Hunger Games (AU Castiel/Dean)
The training facility’s arena was packed. Three events were showcased at a time, and this was no exhibition. This was real. Real bones were broken, as youths from Districts wealthy enough to pay for early training battled it out. Real blood flowed. And sometimes, real lives were lost, right there in the arena, or hours later, when the medics could do nothing for a youth whose injuries were too severe.
They were only weeks from the next lottery. The rules had been changed, again. Now, only those who were eighteen to twenty two years old qualified. So the older kids were fighting hard, as if they were already out there in the fields, beating the crap out of the younger kids, and those their own age. When the results of their Districts’ lotteries came out, the winners here would volunteer to replace those selected by the lottery process. The Districts that started training early through this facility had a distinct edge.
Dean was bleeding from head to foot, or it felt that way. He’d just gotten to the locker room to clean up, when a tall, broad shouldered, dour looking man walked in. Shit. It was his dad. He wasn’t ready to deal with him yet.
Most dads would pat their kids on the shoulder, or help ‘em clean up as they congratulated them for besting kids years older. Dean was fifteen now, but he’d been here for three years, and knew his dad well. It didn’t matter that he’d eventually kicked the ass of the twenty something year old. John Winchester would find fault.
“Dad…” They hadn’t seen each other in three months. Yeah, Dean didn’t expect a hug, not while he was covered in blood. But he didn’t expect to get shoved against the locker, either. Maybe he should have.
“Just what do you think this is, boy?” John demanded, his hand pressing firmly against his son’s chest as he stared down into his face. “A game? It’s not a game. I’ve told you a thousand times, kill or be killed.”
“I won,” Dean said, raising his chin and fighting the need to flinch away from the disappointment in his father’s eyes.
“You won. You won,” John practically yelled, “only after you pranced around for twenty minutes like a Goddamned fairy, giving him chance after chance to get you. You should have taken the kill shot,” he shoved Dean again. “I’m relying on you. Your District is relying on you. Stop wasting our time because you’re gonna be eighteen in the blink of an eye, and then you’ll be out there in the field.”
Dean licked his lips. “I couldn’t get the kill sho—“
“You damned well could,” John countered. “Why do you think I sent you here, boy? There’s no room for softness, for pity, for anything but winning in this world. I should never have let your mother influence you, with her little ‘cooking time’ with you, and her ‘do unto others…’”
Barely listening to his dad, because his mind was already a bit hazy from his battle wounds and blood loss, Dean’s gaze moved to the guys who were changing and laughing at him as his father listed all the things he’d never approved of. Twisting them. Making them sound ugly and demeaning. Didn’t he know that word would spread, and the others would use what he said against him?
“Are you listening to me, boy? Next time I’m down here and I see a sorry display like that, I will come down into the arena and kick your ass myself.” Releasing him, John wiped his hand on his clothes. “I’m warning you. Don’t disgrace us,” he said, turning on his heels and leaving.
“Yeah… happy birthday to me,” Dean whispered. God he missed his mom. His dad had driven her away and then stuck him here. Ordering him to ‘man up.’ Slowly lowering himself onto a bench, Dean took a few moments to prepare himself to get cleaned up.
An hour later, he was in the stands, watching the fighters. Watching one in particular. A sixteen year old named Castiel. He’d known the guy for a while, just as another face, a kid from another district in a wave of other kids. But a couple months ago, there had been a new rotation, and Castiel had been assigned as his roommate. There was something about that guy, Dean thought, catching the guy’s eyes briefly and giving him a nod.
“Keep staring at your girlfriend like that and your dad will kick your fairy ass,” one of the kids who’d been in the locker room jeered.
Just like that, Dean wheeled around, grabbed the kid’s collar, swept his leg under the guys and dragged him down to the ground. Leaning over the guy, getting into his face, Dean snarled, “next time, I’ll stab your face. Don’t let there be one.”
Releasing him, he walked away, but not fast enough to hear the comment about him being just like his old man.
Hours later, Dean stood at one of the high tables in the facilities large pub. It would be open and serve liquor to all ages every once in a while. Like today, after intense games. Everyone needed to blow off steam. Most everyone nursed a wound or walked stiffly, or had a bruised eye.
Dean had avoided Castiel, though he’d wanted to watch him fight, and it was always fun going back to the room and going over their victories and mistakes. Not tonight. Dean just sat there, nursing his beer bottle until he sensed something and turned in time to see Cas walking into the bar.
