SPN Fic: whatever we lose (G)
Jan. 20th, 2010 02:28 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annundrielwhatever we lose
Castiel, Dean, Sam
G
1030
No spoilers.
Castiel has never seen the ocean.
I asked for "first time" prompts. Thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
mclachlan for the prompt: Castiel's first trip to the beach! Thanks also to ginnith and sdrohc_ratiug. Title from e.e. cummings.
Castiel has seen rolling hills and stretching plains, high mountains and dark forests, but he has never seen the ocean. There was never a reason, before, no need for a “vacation destination” as Dean would say.
And now…now there is no time. Lucifer is free and Castiel cannot find his Father to save them no matter where he looks. He stays with the Winchesters more often than not, leaving them only when he gets a tip they cannot follow. He travels the backroads of middle America in the backseat of Dean’s Impala, learns how to read a map and navigate around washed out dirt roads. They never go anywhere near either coast. The apocalypse, when it comes, is going to happen out here, among amber waves of grain and cracked earth.
But Castiel is slowly learning to expect the unexpected, especially if either Dean or Sam are involved, and the expected end never comes. Wonder of wonders, they do not lose.
When it’s over, when all is said and done and his brothers and sisters are shuffling back to Heaven, Castiel watches them go with an ache in his chest both similar to and different from the pain he felt when Dean stabbed him there the first time they met face to face. Dean’s face to this face, this new face he’s claimed for his own. They are his family and if he’s learned one thing from his time with the Winchesters, it’s the importance of family. But he’s also seen that family isn’t always about blood and when he looks at Dean and Sam pulling themselves together, leaning against one another for support like they always have, he finds that he’d rather stay with them, forge a new family here on Earth instead of return to a still fatherless Heaven.
Castiel tells Michael and Gabriel as much. He doesn’t ask or plead or even demand; he simply lays out what he has done and why he deserves this, tells them he’s taking it.
Michael just nods, tired and grave. But Gabriel smirks at him, looking oddly proud as he slaps Castiel on the shoulder and says, “Glad to see you’ve grown some cojones, little bro. You’re going to need them.”
He finds Sam and Dean with Bobby Singer, surprise in all three faces, though perhaps not as much in two of them as Castiel would have suspected. He asks if he can stay and Dean barely glances at Sam before he says yes.
Settling into Singer’s Salvage Yard is surprisingly easy. Bobby has books upon books, pages upon pages of supernatural lore and Castiel spends a good deal of his time going through them, acquainting himself with information that might be useful. Information that might persuade Dean and Sam to keep him around once they start hunting again. Because they will start hunting again. The world is in need—the world will always be in need, he knows now—and that is who they are.
The rest of the time, he watches the Winchesters move back and forth from each other like pieces of driftwood caught in a tide Castiel has never seen, trying to find their balance.
They talk Castiel into trying new things, human things, and he lets them. What use is remaining on Earth if he doesn’t learn anything in the process?
A month goes by, then another, and Castiel feels them pass with every fiber of his being. This is the slow road, he thinks. Watching Dean wash his car, laugh at Sam, grumble at Bobby, he finds he doesn’t mind it.
One day, he steps outside to find Dean throwing a duffle bag into the trunk of the Impala, Sam’s bag already packed beside it. When Castiel asks what they’re doing, Dean grins at him—bright and glinting in the morning light—and says simply, “Road trip.”
They drive for days and it’s a lot like it was before: Castiel in the backseat, Sam in the front, Dean behind the wheel. Except it’s different, too. He can feel how much lighter Dean and Sam are now, how much happier. He’s not sure if this is luck or a blessing anymore. He doesn’t question it.
There are roadside diners along the way, gas stations, rest areas, motels. Castiel thinks the only home the Winchesters have ever known is the road and Bobby Singer’s. It’s something they might have in common. The only home Castiel has ever known is Heaven and the Winchesters.
When Castiel asks where they are going, Dean just glances at him in the rearview mirror and looks away. Sam looks over his shoulder and smiles. “You’ll see,” he says.
Castiel is confused. They have mentioned no specifics, nothing definite. There is no talk of demons or other supernatural beings. All Castiel knows is that they are driving west.
It’s a change in the air that alerts him finally to their destination. It’s nothing he can place at first, a subtle waft of scent, a slight turn in the direction of the breeze. When Dean pulls to a stop, shifting gears into park and turning off the engine, Castiel knows exactly where they are without being able to see past the first sand dune.
He opens the door and hears the ocean in the distance, smells the salt on the air, feels it on his skin.
Standing between Dean and Sam in a half-empty parking lot at the edge of the beach, near an ocean he’s never seen, Castiel remembers what it’s like to believe in things you’ve only heard of, to have faith in something large and mysterious and powerful. To know that just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it isn’t there.
He’s tempted to fall to his knees and ask for forgiveness for the doubt and anger he’s felt. The betrayal that’s been sinking in since he realized that he could look and look for his Father, but he was never going to find Him.
He resists because he knows that over this dune, or maybe the next, lies the ocean and that it will stretch uninterrupted toward the horizon as far as he will be able to see.
Castiel, Dean, Sam
G
1030
No spoilers.
Castiel has never seen the ocean.
I asked for "first time" prompts. Thanks to
mclachlan for the prompt: Castiel's first trip to the beach! Thanks also to ginnith and sdrohc_ratiug. Title from e.e. cummings.Castiel has seen rolling hills and stretching plains, high mountains and dark forests, but he has never seen the ocean. There was never a reason, before, no need for a “vacation destination” as Dean would say.
