SPN fic: Unmeasured Prelude
Title: Unmeasured Prelude
Author: furius
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Rating: G
Characters: Castiel/Dean
Summary: Castiel and Dean, at a loss.
Word count: ~1000
Author's Note: for dc_fireplace.
"Castiel is back."
This was knowledge that required no words, but his presence had shattered every expectation. To let it go unvoiced would have seemed like they condoned the illicit nature of Castiel's...nature. Zachariah frowned. It had only taken a second to destroy him.
He had been abolished from existence, then he was back. He was an abomination. Zachariah could not understand why the archangels did not destroy him once more. Maybe it will stick, if they just try again.
-=-=
The cosmos required it; Dean did not remember death. He remembered Hell, Alastair, and souls tortured on the rack. He remembered being broken and breaking others, but of Castiel and the mending of his soul and of his body, he had no recollection.
Castiel could see, very clearly, in his mind's eye, the long siege, the bright pyres of angels, and the moment he gripped Dean's arm and the white light beyond perdition becoming closer until it embraced him. Nevertheless, the time between passing through the gates and finding Dean Winchester had been sealed or burned away. No angel of Heaven, after all, should've descended into Hell and return.
Lucifer was not incorrect in seeing the similarity between them, yet he had failed to note that Castiel did not enter the dwimmer dark places of the earth as a conqueror or as merely himself. He was obeying a command from God, and he had carried it, like the most precious and the most awful secret in the universe, into where the universe ended. And it was in coming back, the righteous man in tow, Castiel knew that God existed because he had passed through where God was absent.
No faith was ever baseless. And certainly no soulless being ever understood the definition of the faith; it had been unnecessary when death held no uncertainties. If Castiel ever wondered why his brother and sisters submitted to the easy craving of rest and paradise after mere centuries, he only had to realise that only he had such a thing as faith. For a time immeasurable by the calendars of angels and men, he had been alone without the reassurances of Heaven, with only his reason. And even if he had forgotten all the ornaments of time -- the questions he asked, the answers he received, the steps he took, in thought and in action -- the experience had given him an unlooked for immortality; he had descended into doubt and emerged still as himself.
So when he said, in plain English, to Dean Winchester, that he had no faith. What he was saying was, in fact, "You have forgotten."
Dean had forgotten death. He had forgotten that months and years between the supernatural places of the earth and the world did not run in proportional constants. There was a hand-shaped burn on his arm he assumed was the mark of the angel who had grabbed him by the shoulders and lifted him upwards. He had not considered the shape and the angle of the palm and the fingers, the ease and gentleness of the motion required for the handprint to sear so neatly and completely onto his skin. He forgot he had wished to remember.
Perhaps, he wished to believe that he had been reluctant leaving Hell because he could not remember that important other thing- that Castiel had been with him and had somehow convinced him -- that demonic him, delighting in torture, nevertheless, delight without remorse -- that he should return and face sleepless nights, the terror filled days, and the tightening knot of this life because it was the right thing to do.
There must have been a moment, half-way demon, or perhaps nearly himself again, or when he was whole Dean knew he must have known Castiel and Castiel must have known him perhaps better than his father or brother because Castiel had been with him in that terrible place. It was a awful and comforting thought, but Dean could not remember it. All he had were the nightmares and the even more threatening waking hours.
Dean Winchester had chosen his own noose, again, though the choking may prove slower this time.
This time, he may smile, eat, drink, flirt, and kill monsters at his leisure, or until the next thing. He could call an angel by a nickname, adjust his tie, smooth his lapels, and introduce him to food and sex, concepts of family and personal space. And Castiel would let him, with an easy amiability that belied his strength as an angel of God, chosen to prevent an apocalypse, but tellingly indulgent.
Nothing should have been so easy but everything between them was, considering the vast space of years and experience between them; it was as if they have lived all this before, in that lost time, exiles from the regions of angels and from men, two beings half in metamorphosis, sharing and treasuring a memory that had been erased in malice or mercy as if ti had never been.
"It is not going to last forever," Dean would remind himself whenever he was happy, "There is always something else."
But Castiel found himself pleased and even glad for the first time in his long life. The muscles of his face tugged. He was happy there, with Dean, who reminded him of his faith.
-=-=
There was only one scar that Dean Winchester bore in his life that was Castiel's mark and not an artifact from his vessel. New brain, new liver, the palms of his hands as smooth as a baby's bottom, but the groove between his nose and above his upperlip, called the philtrum, had been where Castiel had shushed and sealed the knowledge of Heaven, of himself, and of immortality, into the soul of Dean Winchester.
Beneath that was Dean's mouth, curved in a smile Castiel did not mind not remembering in the pleasure of having it again. And he thought Dean understood this, that all this was all very necessary: the dust-motes in the air, the darkened room, the rough kiss of blanket against their skins, and the sheets smooth with too many washes.
Even cushioned on alcohol, on sleeplessness, Dean needed to see him, needed this body Castiel now wore without guilt near him. After all, faith, isolated, was mere madness.
