Episode 10: In the Midnight Hour
Title: In the Midnight Hour
Masterpost: Supernatural: Redemption Road (for full series info, warnings, and disclaimer)
Authors: electricskeptic and swordofmymouth
Characters/Pairing: Dean/Castiel, Sam
Rating: R
Word Count: ~26,000
Warnings: language, violence
Betas: nyoka and zatnikatel
Notes: Credit and big thanks go to nanoochka for contributing scenes to this chapter.
Art: Chapter banner by kasienka-nikki; digital painting(s) by artmetica, which you can also find here (they contain spoilers for the episode).
Summary: During a hunt on the Texas Gulf Coast, Team Free Will face their demons as the mass disappearances that span the globe threaten one of their own…
Galveston, Texas
Castiel fell asleep in the backseat, along to the hum of the engine. His forehead is resting against the window, and the sunlight refracts through and illuminates him at odd angles, shafts of light playing over the slope of his cheeks, the darkened lines of his growing stubble.
Forgot to shave again, Dean observes as he watches the angel through the rearview mirror.
The Impala, newly resurrected and gleaming with a fresh shine, picks up speed, and Dean glances at Sam over in the passenger seat. His brother's long arms are folded over his chest, and he shifts with each beat over Interstate 45 as they ascend the bridge that will take them to Galveston. He's wearing a shirt with a finger-sized hole in the collar; it needs a wash, and so does Sam.
The Gulf spreads out before them, and Dean enjoys the solitude of his sleeping brother beside him and his sleeping brother-in-arms in the backseat, the way a wolf shifts comfortably in the collective warmth of its litter mates. There is safety here, in this pack of theirs, and Dean feels the upwelling of pride like radiant heat. He does not think the host of Heaven ever had this, for all their righteousness; or would know how to hold it and keep it if they ever did.
Dean parks the car along Seawall Boulevard; the Impala's a beautiful mold of sharp angles and elegant lines, her black paint smooth over the hood, and her dark skin soaking in the sunlight. The brutal warmth and humidity of the coastline sends sweat trickling down the center of Dean's back, and he sheds his flannel, leaving it like a deflating sail in the front seat as he pitches the door closed.
Sam and Castiel remain with their eyes closed, and Dean doesn't dare wake them. He takes the short walk over cracked cement, where sand lines from past storms creep over the blacktop. A wood railing separates the street from the Gulf, and the salt hangs heavy in the air. Dean thinks he's been here before, but he can't pinpoint the exact time, or remember if he was by himself or tagging along with John.
His eyes lock on the gray-blue spread of the ocean, its still and too-quiet surface. In the distance he can see a hulking platform, which he suspects is the ferry dock, the next stop on their little adventure. Sharp smells tickle his nose: wet sand, and fish, and salt. He leans against the railing, drinks in the peace, and wonders what the sea has in store for them. If this is in fact something that could end the world, like Sam seems to think.
Between them, Dean and Sam have visited their fair share of places with bad or unpleasant weather, so despite the discomfort they aren't in a position to complain too bitterly about the heat, not after the South Dakotan winter they so narrowly escaped. The sun is shining so pleasantly above their heads, and the bath-warm Gulf waters lap against the side of the ferry in a soothing suck and pull. Still, Dean's shirt is stuck to his torso in approximately eighty different places, and even Castiel looks uncomfortable, fluttering the hem of his t-shirt to try and encourage air flow. Too bad there's no breeze to speak of anywhere except that generated by the moving boat.
In summer, Texas heat is unlike anyplace else on earth. It's not the dry, arid blast of a desert, nor the swampy sweat-bath of the Deep South; rather, Texas - for all it's still some parts desert and swamp both, like it couldn't pick one climate and stick with it - is at all times a soupy haze that prickles sweat on contact, everywhere, and challenges even the best of lung capacity. Thing is, it's not summer; in fact, there is only a week or so left to go before Christmas, and by all rights they should currently be experiencing temperatures in the mid-sixties, not the high-nineties. Not a single meteorological expert had a good explanation for the sudden heatwave in the middle of December, but the unspoken consensus in the car is that it more than likely has something to do with why Dean, Sam, and Castiel are here to begin with.