And now…now there is no time. Lucifer is free and Castiel cannot find his Father to save them no matter where he looks. He stays with the Winchesters more often than not, leaving them only when he gets a tip they cannot follow. He travels the backroads of middle America in the backseat of Dean’s Impala, learns how to read a map and navigate around washed out dirt roads. They never go anywhere near either coast. The apocalypse, when it comes, is going to happen out here, among amber waves of grain and cracked earth.
But Castiel is slowly learning to expect the unexpected, especially if either Dean or Sam are involved, and the expected end never comes. Wonder of wonders, they do not lose.
When it’s over, when all is said and done and his brothers and sisters are shuffling back to Heaven, Castiel watches them go with an ache in his chest both similar to and different from the pain he felt when Dean stabbed him there the first time they met face to face. Dean’s face to this face, this new face he’s claimed for his own. They are his family and if he’s learned one thing from his time with the Winchesters, it’s the importance of family. But he’s also seen that family isn’t always about blood and when he looks at Dean and Sam pulling themselves together, leaning against one another for support like they always have, he finds that he’d rather stay with them, forge a new family here on Earth instead of return to a still fatherless Heaven.
Castiel tells Michael and Gabriel as much. He doesn’t ask or plead or even demand; he simply lays out what he has done and why he deserves this, tells them he’s taking it.
Michael just nods, tired and grave. But Gabriel smirks at him, looking oddly proud as he slaps Castiel on the shoulder and says, “Glad to see you’ve grown some cojones, little bro. You’re going to need them.”
He finds Sam and Dean with Bobby Singer, surprise in all three faces, though perhaps not as much in two of them as Castiel would have suspected. He asks if he can stay and Dean barely glances at Sam before he says yes.
Settling into Singer’s Salvage Yard is surprisingly easy. Bobby has books upon books, pages upon pages of supernatural lore and Castiel spends a good deal of his time going through them, acquainting himself with information that might be useful. Information that might persuade Dean and Sam to keep him around once they start hunting again. Because they will start hunting again. The world is in need—the world will always be in need, he knows now—and that is who they are.
The rest of the time, he watches the Winchesters move back and forth from each other like pieces of driftwood caught in a tide Castiel has never seen, trying to find their balance.
They talk Castiel into trying new things, human things, and he lets them. What use is remaining on Earth if he doesn’t learn anything in the process?
A month goes by, then another, and Castiel feels them pass with every fiber of his being. This is the slow road, he thinks. Watching Dean wash his car, laugh at Sam, grumble at Bobby, he finds he doesn’t mind it.
One day, he steps outside to find Dean throwing a duffle bag into the trunk of the Impala, Sam’s bag already packed beside it. When Castiel asks what they’re doing, Dean grins at him—bright and glinting in the morning light—and says simply, “Road trip.”
They drive for days and it’s a lot like it was before: Castiel in the backseat, Sam in the front, Dean behind the wheel. Except it’s different, too. He can feel how much lighter Dean and Sam are now, how much happier. He’s not sure if this is luck or a blessing anymore. He doesn’t question it.
There are roadside diners along the way, gas stations, rest areas, motels. Castiel thinks the only home the Winchesters have ever known is the road and Bobby Singer’s. It’s something they might have in common. The only home Castiel has ever known is Heaven and the Winchesters.
When Castiel asks where they are going, Dean just glances at him in the rearview mirror and looks away. Sam looks over his shoulder and smiles. “You’ll see,” he says.
Castiel is confused. They have mentioned no specifics, nothing definite. There is no talk of demons or other supernatural beings. All Castiel knows is that they are driving west.
It’s a change in the air that alerts him finally to their destination. It’s nothing he can place at first, a subtle waft of scent, a slight turn in the direction of the breeze. When Dean pulls to a stop, shifting gears into park and turning off the engine, Castiel knows exactly where they are without being able to see past the first sand dune.
He opens the door and hears the ocean in the distance, smells the salt on the air, feels it on his skin.
Standing between Dean and Sam in a half-empty parking lot at the edge of the beach, near an ocean he’s never seen, Castiel remembers what it’s like to believe in things you’ve only heard of, to have faith in something large and mysterious and powerful. To know that just because you can’t see it doesn’t mean it isn’t there.
He’s tempted to fall to his knees and ask for forgiveness for the doubt and anger he’s felt. The betrayal that’s been sinking in since he realized that he could look and look for his Father, but he was never going to find Him.
He resists because he knows that over this dune, or maybe the next, lies the ocean and that it will stretch uninterrupted toward the horizon as far as he will be able to see.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-20 11:57 pm (UTC)Perfect. Just, absolutely perfect.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-21 05:26 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-21 01:18 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-21 05:28 am (UTC)Excuse me while I make flaily hands at your icon. I only just started watching Southland and am loving it.
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-21 03:43 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-21 05:29 am (UTC)Thank you!
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-21 09:15 am (UTC)Awww poor Cass
Very nice.
Just a beautiful quietness about it.....
(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-22 10:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-23 03:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-01-24 12:08 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-01 07:04 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-04 01:20 am (UTC)And I am so happy that it brought you back a little something about faith you could ground yourself in. I think we all need reminders. ::hugs::
(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-01 10:42 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-04 01:21 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-01 01:49 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-04 01:24 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-01 02:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-04 01:25 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-05 08:00 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-06 06:00 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-09 09:17 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-09-11 08:27 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-11-18 07:38 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2010-11-20 08:38 pm (UTC)I'm so happy that you liked it. Thank you! <3
(no subject)
Date: 2012-11-08 02:32 am (UTC)