-=-=
Author: furius
Disclaimer: Not mine.
Rating: G
Characters: Castiel/Dean
Summary: Castiel and Dean, at a loss.
Word count: ~1000
Author's Note: for dc_fireplace.
"Castiel is back."
This was knowledge that required no words, but his presence had shattered every expectation. To let it go unvoiced would have seemed like they condoned the illicit nature of Castiel's...nature. Zachariah frowned. It had only taken a second to destroy him.
He had been abolished from existence, then he was back. He was an abomination. Zachariah could not understand why the archangels did not destroy him once more. Maybe it will stick, if they just try again.
-=-=
The cosmos required it; Dean did not remember death. He remembered Hell, Alastair, and souls tortured on the rack. He remembered being broken and breaking others, but of Castiel and the mending of his soul and of his body, he had no recollection.
Castiel could see, very clearly, in his mind's eye, the long siege, the bright pyres of angels, and the moment he gripped Dean's arm and the white light beyond perdition becoming closer until it embraced him. Nevertheless, the time between passing through the gates and finding Dean Winchester had been sealed or burned away. No angel of Heaven, after all, should've descended into Hell and return.
Lucifer was not incorrect in seeing the similarity between them, yet he had failed to note that Castiel did not enter the dwimmer dark places of the earth as a conqueror or as merely himself. He was obeying a command from God, and he had carried it, like the most precious and the most awful secret in the universe, into where the universe ended. And it was in coming back, the righteous man in tow, Castiel knew that God existed because he had passed through where God was absent.
No faith was ever baseless. And certainly no soulless being ever understood the definition of the faith; it had been unnecessary when death held no uncertainties. If Castiel ever wondered why his brother and sisters submitted to the easy craving of rest and paradise after mere centuries, he only had to realise that only he had such a thing as faith. For a time immeasurable by the calendars of angels and men, he had been alone without the reassurances of Heaven, with only his reason. And even if he had forgotten all the ornaments of time -- the questions he asked, the answers he received, the steps he took, in thought and in action -- the experience had given him an unlooked for immortality; he had descended into doubt and emerged still as himself.
So when he said, in plain English, to Dean Winchester, that he had no faith. What he was saying was, in fact, "You have forgotten."
Dean had forgotten death. He had forgotten that months and years between the supernatural places of the earth and the world did not run in proportional constants. There was a hand-shaped burn on his arm he assumed was the mark of the angel who had grabbed him by the shoulders and lifted him upwards. He had not considered the shape and the angle of the palm and the fingers, the ease and gentleness of the motion required for the handprint to sear so neatly and completely onto his skin. He forgot he had wished to remember.
Perhaps, he wished to believe that he had been reluctant leaving Hell because he could not remember that important other thing- that Castiel had been with him and had somehow convinced him -- that demonic him, delighting in torture, nevertheless, delight without remorse -- that he should return and face sleepless nights, the terror filled days, and the tightening knot of this life because it was the right thing to do.
There must have been a moment, half-way demon, or perhaps nearly himself again, or when he was whole Dean knew he must have known Castiel and Castiel must have known him perhaps better than his father or brother because Castiel had been with him in that terrible place. It was a awful and comforting thought, but Dean could not remember it. All he had were the nightmares and the even more threatening waking hours.
Dean Winchester had chosen his own noose, again, though the choking may prove slower this time.
This time, he may smile, eat, drink, flirt, and kill monsters at his leisure, or until the next thing. He could call an angel by a nickname, adjust his tie, smooth his lapels, and introduce him to food and sex, concepts of family and personal space. And Castiel would let him, with an easy amiability that belied his strength as an angel of God, chosen to prevent an apocalypse, but tellingly indulgent.
Nothing should have been so easy but everything between them was, considering the vast space of years and experience between them; it was as if they have lived all this before, in that lost time, exiles from the regions of angels and from men, two beings half in metamorphosis, sharing and treasuring a memory that had been erased in malice or mercy as if ti had never been.
"It is not going to last forever," Dean would remind himself whenever he was happy, "There is always something else."
But Castiel found himself pleased and even glad for the first time in his long life. The muscles of his face tugged. He was happy there, with Dean, who reminded him of his faith.
-=-=
There was only one scar that Dean Winchester bore in his life that was Castiel's mark and not an artifact from his vessel. New brain, new liver, the palms of his hands as smooth as a baby's bottom, but the groove between his nose and above his upperlip, called the philtrum, had been where Castiel had shushed and sealed the knowledge of Heaven, of himself, and of immortality, into the soul of Dean Winchester.
Beneath that was Dean's mouth, curved in a smile Castiel did not mind not remembering in the pleasure of having it again. And he thought Dean understood this, that all this was all very necessary: the dust-motes in the air, the darkened room, the rough kiss of blanket against their skins, and the sheets smooth with too many washes.
Even cushioned on alcohol, on sleeplessness, Dean needed to see him, needed this body Castiel now wore without guilt near him. After all, faith, isolated, was mere madness.
-=-=