AN: A S6 AU where Castiel did not team up with Crowley.

I will only make this statement once. Warnings for this story include: profanity throughout, alcoholism, graphic violence, alternating time lines, medicinal drug use and non nondescript elements of rape. If any of these bother you, I suggest you click back now.

For the undaunted, I hope you enjoy. As always, reviews are greatly appreciated.

The stink of burning flesh no longer bothers him. He's too used to it by now that he's able to block it out, as if it's not there. It's a smell he's grown up with, beginning with his mother, filled with a string of other people he'd known during his childhood. They were names without faces or faces with no names, but they were people who, at some point during the last twenty five years, had been a blip in the life of Dean Winchester. It didn't seem that long ago that he and Sam had been standing in the woods, near a similar pyre, with the body of their father lying on top.

Back then, he hadn't been able to block out the smell so thoroughly.

It was customary that, in order to have a proper hunter's burial, the deceased's belongings be thrown onto the pyre along with the body. The life was too full of hate and anger that the risk of losing a colleague and gaining a vengeful spirit was too great. Everything that had meant anything needed to be destroyed.

Still, Dean doesn't have the strength in him to throw the worn coat onto the crackling wood. He has it folded, clutched tightly in one hand, pressed against his side. Sam doesn't say anything, and he won't. Dean's grateful.

His mind feels like it's melting and boiling; drowning, in grief and despair and so much anger. He's angry at everything. He wants to scream, to pull out his Glock and shoot the next thing that moves. He wants to get shitfaced at the nearest bar and go home with the first woman who doesn't reject his drunken advances. He wants to jump into the Impala, put the car in gear, and just drive forever. Straight and straight until he hits the Pacific Ocean without ever once glancing in his rearview mirror.

Yet all he can do is just stand there and try not to cry.

He ultimately fails.

The smoke curls up from the wood, like tiny fingers, towards the sky, reaching for the stars and the moon. In a few hours, the fire will die out and there will be nothing left by a pile of ash that the wind will eventually scatter all over the tiny woods he and Sam found. There will be nothing left to say they were ever here, or that one of the greatest friends Dean ever had had existed.

Nothing except for burned pants and a stained coat, with torn lining and broken stitches. He'll take it back to Bobby's, he decides, once he regains the strength to move his legs away from the pyre. He'll take it back and he'll clean it up. The large hole in the back can be sewn up and with the right combination of bleach and ice, the blood will run off. He won't just salvage it, he'll save it.

The scorch marks that stain his pants are another story. He knows he'll have to throw them away eventually.

He looks back up at the stars, millions of them littering the sky, filling his entire line of vision. They are big ones and little ones, some shine blue and others white; some shine brighter than others, stealing the attention away for themselves. The smoke stretches up towards the sky, reaching for a star that Dean thinks is the brightest and bluest in the sky.

God, Dean prays for the first time since before his mother died, Cas was a good angel. The best. Please be good to him.

There was so much more Dean wants to say, but no words seemed to encompass the entirety of his thoughts and feelings. They are stuck to the tip of his tongue, forgotten and abandoned. It didn't matter, he decides. If God really is omnipotent, then He knows what Dean wants to say, but can't.

Dean hates how quiet it was every time he stood by one of these pyres. He was stuck frozen in time, while the rest of the world continued to move and spin. It wasn't fair that they got to be happy and blissful and ignorant. If they had known what happened today, they would be mourning like he and Sam. They should know; they need to know that today the greatest angel the world ever knew died trying to protect them. Cas deserves so much more than a shitty hunter's funeral, burning in the woods in the middle of fucking nowhere at two in the morning with only two bodies to watch. Dean wants the entire world to grieve with him. He wants to give Cas a magnificent parade, with eulogies and wine and people talking about him and crying, feeling the same emptiness in the pit of their blackened souls that Dean feels. Instead, they get to on living, unaware that tonight two men say goodbye to the best friend either of them ever had; that tonight once again, their lives were shattered and they're left to pick up the pieces again. But the pieces are tiny and sharp and some are lost. They'll never be able to piece it all together again. Something will always be missing.