"Texas, huh?" Sam says as he circles around the Impala to join Dean by the guardrail of the ferry. Almost no more than that is needed to communicate Sam's thoughts on the subject, having already stripped out of his overshirt so he's just in a t-shirt and jeans like the rest of them. They're about ten minutes into the ride across the strait from Galveston to Crystal Beach, which Dean had never heard of before this. According to Sam, it's a tiny beach town that'd been devastated by Hurricane Ike a few years back and was starting to rebuild. It's also the site of a number of recent happenings they're en route to investigate. Disappearances. Strange weather patterns.
It's weird to be back on the road. It's the first hunt since…well, since just about everything. Since they lost Castiel to godhood, and since they saved Castiel only to lose him again, this time to Purgatory. It's also the first hunt since Sam had his head filled in with memories of his time in the Cage. So Dean's nervous, cautious, a little too watchful. Sam and Cas are both ticking bombs that could go off at any moment. Even so, working a case might be just what they all need to inject some normality back into their lives. Plus, Bobby's been threatening them with bodily harm if they didn't Get out of my damn house and go see what the hell is going on!
Castiel shifts closer to Dean, and Dean watches how the wind pulls at his friend's hair, blowing it wild across his face.
"So remind me again what we've got," Dean says, pulling himself away, for the time being, from watching Cas stare listlessly out at the churning waters of the strait. Sam idly mentioned they might see dolphins in the Gulf, and since they left the ferry terminal Castiel's been watching the waves for any sign of those slippery gray backs and smoothly curved fins, shifting his focus every so often to the brown pelicans swooping about on the breeze or the frigate birds that have hitched a ride on the ferry, occasionally perching on the rails or fluttering between the few parked cars.
Dean doesn't know what could possibly be so fascinating about marine life, to an angel anyway, but he's also of a mind to let Castiel do whatever he wants. If it'd bring him some measure of peace from the war that's been waging inside him, it seems, at every waking moment, Dean would almost let Castiel key affirmations across the side of the Impala. Almost. They barely finished fixing her up in time for this trip, and if Dean can be honest it's pained him a little to be away from her for more than a few minutes at a time, a little overcome by the reality that she's not just back on the road and once again in perfect running condition, detailing as sleek and gleaming as the day his dad drove her off the lot, but that he and Castiel made her that way. Together.
From his messenger bag, Sam pulls out a bundle of newspaper clippings and the notepad he's been using to scribble down theories and observations. Ever since he and Bobby started watching the global airwaves for signs of what Castiel called "powerful portents," they've had their work cut out for them. At the first sign of something unusual that didn't require crossing an ocean or more than three time zones, they knew it was their chance to investigate.
"It's the same sort of stuff we've been hearing about everywhere else," Sam says, "but the first string of incidents to fit the profile in North America. This one mostly concerns mass disappearances; over a dozen people have gone missing from Crystal Beach and Galveston in the last couple weeks alone. In communities this small, it's not the kind of thing you can just write off as a coincidence. Not in so short a time span."
"What are local authorities saying?" Dean asks.
"Typically, they have no clue. Best theory going is the missing people might have gotten lost at sea, but there's been no rough weather and no indication any of them were avid boaters. So either they decided to take a swim with a bunch of rocks in their pockets, or-"
"Or something grabbed 'em," Dean finishes for him. "Great. Because finding the Loch Ness monster in the Gulf of Mexico was something I've always wanted to cross off my bucket list."
"Good ol' Nessie," Sam chuckles, shaking his head. "But hey, there's also a local conspiracy-theory site reporting that the disappearances are linked to the 2010 Gulf oil spill. Mutant fish out for revenge, eating poor unsuspecting townsfolk."
Dean laughs, feeling it ring deep in his chest. "And we shouldn't rule out the possibility of a sharktopus," he quips, and a glance up shows that even Castiel rolls his eyes at that one, deadpanning, "It's highly unlikely a shark would breed with an octopus."
"Cas," Sam says, shifting his gaze between the angel and Dean, and smiling like he knows something no one else does. "Do you have something against interspecies matchups?"
"Not at all," Castiel says, tone gone thoughtful. "Interspecies mating has long played a role in evolution on the planet. I suspect this ocean has several whale and dolphin hybrids. I just doubt that a shark and an octopus would be given occasion to mate."
