homeplot pre-play!

[heartless_sob]

Sleep faded into a dream too vivid to be fake.

Everything changed, and though it probably happened within the span of a second, it felt like the longest second of Castiel's life. Senses heightened, others dulled and Castiel's emotions melted, shifted, changed into something else. He knew more, felt more, but it was different.

It was homeCastiel

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[weary_head]

Dean woke up slowly, his dreams falling away from him into the dark, fading even as he tried to hold on. He couldn't remember quite why, but when his eyes blinked open he was smiling.

It didn't last for long.

Above him was a ceiling, not wood, not bamboo, but cheap styrofoam tile, and Dean sat bolt upright in bed. Home, home, he was home, he could feel it in the air all around him, and Dean's heart seized. One wildly outflung arm told him he wasn't alone in his bed, and Dean's heart skittered again, all but bursting when he saw the top of Angua's fair head peeking over the covers.

That made no sense at all, but Dean didn't question it, catapulting out of bed to investigate the bed that should have cradled Sam's lanky body.

He found only Jessica. Alive and dreaming, and if he hadn't been able to all but taste his heart in the back of his throat, Dean would've said he was still dreaming.

He was home, but where was SamWhen stumbling to the bathroom to check there brought him face to face with Castiel, Dean shot him a bewildered

[heartless_sob]

Castiel reached out and gripped Dean's shoulder, a vague sense of want making him push Dean's sleeve back to inspect his arm. There, branded into Dean's skin, was his handprint.

"Sam isn't here," came Castiel's voice, deeper, more monotone than it had been since he'd fallen. This was good, and it wasn't. He believed they had been sent to the island to be safe. Dean had been sent before Hell so that he would not start the apocalypse, and Castiel had been sent after to make sure nothing happened to him. Sam was sent before all of them, so that his powers would never manifest. Jess, so that she would live. It had made sense to him, at the time. Now, very little did.

He looked up at Dean, holding him with an intense gaze. "He may be in trouble. I will have to leave you for a little while, to check the convent he was last at. Wake the others. Get dressed."

He disappeared.

[weary_head]

Dean hardly had time to decide whether he was going to gape at Castiel's wretched message or the giant, honking brand on his shoulder when Castiel up and disappeared.

"Son of a bitch!" Dean shouted into the empty space in front of him, head turning sharply to see if he'd woken the girls. Light spilling in from the window sank his stomach like a stone.

"Oh Jesus." He ran to the window and found only a street lamp, but that didn't mean the moon wasn't out there. Creeping on tiptoe, Dean returned to Angua's bed.

He didn't know if he could do it. If the moon rose and Angua changed, Dean didn't know if he could do it, lock her up like she'd need to be for his safety and hers both. Dean sank down on the bed behind him, squashing Jess' foot in the process.

[off_the_ceiling]

Jess was awake immediately, her sleep never as deep or as restful as it had been before Sam had disappeared. She didn't feel awake, though, because her eyes were open and she was sitting up and looking around, but she didn't recognize anything around her. It wasn't Dean's hut, it wasn't the compound, wasn't anywhere on the island. It wasn't any home she'd ever known, or any place she'd ever been.

"Dean?" she said at the Dean-shaped form on her bed, yanking her foot out from under him. "Dean, what's going on?"