Dean is thirty years old and he's tired of being left to pick up pieces that don't fit.

"Dean," Sam says. It's the first time he's spoken in hours. Since the warehouse earlier that evening. It sounds foreign, like he's speaking another language, from the bottom of the ocean. Dean thinks he's imagined it for a moment, until Sam speaks again. "Dean, we need to go. We need to tell Bobby."

All Dean can do is nod dumbly. Sam is right. Sam is always right.

As the fire burns out and the crackling stops, Dean remembers the last time he was here, after his father's death.

He hadn't been crying then.

Sam doesn't say anything about the wetness of Dean's face this time and Dean's grateful for that too.

But Sam still has to grab Dean gently by the arm and lead him back to the Impala. He ushers Dean into the passenger's seat, and Dean doesn't complain. He sets the coat onto his lap, turning it around so that he can study the back. He fingers the tear in the fabric. It's nearly five inches long and three inches wide, from where the blade had been twisted. Dean's stomach curls at the memory of the noises that had escaped Cas's mouth in that moment.

When Sam climbs into the driver's seat, Dean places the coat under his feet and leans his head against the window. Sam starts the car and it begins to move. Dean presses his face against the window and looks back up at the stars. He can't find the bright blue star and he thinks he's about to start crying again, but no more tears fall from his eyes.

Grief turns back to anger; it's familiar, comforting.

I hope you got your ears on Raphael, Dean prays hard, digging his fingernails into the flesh of his thigh. This is Dean Winchester. Tonight, you killed the best friend I ever had. I don't care how long it takes, I will spend the rest of my life hunting you down until I kill you. And I'm gonna make you suffer like you made him suffer. I'm not a lot of things, but I am a man of my word. So wherever you flew you your cowardly ass off to, you better hope it's a place I can't get to. I'm done with people fucking with my family.

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Cas is worn down. The light in his eyes isn't as bright, as concentrated. He's not holding himself straight and still, but instead allowed his shoulders to sag and his knees to bend. Yet, he's immensely tense.

"Cas," Dean asks, "what's going on?"

Cas looks at him, but the gaze isn't the piercing gaze Dean is used to. It's faded.

"Stuff not going so good back home, I guess."

Cas sighs. "I believe I may have made a grievous error. "

"What happened?"

Dean listens quietly as Cas speaks and tells Dean of his return to Heaven after Lucifer and Michael were thrown into the Cage.

"Explaining freewill to angels is like trying to teach poetry to fish," he says. "My brothers and sisters were not eager to hear what I had to say on the subject. And then Raphael requested an audience…"

Dean didn't interrupt as Cas told him of his conversation with Raphael and the plan to re-start the Apocalypse.

"He said if I pledged my allegiance to him, I would be welcomed back in Heaven. I refused, of course, but I think that was what he wanted. He was eager to, uh, "teach me a lesson"."

Dean imagines Cas there in Heaven, standing up to his big brother and getting his ass kicked. He's both immensely amused and proud, though his heart flutters at the thought of Cas lying wounded in Heaven, with no one to help him, and then the amusement turns to fury. He and Sammy have fought and wrestled their entire lives, but he can't even imagine hurting Sammy just because he could, because he was stronger, to prove a point. Even with Sam acting the way he has been lately. Raphael's a big brother. Shouldn't he want to protect his baby siblings?

"It's civil war," Cas says. "A few brave hearts have signed on to my cause, but we're horribly outnumbered. And Raphael's an archangel."

"I'll help you," Dean says before he realizes it. "Together we took down Heaven's top dogs. You, me, Sammy—hell, even Bobby. Together, we can take down Raphael."

Cas shakes his head. "It is not fair for you to be burdened with my problems."

"We've burdened you with our problems plenty of times before. Let us repay the favor."

"That was different," his tone is short and clipped. "I was already involved."

"Well, if the fate of the world is at stake, then it's not just your problem. It's my problem too."