"Tell that to the Syfy network," Dean says cheekily. Castiel's eyes flash something warm in his direction, to which Dean can only blush and drop his eyes in response, not wanting to get into an epic staring contest with his brother right there. Ever since the sparring match and the world's most awkward tattoo sitting, things have been a bit on-edge between them. Not in a bad way, exactly, more just like they're on the precipice of something that's about to happen. Dean doesn't know what that is; if nothing else, he's fairly certain he doesn't want to think about what it could be, especially not within range of Sam's knowing smiles and not-so-subtle comments. Lately, he's been loudly and pointedly clearing his throat upon arriving in any room that Dean and Castiel occupy together. In more ways than one, this trip is a needed distraction for everyone.
"Whatever it is," Sam continues, thankfully oblivious to Dean's train of thought, "we're going to have to Fed up and make ourselves known to the local police before we make any effort to investigate on our own. Bobby made some calls earlier and says they've been trying to restrict access to the beach. That's kind of hard considering the whole island is a beach, but they're still making regular patrols to try and keep people out of the water."
Apparently through with watching for dolphins amidst the waves, Castiel turns and leans back against the guardrail of the ferry, shoulders back and hips out in a way Dean really, really doesn't find distracting as all hell. "What's to say we won't be ambushed by whatever it is that's disappearing these people?" Castiel asks, voice curious. "In the event of an attack it's unlikely I could do much to prevent it."
"When do we ever not get attacked by the thing we're investigating?" Dean sighs. "It's practically our number-one tactic for getting shit done."
"And Dean is such effective bait," adds Sam with a smile. "He's like monster catnip."
"Dean will not use himself as bait," Cas says with surprising force. Dean opens his mouth to respond to that, to say that he has every right to use himself as bait, but he sees the vehemence on Castiel's face and it gives him pause. For a moment he thinks not about trying to tease the angel for being a stick in the mud, but the quiet certitude in his eyes when he told Dean, You belong to me. Not for the first time, he supposes, Castiel is taking issue with Dean treating the value of his own life with such levity. Maybe that's because Castiel considers Dean his.
Dean shakes his head, swallowing against the dryness in his throat that manifests every time he thinks about that night. "Easy, Cas," he says with a soft laugh. "No one's getting used as bait."
In response, Castiel makes a sound a bit like a grunt and turns his head to look back out at the strait. Dean does not appreciate the look Sam gives him next, and thinks that if this shit keeps up, Sam tiptoeing around them like he's so clever and he knows something they don't know, they'll be obligated to have a confrontation before the week is out. Luckily Castiel doesn't seem to pick up on or understand what's had Sam so amused these days, offering up shotgun so Dean and Castiel can sit together in the car, disappearing for long walks like they really need more alone time, and Dean thinks that's probably just as well. Things have been awkward as hell the last few times he found himself alone with Cas, and since he can't make heads or tails of what's going on with them, it's best left unaddressed and unexamined.
Dean wants to move on and get Sam to recap a bit more of the information he and Bobby have gathered from their various sources - unless Dean's an active participant in the research process, he prefers to get the condensed version right before go time - but is interrupted by the other ferry passengers beginning to make their way back into their respective cars. A glance towards the front of the boat confirms they're close to reaching their destination, and with a sigh Dean gestures for Sam to start packing things up. Partly he's glad, because the sooner they're back in the car, the sooner he can turn the AC back up to full blast.
"We can talk more once we're settled at the motel," Dean suggests, wiping the back of his hand across his brow and moving to open the driver's-side door. "Something tells me we won't have to fight anyone for a room."
"Or two rooms," replies Sam, and ducks down into the passenger seat before Dean can fire a withering glare his way. It feels far less effective once he settles himself in the driver's seat and pointedly ignores Castiel's questioning gaze as he, too, gets in the vehicle. "With all these people disappearing I'm sure we can get a good rate," Sam adds smoothly, by way of explanation. "No need to cram everyone into the same room, not in this heat." Eyes twinkling, he looks at Cas in the rearview mirror. "You'll like having a bed to yourself, won't you, Cas?"
"Shared accommodations would have sufficed," comes the even reply from the backseat, and Dean narrowly avoids banging his forehead down against the edge of the steering wheel, already anticipating Sam's comeback.
"Don't even fucking say it," Dean warns him, staring him down with every inch of brotherly malice he can muster. This is how Sam works; unless it's a subject of a time-sensitive or life-threatening nature, he attempts to wear Dean down into talking about emotional shit by embarrassing him into submission. "Just don't."
"I wasn't going to say anything!" Sam protests, all innocence and puppy eyes.
"Famous last words," answers Dean, and then he's turning the key in the ignition and trying to let the reassuring purr of his baby's newly reconstructed engine ease away his annoyance.
