Disclaimer: I own nothing.

Author Notes: Set after 5x16 'Dark Side of the Moon.' Thanks to cageyklio for great beta work.

THE RAZOR'S EDGE

The motel room was silent. Sam had booted up his laptop and retreated to the table by the window, hunched over it like it held all the answers. He kept trying to talk to Dean, but Dean cut in with a growl and a gesture that said not now, not ever, so Sam shut up and shot Dean sad worried looks until Dean couldn't stand the weight of them any more and headed out with the sole purpose of getting stinking drunk.

He got outside, maybe four steps from the Impala, when Castiel appeared. Dean paused. Castiel held out a beer.

"And it ain't even the weirdest thing I've seen today," Dean muttered, snatching the bottle and leaning against his car.

He'd almost drained it before he realised that Cas had a bottle too, half-empty. The angel stared into it, the same way that Sam had been looking at his laptop. Frown lines looked like they'd been carved permanently into his face. Everything about him rang with defeat.

Yeah, Dean knew how that felt.

"Never thought I'd see the day, Castiel drinking a beer."

"Neither did I."

Castiel sounded full of hard angles, bitterness sharpening him, and Dean turned his head, only to find Cas had eerily managed to move closer without him noticing. It was a goddamn bad habit that always made Dean jump and he hated that, a lot. Now was no exception.

"Jesus, Cas, we've talked about this."

"We have talked about many things."

The words were soft now and Dean got a faceful of Cas's breath with them, more than a little laced with beer. Dean rocked back on his heels.

"Not your first beer tonight, huh?"

"That is correct."

"Picked a hell of a time to get with the programme, Cas."

"I am drowning my sorrows."

And they were back to bitter again. Dean watched him drink, watched his throat as he swallowed, pale skin and stubble and sheer exhaustion writ large on his face, like the weight of the world had crushed him. Something shuddered inside of Dean.

Empty, Famine had called him, and that explained a lot. But right now, Dean felt like he was getting a personal introduction to a new kind of gnawing hollowness, sickeningly consuming him as he observed Castiel unravelling fast.

The angel wasn't supposed to lose his faith, wasn't supposed to drop down into the mud with the rest of them.

"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Castiel grimaced through the words.

"Figures you'd be a downer drunk."

Castiel blinked. "I am merely telling the truth."

Dean cracked a laugh. Fucking perfect.

"Of course you are."

Castiel gripped his beer tighter, the liquid sloshing violently. Dean didn't move away. The whole 'Dad going and not coming back' thing cut a little too finely close to home. He clinked his bottle against the one in Cas's hand.

"Well, here's to the end of the world. Looks like we're getting front row seats."

"How can you be so......accepting?" Cas's words were crooked, like he was fumbling in the dark for them and it still sounded fucking funny, despite everything.

"Lot of practice," Dean settled for. "Hell, under the surface, there's nothing here."

Castiel frowned. "I do not believe that is true."

"Oh really? You don't?" Dean raised an eyebrow. "Well, 'scuse me if I don't take your word for it, drunky."

Castiel squinted at him, then at the bottle. A second later, the bottle disappeared and Cas, a little unsteady on his feet, was in front of Dean, closing in on his personal space. Dean finished off his beer. He was not nearly drunk enough for this. Even if the eager burn down his spine said otherwise.

"Dean, I need you to......"

Jesus, Cas's voice cracked. Not a good sound. Cas paused, bracing a hand on the Impala's hood. It was such a human gesture, like any drunk dude hitting the fresh air after a long liquid night. It was so human; it sent something painful through Dean's nervous system. He waited until the angel's eyes were fixed back on him.

"You might not have noticed, Cas, but I'm a little overloaded right now by what the world needs me to be so...."

"No," Cas wavered forward, his words forceful. "You must stay still, steady, on the course to do a great thing."

"Geez, Cas, pressure much?"

"And you are irritating," Castiel glared at him for daring to interrupt. "You are not listening. My brothers are hunting us and my father is gone. You are....."

All I have left

Cas didn't say it, but Dean heard anyway. Castiel stayed right where he was, eyes fixed hard on Dean's face. Dean was pretty sure he didn't want him to move. And hoped to whoever was listening that Sam wouldn't come out right now to see what was going on.

Cas was still staring intently. He was doing that freaky not-blinking thing that everybody who met him found weird. God, Cas wanted him to say something. It was all too damn big to squeeze down into sentences.

So he peeled Cas's hand off the Impala and kept hold of it. Casually, like he was ten again and Marissa Carlson had sat down beside him on the concrete wall by the mini-mart. Those were definitely not butterflies in his stomach.

Cas slid up into a standing position beside him, leaning back against the car. Their hands were hidden in the dark, but Dean could feel them. Cas's fingers, no calluses or scars, not yet.

Cas was solid. He was there. Fracturing apart – who wasn't? - but he was there.

"Dean."

It was a sigh, almost yearning. There was something playing at Cas's expression, a break in the darkness. It made Dean want to do something stupid like crush Castiel closer to him.

Cas's feet were steadier. Goddamn angelic recovery powers. The world should still be out of focus. Dean felt stone cold sober too. But he couldn't let go.

Castiel tugged him closer, like there'd be no denying such an action. His warmth leached into Dean. Dean coughed out what could be a laugh. It was testament to how screwed up his life was right now that this felt like a bright spot. A crumbling angel, unsteady and awkward and angry, holding onto him like a certainty.

He could feel Cas's breath again, on his skin, like a prayer. He closed his eyes, trying to keep everything the right side of control. That plan was blown out of the water when warm needy lips were suddenly on his. He made a pathetic noise that he would flat-out deny later. Cas was insistent, crowding in. Dean could taste his desperation in amongst the beer. He could taste Cas.

It was like a dam had broken.

Dean twisted his free hand into Cas's shirt. He couldn't stop. He couldn't…..

Cas moaned, his hands mapping the plains of Dean's body, sitting off scorching chain reactions. And it was on. Dean growled into his mouth, sinking his teeth into Cas's bottom lip. He couldn't be gentle. He couldn't be what Cas deserved.

"Cas."

That was too pleading to be Dean's voice. But he'd held an angel's hand, for fuck's sake, a drunk angel's hand. Embarrassment was a long way in the distance behind him, hidden from everybody if he just kept his eyes closed and his hands on Cas. Cas's fingers impatiently slid under his shirt. This was a razor's edge of pain and pleasure, white hot and burning, doomed from the start.

Dean took a breath, stilling his movements by necessity, resting his forehead against Cas's, for balance and because that connection felt suddenly vital. Like if he let go, there was no way back up out of the pit this time.

Cas deserved more than Dean. He deserved better.

"Dean," there was reprimand in Castiel's voice as he held Dean in place. "I am making a choice. Don't deny me that."

Everything about Cas sounded and felt raw and tender. Dean closed his eyes. But Cas held on, lips insistent against Dean's throat, his face, his mouth. Dean shuddered. Cas was in a really bad place right now. Cas was fucking choosing him.

Need and want flamed under Dean's skin and he gripped Cas tight, grasping for the car door handle. This wasn't going to be classy. But Cas knew him, he knew what to expect. And he'd still made his choice.

Cas smiled against his lips, his breath still full of beer and want and something else burning hard for the first time since Dean and Sam's return. "Dean."

And Dean finally shoved the door open, gripped a fistful of Cas's tie for security, and pulled him in away from prying eyes and nosey brothers. There'd be a few hours before Sam knocked on the window with a bitchface and coffee and all the new sickening omens that pointed to incoming end of days.

"I've got you," Dean hissed, as Castiel whimpered in the back of his throat.

Castiel's smile was almost broken. Dean tried to kiss it away.

-the end