A shadow of a smile tugs at the corners of Cas's lips. Dean wonders what it would be like to see Cas really smile, or even laugh. He's always clamped down tightly onto that stick shoved up his ass, but Dean thinks that someone had to make Cas that way. After his mother died, Dad became different and raised Dean to be different. Cas, he thinks, has been a soldier his entire life, just like him. And soldiers are never born. They're always made. What kind of person did Cas used to be, before they beat it out of him at the Angel Academy?

Dean knows that Cas has plenty to be stressed about—the dude could use a couple good night's rest and maybe a few shots of whiskey in between, even if he denied otherwise—but Dean wonders what it would be like to see Cas relaxed and happy.

Probably terrifying, he thinks. He wants to share the joke was Cas, but just barely stops himself. Cas won't get that it's a joke and Dean doesn't want to upset him further than he already is.

Dean swallows. "Cas?"

"Is it okay if I stay here, Dean? For just a little while?"

He's expecting to get kicked out. Dean is revolted by the idea of what tiny whispers are running through Cas' mind that made him ask such a question. Cas doesn't get along with his brothers, and from what interactions Dean's seen between Cas and the other angels, he never has. Baby brother, he thinks. Cas is the baby brother, even if he's never been treated like one. Dean already has Sammy. He can take Cas too. He wants to retort back with a sarcastic quip, but he knows that Cas won't get that either, so Dean's forced to have a chick flick moment and actually speak his actual feelings to Cas.

"Stay as long as you want, Cas. Stay forever."

Dean goes to bed a short while later, and when he wakes up, Cas is nowhere to be seen.

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They get back to Bobby's early that morning. Bobby's been expecting them because he's out on the front porch, even though the sun isn't even up yet. Dean wonders when Sam got the chance to call Bobby. Dean knows Bobby knows and if he didn't know better, he'd say Bobby'd been crying.

Sam gets out of the car first. Dean's slow behind because he's unsure of what to do with the coat. He ultimately decides to take it with him. To hell with what Bobby and Sam would think. They both could go fuck themselves with a knife.

He throws it over his shoulder. Neither Bobby nor Sam make any mention of it.

Sam bends down to hug Bobby. Bobby pats him on the back. "It's good to see you, boy," he says, his voice scratchy. He's been smoking again, even though he promised the boys he'd stopped.

"Hey, Bobby."

When they release, Bobby turns to Dean. He doesn't hug Dean, but Dean doesn't mind. He doesn't want to be hugged.

"Don't you just look like hell," he says.

Dean can't bring himself to smile.

Bobby sighs and turns back to Sam. "You get the works done?"
"Yeah. All proper and everything."

"That's good. He deserved it."

He deserved more, Dean thinks. He chews on the inside of his lip to stop from saying it out loud. He's not angry at Bobby, he reminds himself. This isn't Bobby's fault.

"What's the word on any other angelic activity?" Bobby asks.

Sam shrugs. "Nothing so far. It's been quiet. No news is good news, right?"

"Hell no. Maybe for normal people with their normal lives. Us? No news means something's brewing in the wind. Keep your ears on, both of you."

He turns back to Dean. He clamps his hand down hard on Dean's shoulder and gives it a gentle shake. "He was a good boy, Dean. Now, I know you ain't feeling well. You've both had a shitty night. Come inside and get some rest, the both of you. Maybe I'll have breakfast when you wake up. If I decide to be nice."

"How about we skip the nap and the breakfast and just get to the booze?" Dean asks. Bobby glares at him, but Dean doesn't give a damn.

"I don't know what you're thinking, boy, but you better stop it. You're a dead man walking. I ain't your daddy, but I'm not above of putting you over my knee and smacking some sense into you. You need rest and you need to eat; if the world's about to go topside again, we need to be ready."

"Bobby," Dean says and shrugs, "you know me. I think better when I'm drunk."

"Yeah," Bobby licks his lips. "Yeah, I know. C'mon boys, get inside. Dean—well, who am I to deny a grieving man a drink?"

"Who said anything about grieving? I just haven't had anything to drink in over twelve hours. Look at me, I've already gotten the DTs."

Sam huffs and Bobby glares, but they don't say anything on the subject.