Sam doesn't relent though. "Well," he says, voice all amusement. "Maybe you can get Cas to tell you more about those wholphins."
"Excuse me?" Dean frowns, tossing a glance at Sam before turning back to watch the vehicle in front of him begin its drive off the ferry.
"The offspring of the forbidden and tragically star-crossed interspecies mating of a whale and a dolphin," Sam says, and he's all-laughs now.
Dean has to stop himself from pulling over and throwing his annoying little brother into the Gulf of Mexico. It almost feels like old times.
Unloading all the cars off the ferry is a process that takes around five minutes, owing to the fact they're practically the only ones on the boat, and before long Dean's navigating the Impala out of the terminal and onto the main road, not that there's a whole lot of them to choose from in Crystal Beach. At first glance, the drive along the peninsula is featureless and flat, nothing more than sun-bleached grass and sparse marshland as they head east along Highway 87, bracketed by the slowly rolling waters of the bay. After a couple of miles, the beach begins to open up to sandy shores dotted with houses unique to the Gulf Coast, brightly colored and set upon stilts a good story and a half off the ground. Why anyone would want to live in a place just inviting hurricanes is beyond Dean, but as they pass an old lighthouse flanked by swaying palm trees he has to admit the place isn't lacking in picturesque charm. He can picture families spending their vacations here, running around on the beach the way he and Sam rarely did, though with the rash of recent disappearances he figures people aren't in much of a frolicking mood.
The first motel they pass - it, too, sits on stilts - is called the Paradise Oasis, and it's a painted monstrosity surrounded by one of the worst landscaping jobs Dean has ever seen. While the lawn itself is little more than dust, there are a few shrubs, palm trees, and bromeliads attempting to cling to the few patches of dying grass that seem to exist only for appearances' sake. The contrast of the blue, blue sky against the ugly pink of the motel keeps making Dean think of hospital nurseries, though it occurs to him he hasn't seen the inside of one since Lisa took him to look at all the babies through the window the day her sister gave birth.
"This place?" Sam asks as Dean pulls off the highway and into the parking lot. Even he of the garish western shirts seems offended by the color scheme, pulling a face that immediately makes Dean decide this is where they'll be staying.
"Better than nothing," Dean says. "I'm sure this town ain't exactly drowning in motel options." Sam groans at the wisecrack before Dean even has a chance to jab him in the ribs and add, Get it?
"I'll go see if the manager is willing to give us a reduced rate," Sam says with a sigh, unfolding all six and a half feet of his body from the Impala and pausing to stretch his arms over his head. The blast of heat from outside alone is enough to make Dean's skin prickle with sweat on contact. "They can't be that busy with all these disappearances going on, not even this close to Christmas."
"At least one of those rooms had better have two queens," Dean shouts after him when Sam walks away in the direction of the motel office, his shaggy head vibrating with laughter.
It's too fucking hot for Sam to be in this good a mood, Dean thinks, especially not with the end of the world - again - possibly weighing down the purpose of this whole trip. Just once, Dean wishes they could take off on a job and have it be easy; especially this close to Christmas, it'd be especially nice to enjoy the holiday and the availability of a beach at such close proximity. Not that Dean has ever been one for beaches, but he could be, maybe, if given the opportunity. Hell, even Cas could probably benefit from a few hours out in the sun - his skin is white enough to give the Edward Cullen wannabes of the world a run for their money. But from the sound of things, they'll be lucky if this job gives them any time at all to catch their breath in between shaking down the locals for information.
With a noise of disgust at how quickly his body has managed to drench itself in sweat yet again, Dean peels himself off the seat and back into the sunshine, noting from the corner of his eye that Castiel takes a moment longer to do so, looking contemplatively at their choice of lodgings with an otherwise expressionless face.
"You okay?" Dean asks, popping the trunk so he can fish out their duffle bags. There's three taking up space in the trunk now - his, Sam's, and Castiel's. Dean smiles at that, and perversely, he thinks they grossly over-packed for a trip that ought to require the least amount of clothing possible, but driving from South Dakota to Texas required they pack for two totally different climates, anticipating both cold and hot. He hands the right one off to Castiel and adds, "You've been pretty quiet for most of the drive," like the angel is otherwise a regular chatterbox.
"These disappearances have been weighing on me somewhat," Castiel admits after a pause. He meets Dean's eyes only briefly before glancing away. "I can't help thinking they must have something to do with-" Voice cracking, he looks down at his hands and then again off at the horizon, the deceptively calm waters that brought them here. "With what I did," he finishes. "Families are entering the holiday season anticipating a time of joy and togetherness, and instead they've been losing their loved ones."
Dean wants to fix Castiel with an angry glare at the suggestion, but the damn angel won't even look at him. "Hey," he tosses back, trying to keep the edge from his voice, "that's not why we're here. Right now there's nothing to say any of this has the first thing to do with the stuff Tamara was talking about or with your stint playing God for that matter, and even if it does, you're of no use to us on this job if you just mope around blaming yourself when you could be helping people."
That comes out far harsher than Dean intends, so he tries so soften it, going up to where Castiel leans against the Impala with his free hand wedged into the front pocket of his jeans. Which, Dean admits to himself, is weird. Cas is dressed casual, in dark Levis and a soft gray t-shirt. Dean reaches out to skim his fingers down Castiel's arm, and even here in the sweatiest, hottest climate around, the touch sends a little shiver through him he sees answered in the quiet breath Castiel draws in through his teeth.
"Don't you go around assuming this is on you, man," Dean says. Castiel opens his mouth to protest, but Dean is right there knowing what he's about to say. "Don't, Cas. Let's just get this job done and save the self-flagellation for later."
Hesitating, Castiel eventually nods, albeit not in a very convincing way. Dean figures that's probably as good as he's likely to get for now and releases his arm, breathing a quiet sigh of relief when he sees Sam emerge from the door to the manager's office, crossing the parking lot back to the car in less than ten long strides.
"Got us two rooms," Sam informs them cheerfully and tosses one of the keys in his hands towards Dean. It escapes no one's notice that he keeps the remaining key for himself, the matter seemingly decided who's going to be bunking down with whom. At this point Dean doesn't even have the energy to argue with him, desperate to be inside where there's - hopefully - a functioning AC unit. He could room with Attila the Hun for all he cares, though Cas is preferable by far. "They're both doubles, but the manager threw us a two-for-one deal. Said he hasn't had a single visitor since locals started vanishing and was grateful for the business. Even if he did seem to think we were crazy for being here."
Stifling a snort, Dean throws Sam's duffle bag to him. "Jury's still out on that one." Sam acknowledges the truth of this with a small smile and turns back to the motel; Dean is right behind him but pauses when he senses Castiel hanging back. "What's wrong?"
"I…think I would prefer a room to myself," he says reluctantly. "You should be with your brother."
At first Dean can only pause in response, unsure how to address that or the immediate and unexpected sting of disappointment that tightens his throat. Annoyed, he attempts to squash it down; it isn't like Castiel just rejected his fucking invitation to prom. "Why?" he asks instead, lamely, hearing the infuriating smallness of his own voice. Get a fucking grip, he tells himself, but nevertheless in the back of his mind he has to wonder what the hell happened between now and he and Castiel sharing a bed just a few weeks past, Cas saying You're mine like it was an irrefutable fact of the universe. Not that Dean is thinking about that at all, but he figured by now they were at least past having to argue about sleeping arrangements.
With a small shrug, Castiel answers, "I'd like some time to myself. And it would be good for Sam to have someone nearby, just in case…" He trails off with another weak gesture and a lift of eyebrows.
"Sam actually sleeps through the night," Dean says quietly. "And last time I checked, it was good for you to have someone around, 'just in case'." He sighs. "Are we seriously discussing this?"
"I rather not." Face troubled, Castiel holds out a hand for the room key gripped in Dean's fist. "Please, Dean, it's not…personal. You and Sam are accustomed to sharing a living space, and you and Bobby have been good to open up your home to me. But I'm also accustomed to having time to myself to meditate on things. Regroup, if you will. And there's been much for me to think about these past weeks."
Unsettled, Dean hesitates and starts to pass the key over, pausing just as Castiel's fingers close around the plastic fob. He wants to ask a million things, chief among them, Why won't you let me help? but the words get tangled up in his own feeling that he'd probably refuse help, too, if he were the one with the kind of baggage Castiel has been carrying around. Hell, he's been there. He wonders if after a certain point he's best helping Castiel by taking a step back and trusting that the angel knows what's best for himself. After all, he's trusted his friend with much more in the past; maybe not always to the best result, but they've been coming back around from that, haven't they? Learning how to lean on each other again?
"If you're having more of those damn nightmares-" he starts, and his voice catches. He has to force himself to hand the key over. "Or anything, I want you to let me know. I'm next door. And for the love of God, don't go pushing yourself to stay awake all night, you hear me? Because I'll kick your ass if you're falling asleep on the job tomorrow."
There's a gratitude in Castiel's eyes Dean doesn't expect, nor the hand, now holding the motel keys, that whips out to squeeze around his fingers. "Dean," Cas begins, and his voice breaks a little. "Thank you. Your trust means more to me than-" He trails off and looks down at their joined hands. "Just - thank you."
"Yeah, yeah." Suddenly awkward, Dean gently tries to pull away and nods in the direction of their rooms. "Get changed and meet us in our room in an hour so we can decide what to do next. And take a shower or something, you're not exactly angel-fresh."
Despite Dean's attempts to disentangle their fingers, Castiel's grip tightens once more before he lets go. "Speak for yourself," he tosses back lightly, "you reek."
With that, Castiel makes his way across the parking lot to the motel, and Dean lingers a second to pretend to lock up the car and double-check that they've got the books, fake IDs, and weapons they'll need in the trunk, though he knows for a fact he packed them all before leaving Bobby's. He can't help but breathe a small sigh of relief that the moment with Castiel is over, though of course he has no clue what just happened. At the same time, he immediately misses the pressure of Castiel's hand, the earnest thanks in his blue eyes at being given such a small amount of trust, and Dean's only attempt to explain it is that he's officially lost his marbles.
Castiel lingers for what he suspects amounts to several moments too long in the shower, turning the temperature dial down so that the spray is lukewarm, and relishing the sensation of the water sluicing away the sweat that's accumulated on his skin in the Texas heatwave. It bothers him, that he's so easily affected by something as simple as climate conditions now; it's another uncomfortable reminder of just how much he's tethered to his vessel - his body.
All the same, he supposes it would be deeply ungrateful of him to complain when he's very much aware of the fact that, by all rights, he should be dead. Or worse. He remembers, with a rush of unprecedented panic, his isolation in Purgatory, the stench of blood and burning flesh that suffused the monster encampment, the snarls and shrieks of the fanged things that hurled spells at him to keep him contained in a crude approximation of his true form. He staggers a little as the claustrophobia of it hits him square in the chest, screwing his eyes shut and breathing hard. He sets one hand against the cool tile of the shower wall, presses the fingers of the other into the vivid red mark burned into his chest.
He opens his eyes when the world stops spinning, and he's back in the luridly-painted bathroom of a motel in Texas, a million miles from that place of suffering and solitude. The water is running closer to cold now, and Castiel shuts it off, exiting the shower with some degree of reluctance. He searches through the duffle bag Dean had helped him to pack, choosing the pair of flannel sleep pants he favors and a soft white shirt, both Dean's. It's comical, in a depressing sort of way; Castiel wore Jimmy Novak's suit and trenchcoat for five years straight, barring his brief stint in a Delacroix hospital, but today he can't stand to be in the same clothes for more than a few hours thanks to a bit of heat.
The Winchesters are looking at him expectantly when he enters their unlocked room; Dean regards him with an expression of mingled concern and irritation with which Castiel feels intimately acquainted by now.
"What the hell took you?" he demands, tone even more gruff than usual. "Sam thought you'd drowned in the shower."
"I even suggested Dean go check on you," Sam says, flashing his brother a smile that Castiel can't quite decode.
"I can't drown," Castiel reminds them, the words coming out sharper than he intended. "I'm still an angel, despite my current appearance."
"We know, Cas," Sam says, and he smiles reassuringly at Castiel, so that the nasty little ball of guilt Castiel gets every time he remembers what he did to Sam tightens uncomfortably in the pit of his stomach. He deserves Sam's kindness even less than he deserves Dean's, but he's still selfishly grateful to have it. That, more than anything else, is what ultimately quells his rising irritation, and he moves further into the room to perch sheepishly at the foot of the bed.
"What are we planning?" he inquires, pointedly ignoring the way Dean is still watching him too closely. Castiel is in strategizing mode now, and it's familiar and disconcerting all at once. He recalls long meetings spent hashing out strategy with his most trusted allies, plotting the best ways to defeat Raphael's followers, guerilla maneuvers to win the civil war. He thinks of Rachel and Balthazar, dead now by his own hand. He sighs and turns back to watching the brothers discuss this latest case.
Sam has launched into a detailed breakdown of the case with an enthusiasm that suggests he's been fairly desperate to get out of Bobby's house and back on the job, but the basics as Castiel understands them go something like this: the largest concentration of disappearances in a single location took place at a nearby golf club resort a little over a week ago, where sixteen people vanished all at once in broad daylight, many of them in the middle of playing a round of let's hit balls with sticks, as Dean describes it. Furthermore, there are almost no witnesses for most of the disappearances, but one local man, a Mr. Theodore Conway, swears that he watched his son get dragged into the water from their fishing boat last Tuesday.
Castiel finds himself thinking about Mr. Conway's son: what he was like as a person, what his hopes and dreams were, his ambitions for the future. Human beings are so fragile, precious, their lives fleeting. He'd found it difficult to remember that last year, when he had been so consumed by the war; at times he had thought of his Father's most loved creations as little more than walking power sources, batteries on legs.
"So I'm thinking we should split up," Sam announces, interrupting his train of thought. "I'll go talk to this Conway guy, and you two can look into things at the golf club."
"Sam," Dean huffs, glaring at his brother. Castiel has no idea why Dean should take such offense to the suggestion, and is even more mystified when Sam appears to be trying (and failing) to suppress a smirk.
"It makes the most sense," Sam insists weakly, holding up his hands in a placating gesture. "No offense, but neither of you guys are exactly Captain Empathy when it comes to dealing with grieving relatives, and with any luck things will go a lot faster this way so we can get out of this heat."
Dean snorts. "Yeah, right. More to the point, are you sure you're gonna be okay on your own?"
Sam grins. "I'm a big boy, Dean. I can take care of myself."
"You know what I mean," Dean insists, and Castiel notes the sharp undertone of worry cutting into his voice now.
"Yeah, I know," Sam says quietly, all of his earlier levity abruptly gone. "Look, Dean, this is just something I gotta do, okay? On my own. I need to do this."
Dean narrows his eyes, and for a second Castiel thinks he's going to continue arguing; but then his shoulders sag as he relents. "Yeah, okay," he concedes, and that's that.
As it turns out, the Crystal Beach Golf Club Resort is only a short distance from their motel, so it makes more sense for Sam to drop them off there before continuing on his own to meet Mr. Conway in Galveston proper.
"Look after her, bitch," Dean warns as he hands the keys to the Impala over. "I only just got her roadworthy again."
Sam's only response is to stick his middle finger up at them as he drives away, and Dean turns to Castiel with a long-suffering sigh and a slightly pained smile. "Shall we?"
They make their way around the putting greens mostly in companionable silence, Dean walking with his EMF meter held out in front of him. This one isn't made out of a Walkman, Castiel notes somewhat absurdly, and thinks with a strange pang that he would like to have seen Dean's homemade device in action.
"Are you okay, dude?" Dean asks after this has gone on for a while, shattering the peace and quiet. Castiel barely refrains from rolling his eyes, biting down on his growing irritation. He knows that Dean means well, but he's grown a little sick of hearing that question after the last few weeks. Not that he has anyone to blame for that but himself.
He sighs. "I'm fine, Dean. Why do you ask?"
"No reason," Dean shrugs. "Just, you seem a little out of it today, is all."
Castiel turns that over in his mind and concludes somewhat reluctantly that Dean probably has a point. "I suppose I'm just not used to being out of the house," he says slowly.
"Yeah," Dean agrees, except it sounds like maybe he doesn't agree at all. Still he manages not to comment any further, for which Castiel is infinitely grateful.
"I used to play golf for a while," Dean comments randomly after several more minutes of silence have passed between them. "Back when I lived at Lisa's."
The admission takes Castiel by surprise, and when he looks at Dean he finds the knowledge adds another layer to his perception of this strange man, a new angle by which to see him from. There's something wistful about Dean's expression, and Castiel wonders a little sadly whether Dean would be happier if circumstances were different and he had continued to live with Lisa and her son, unaware of Sam's return from Hell and everything that had followed afterwards. Probably, but it would have been a false brand of peace, like the kind Castiel had given Lisa on Dean's wishes when he'd erased her memories. A peace born of ignorance.
Would you rather have peace or freedom? he'd asked Dean once, like having one would preclude him from ever attaining the other. From what he knows of both, Castiel suspects that might just be the case. