he wasn’t, and he didn’t, and all he could think was that this was a ruse of his captor’s, meant to make him believe he was being rescued, to test him. And he put up as much of a resistance that he could.

     Which was next to nothing.

     He didn’t know if Cas even felt him try and squirm against him when he fell heavily into his arms, if he felt the labored breaths and the scared trembles of his feeble attempts at getting back in the chair. If he had, it didn’t seem to matter, and as quickly as Cas had appeared they were preparing to leave, Crowley’s weak form slumped against the angel that had freed him.

     It wouldn’t be long, before the escape was noticed.  In this world where the Host ruled all, it was hard to get away for even minutes sometimes, let alone bolt free of it. Even as he was trying to get a vaguely struggling demon free of his bonds, Castiel was wholly aware of how quickly they were running out of time.

     He did feel Crowley struggle, but it was so feeble that it was easily overridden.  Castiel figured, probably rightly, that nothing felt like reality to the demon right now, and that he would not be oriented enough to accept anything, let alone actively help in his own escape.  As such, Castiel bypassed it; looped arms around that shivering mortal body (the soul long since ripped out, leaving only the demon) and flew them hard and fast out of there.

     Gabriel’s rendezvous was on a newly scoured, cleaned, thriving place once called Love Canal.  Castiel knew when he landed with Crowley, they would only be there for a few moments.  Still a few too many when on run from the Host.

     “--thank Dad-- wait.”  Gabriel appeared just as he was supposed to when the specialized spellwork identifying the angel landing activated.  But clearly, from his expression, he didn’t expect Castiel to have a passenger.  Both of them looking spooked, though only one looked completely disassembled.  “Oh, for-- okay, Castiel.  That’s Crowley, right?  Last red eyes hanging around.  Or-- you know, not hanging around.”

     “I couldn’t leave him there.”  Castiel was bristled and anxious, and darted glances around expecting trouble. “Will you help?”

     Gabriel palmed down his face, but one moment later, they were standing in a clearing in a river valley; the air was crisp, clean and this place had not been ‘scrubbed’ as hard as others.  “I can hide you two here for awhile.  See if you can put Crowley back together.  But you only got ten square miles, comprende?  Any more and you’re outside my influence.  You’ll feel it before you hit it, though.”

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     Crowley had aimed to rocket them across the map, as far as possible from the cluster of Cas’s siblings and into a moment of safety. They had appeared in the flat land in Idaho, in the far back property of what looked to some sort of farm, ruined and abandoned now. It was secluded, early evening, and even as they crashed to the ground together and Cas squirmed from his grip there was no one, human or otherwise, that had appeared to have seen them.

     The demon pushed back and away, scrambling back on hands and knees and then pulling himself standing, giving Cas the space he needed, at least for a moment. The broken angel was heaving into the dirt, cuffs still around his wrists, blood staining the clothes he wore. Crowley wasted no time, though, after making sure he was at least conscious, before beginning a rough and messy circle of sigils, wide and arching around them, giving them just that much extra protection for a few moments.

     Now that he had taken Cas and aided in injuring Naomi, he was quite sure that the price on his head was now two.

     “My, this was not how I expected my day to go, angel,” He started, finishing off another drawing. “We need to move, soon, your bloody siblings are no doubt going to follow.”

     Cas heaved what little froth and bile there was up, tinged bloody from the bruises that were half hidden by the red from the cutting, and then he half-scrambled backwards, unable to gain his feet and close to passing out.  He vaguely recognized Crowley -- under an overpass, outside a warded mansion -- but it was a flickering, faded recognition.

     He couldn’t fly, himself.  He wasn’t even quite sure he had long before consciousness fled, and by then, it wouldn’t matter.  It was cold enough out that even Castiel could die of it, even still an angel by technicality, when one factored in blood loss and metaphysical wounds.

     For now, he stared at Crowley, shivering and teeth chattering, waiting for some other horror to come down on him.  At least, he did until the battering his vessel (and himself) took asserted itself and he wilted down into the grass, fighting the whole way and still losing consciousness in the end.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     Crowley barely remembered the world before. He had become so utterly numb, so pulled back and so guarded that everything before the angels and before Naomi seemed like a foggy dream, a distant memory that didn’t actually exist, a fragment of his shattered mind.

     Fear was a terrible thing. It gripped and clung in ways that were inescapable, dug its claws in and made home in its host’s very core. Fear was something Crowley hadn’t been all that familiar with until this. Fear had destroyed him, had brought him down to a pathetic pile of shattered pieces that never got put back together correctly. Fear’s name was Naomi.

     Crowley hadn’t even done anything this time to end up strapped in that chair. He hadn’t put up a fight, or tried to escape – those were things he hadn’t attempted in years, and still… Here he was, strapped down to the hauntingly clean clinical chair with an apparatus on his head and tears of blood leaking from the inner corners of both eyes.

     Naomi had quite literally stripped him down to a drooling mess this time, and as she built him back up she did so with a sort of carelessness that spoke to the fact that this session had no real purpose, it was simply a way to pass the time and see if there was anything new that could be learned that might have been missed the last thousand times. With that last final turn that forced one of the spikes in his skull deeper, she pushed the demon right to the edge; his screams dissolving into uncontrollable babbling and gurgles as the body he was now permanently bound to seized and convulsed against his bonds. He couldn’t scream anymore, at least not physically – Naomi had made sure of that – but inside his head it was deafening.

     The next few steps passed in a blur, the spikes scraping through flesh and bone as they were pulled out, spilling rivulets of deep crimson in their wake. The angel didn’t bother to heal him or unbind him, even, when she left, leaving him slumped in the chair miserably. He was held up by the fixture still attached to his head, the straps around his wrists and ankles, and the large harness that kept his body from bowing and bucking and physically breaking during the sessions.

     Crowley didn’t move – couldn’t, even after Naomi left the small room to either retrieve more equipment or to just let him rot a bit, he wasn’t sure.

     And he wasn’t sure if he really even  had it in him to care.

     Castiel more felt than heard Naomi being summoned away, perhaps to interrogate one of the Host thought to be sympathizing with Gabriel.  That happened, sometimes.  He knew they kept an eye on him, specifically, too.

     The idea of going in there was frightening, but Castiel had been building himself up to defecting, even if that needle had only just tipped over.  It wasn’t that he had any love lost for demons; he’d been at war with them.  It was the senselessness of Crowley being treated like this when he was no longer anything like a threat.  To Castiel, it seemed almost idle cruelty.  Perhaps because it was.

     It still took some nerve building.  Long minutes passed.  He reached out his senses, checking on the others’ positions.  Stretched them further to find Crowley, still where Naomi had left him.

     And then he moved.  Stepped and landed in a quiet flutter of wings, and even though he thought he was prepared for this, the sight of it -- the chair, the metal, the demon -- was enough to make Castiel recoil, horror gripping him and the throat of his vessel, too.  His feather bristled and he took half a step back, just staring.

     Crowley was in terrible shape.  But worse, he looked shattered beyond repair.

     It was with shaking hands that Castiel stepped forward again, failing to completely still them as he went to get that damned thing off Crowley’s head, to unbuckle him and to get them to the safe spot Gabriel designated for all defectors.  If it hadn’t been compromised yet.

     For now, one thing at a time.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:

     Crowley’s gaze followed the angels who, as expected, gathered to round up Castiel, before sweeping back to settle on Naomi. The demon’s expression wrinkled in a bit of a wince, and he took a slow, careful step forward. 

     And then, everything erupted again into chaos. There was a flutter of wings, and then a shining silver streak across his vision as an angel blade spun past him and buried itself between Naomi’s ribs. Her scream was deafening, and it was enough to almost make Crowley stop and lift his hands to his ears, and he might have, were it not for the angels around Cas that seemed to completely pause in momentary shock.

     Crowley took his shot. In a flash he was next to Naomi, fingers wrapping around the hilt of the blade and giving it a sharp twist and a deep thrust, burying it even farther into the vessel and the angel that lie beneath. He tingled from the closeness, from Naomi’s scream, the glow of her gaze. She wasn’t dead, no, but that blade had carved a horrible chunk out of her.

     “Sorry to disappoint, sweetheart.” He mumbled, wrenching the blade again and this time pressing it away and in before he teleported over next to Cas. Crowley lunged forward, through a gap between the angels that were apparently aiming to do the exact same thing that he was, and attempted to wrap his arms firmly around the wounded angel’s middle and get the hell out of that church.

     His goal was to relocate somewhere across the ruined country, and then to one of the places he had been using to hide, but there was no guarantee that it would work. He didn’t know if the angels had used magical protection, or if they’d come up with a fail safe for the event that something like this would happen.

     Still, though, as he went to grip at Castiel, he decided to try.

     Whatever adrenaline induced desperation made Castiel throw that blade, it wasn’t enough for him to keep that fight up for very long, and he wasn’t going to stand even a sniff of a chance against the two brothers who rallied once they overcame their surprise.

     That didn’t stop him from trying.  From baring his teeth and trying to summon his own blade to hand.  They were just closing in on him--

     --and then he was somewhere else, a demon’s thick arms around him, pinning his arms down to his sides.

     Castiel was too disoriented to even map his place in this world; how far they had gone.  He wrenched free and collapsed on hands and knees, gagging at the ground and then dry heaving, shoulders shaking as he did so, pulling his grace-bleeding wing up to try to join the other one, ethereal on both sides of himself.

[lastseraph]

@redeyedking

     It wasn’t the first time Castiel had heard this demon scream, but he wanted it to be the last.

     There weren’t that many demons left in the world, anyway.  Two dozen or so, just enough for the Host to play with.  Used as servants or slaves or taken apart to vent frustrations on, the small contingent consisted almost entirely of black-eyed demons and one single red-eyed demon, and it was the latter that was screaming as Naomi took him apart again.

     Castiel was nearby only because he had been ordered to observe from this vantage, and watch Paradise as it moved.  The Earth below, Father’s finest jewel, green and blue and clean.  There were no big cities anymore.  No disease.  No automobiles.  Everything was pristine.  Nature and humankind alike, the chosen who didn’t ascend in the rapture, living like their fore-bearers did long before.

     Castiel knew, too, how thin that veneer of perfection was.  Knew that Gabriel was gathering angels from the outskirts of the ranks of the Host in the hopes of returning free will to humans.  He even had an invitation himself, but so far, Castiel had measured the risk versus the potential reward.  He was exhausted and frightened, and that would add more.

     But listening to that demon scream--

     It was only ten years ago when Crowley was King of the Crossroads, and then when the Apocalypse happened right as planned, he was one of the few spared his life.  Now, ten years later, having caught glimpses of what was once a proud creature (opposite realm or no) as he was broken further and further, Castiel did wonder if death would have been more mercy.

     There was nothing he could do right now, but wait.  Wait for the screaming to stop.  But for the first time, the needle measuring risk versus reward crossed that center line.  If Castiel had any means, this would be the last time that demon screamed.

[lastseraph]

redeyedking:     

     That scream of Cas’s shook something deep inside Crowley, and it made the skin he wore crawl. But not so much as the sound of wings and the energy that filled the room mere moments after Crowley thought that they might have a shot at some sort of escape.

     Naomi’s voice all but brought him to a screeching halt, fingers still wrapped around the heavy chain that had just collided with the side of Suriyel’s head. She was behind him, Crowley knew, and luckily so; the look on his face taking more than a second or two to be masked.

     The din of fighting ceased instantly, and when Crowley finally turned around, the only sound heard was the patter of rain, that now seemed positively deafening.

     “Darling!” His voice was a bit of a forced lilt, and he spun on his heel to face her, the heavy chain still in one hand, his fingers wrapped tight around it. A wide smile split his face, and he spread his arms in a sort of welcoming gesture. “Unexpected, indeed. What a surprise – And may I say, looking lovely as ever. New suit?”

     “Yes,” she answered, keen eyes dissecting Crowley’s demeanor; at least, appearing to, as she took him in with his chain, and one of her brothers on the floor slowly picking himself up, and another of them backing up as well as shaking legs would allow.  She gestured almost casually, and the two angels she brought with her flitted over to surround Castiel, who bared teeth at them and tried to escape on his own wings, albeit uselessly.

     Gold-blue grace curled up from wounds, from those who had eyes to see it.

     “I’m here for my errant brother.  He’s gotten very confused and lost, and it’s in everyone’s best interest--”  especially yours was strongly implied by her tone, “--if I can take him home and get him sorted out.”

     One of the angels lunged at Castiel.  But when Castiel threw that blade, it wasn’t at the brother who was lunging, but at the sister who was far more frightening to him than death for reasons he didn’t even understand.  It wasn’t likely to be a fatal hit, but even in this state, he was excellent at aiming and speed.