"One drink, then I'm sending both of your asses to bed. And the shower."

One drink turns into several consecutive shots of whiskey and shower and sleep are put off so that Dean can sit on the sofa and watch the Doctor Sexy MD marathon playing. Sam's asleep upstairs and Dean doesn't know where Bobby is, and he doesn't care.

The TV's playing, but Dean's not really watching. He's seen this episode before—the John Doe coma patient is nurse Susan's runaway son—and despite the surplus of liquor swimming through his blood, he's still not drunk enough to properly enjoy it.

He keeps staring at the coat and everything about it feels wrong. It's flat and stained and torn, limp, lifeless—just a regular coat. But it's not a regular coat. And that's what makes it so wrong.

Dean stands up and carries the coat to the kitchen sink. He fills it with ice water and soap and dunks the coat underneath. The ice water stings his skin and after just a few minutes submerged, his fingers are already numb, but he keeps scrubbing at the coat, at the hideous stains that don't belong there. Dean's been staring at the stains and the tears and broken lining and loose stitches for the last ten hours and they're all so wrong. It's like Raphael still has his hands on him. Still cutting into him, slicing and stabbing. He's still got Cas and he's taunting Dean with these stains and tears and broken lining and loose stitches.

Deans scrubs harder. He can't feel his fingertips, as they meld around the aged fabric. He's not sure if they're even there anymore. Perhaps he's lost his hands in the ice water, he thinks fleetingly. He pulls his hands out and dries them on his pants. He hasn't changed them yet; they're still marked with the burns, a shadow of something far grander.

The coat and the burned pants somehow make him insignificant. There was this being once, awesome and grand, that had lived for several thousand years and laid siege to Hell to pull a man from Hell. He had a family once, but they weren't a real family. They were cruel to him because he was different. He was different because he cared, but that made him him. And when his family needed him, he turned his back on them and turned towards a new family he found: a real family, with people who showed him kindness and love.

He fought and killed the brothers that had tormented him since Creation. His disobeyed, the greatest sin for his kind and fell from favor because a Righteous Man asked him for his help.

He helped cast his older brothers down into the Pit for eternity and saved the world he'd loved, the world that had caused him so much pain.

He returned to his true home to try and make amends with the family that hated him. He tried to show them the wonders he had discovered on Earth, wonders he was more than eager to share. He still had faith in them. When they wouldn't listen, he fought for what he believed in.

He gave his life for an alcoholic dropout and an ex-junkie.

And all that was left of him was a stained coat and burned pants. He might've well just died in a back alley.

Dean wonders briefly if Cas was scared during those days when Raphael had him and then decides he doesn't want to know.

He dunks his hands back in. The ice has begun to melt and the water has warmed up minutely. Dean forces himself to scrub a little longer and then he pulls the coat from the water and rinses off the popping suds.

He can't hold back the cry that rips through his throat.

Ruined…

The stains aren't gone. They've gotten bigger. They've run and smudged, bleeding down the length of the coat, spreading like a virus. The few parts that had remained virginal were tainted by the running stains.

Dean can't take it. He holds the soaking coat to his chest and slides to his knees. He only wanted to help, to make it better and he just made it worse.

This time he can't hold back the sobs that wrack his body.

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Dean doesn't see Cas for two weeks. He's worried sick the entire time. He knows Cas is busy, being the general of a losing army and all, but still. He wants to see Cas. To know he's alive.

He spends the night praying to Cas. It's lonely in the motel room by himself. Since Sam's confession that he hasn't slept since Hell, he doesn't see any reason to keep any charade of normalcy and he goes to fuck off during the time Dean's supposed to be asleep.

His brother is not his brother.

His best friend is fighting an impossible world.

Ben is not his son and Lisa is not his wife and though he loves them, he can never be in love with them.

Cas He prays, I know you're busy, but. He stops the prayers there. What if Cas was fighting right now and Dean was distracting him? What if Cas spared an iota of his attention on Dean's prayer and that got him killed?

Cas always came when he could. If he hadn't come, it meant he couldn't.

Fighting a war, Dean thinks. Fighting for free will for his people. Much more important than just keeping me company.

But what if, the sinister voice from the back of his head, the lingering from Hell, whispers, what if he hasn't come because he's dead? What if Raphael's wasted him and pinned his dead body to those pearly white gates?

The thought is shoved aside hastily, messily, but Dean still can't get the idea out of his head. Raphael had already killed Cas once. Dean remembers going back to Chuck's house and a bloody tooth was all that remained.

For the first time, Dean thinks there's more to this war than just the fight for free will.

He hears the beautifully distinct sound of flapping feathers.

"Cas," he says.

"Hello Dean. I heard your call."

"What if you die?" the words tumble out past his lips before he knows better.

Cas tilts his head. "Raphael wins the war."

"No," Dean says hastily, "I mean, I know that. But. How would I know if you die?"

Cas averts his gaze. "You should not burden yourself with such thoughts."

"Cas," Dean's voice breaks. "Don't talk like that. You're important to me and I'm worried about you."

A shadow of a laugh passes his lips. "You shouldn't."

"Please, Cas," Dean says. "Don't bullshit me. You're scared, aren't you? How would I know if you die?"

"Raphael would probably tell you. He enjoys gloating."

It's not the answer Dean wants to hear; but he knows it's the only one he's going to get. The thought of Cas dying-actually dying, this time—is too much. But the thought of Raphael, the winged dick who started this whole mess being the one to tell him…

He hates hoping. Hoping was passive, inactive. It was waiting. Dean knows that if you want something done, you have to fight for it.

But yet he hopes. He hopes that Cas is right, that it will never come to that.

But he can tell that's what Cas is hoping too.

"I still want to help."

"I find sanctuary knowing that you and Sam are safe down here."

"He wants to restart the Apocalypse, right? So, he needs Sam and I, to be the vessels. He won't kill us."

Cas snorts, huffs out of annoyance. "Has it every occurred to you, Dean, that there are some instances where death is preferable? You remember the pain Zachariah inflicted on you after Lilith? Raphael is far more powerful. He can inflict so much more. I appreciate your concern. I do. But let me have my peace."

Dean nods. "Okay," is all he's able to say at first. After several tense seconds, he nods again. "Okay. We won't get involved."

Cas relaxes slightly. His eyes wander the room. "I would like to stay here for a short while, Dean. May I?"

"Yeah, Cas," Deans tells himself the burn in his throat is from whiskey, even though he's bone sober at the moment, and not the building pressure in his eyes. "You don't ever have to ask."

Dean falls asleep sometime later, while Cas stands by the open window, looking out. When he wakes, Cas is gone.

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Dean's not sure how long he sits on the floor like that, but eventually Bobby comes down. Dean stares at Bobby's worn sneakers, unable to look him in the eyes.

Bobby sighs. "C'mon, Dean. Get to bed. He wouldn't want you torturing yourself like this."

Cas hasn't been dead for a full twenty-four hours and they've already stopped saying his name. Dean wants to them to say his name; to acknowledge that he existed. That he meant something. He was Bobby's friend too. Hell, Bobby had taken him in, just like he took Sam and Dean. An adopted son. Cas is—had been? Was?—family.

But the words die on Dean's lips.

He allows Bobby to usher him up the stairs, to the second guest bedroom, though he vehemently refuses to let go of the coat, almost growling at Bobby like a wounded animal when Bobby tries to take it away.

Bobby resigns, rolls his eyes and mutters something under his breath that Dean doesn't understand, before he leaves.

Dean strips off his ruined jeans and looks at them, studies them. They cover the whole area of the crotch, though Dean wasn't ever hurt when—

They don't smell burned either. Dean isn't sure how to describe the smell, unable to find the words to encompass all that it is, but it's entirely Cas and somehow that's enough.

He lies down on the bed and stuffs the damp coat underneath his pillow. His stupor is wearing off, darkness reaching into his mind towards him, inching closer and closer, growing faster and faster, until it overtakes him.

When he's asleep, Dean dreams of blue eyes, wide and shell shocked, staring up at him, and then they're drowned in a blinding white light.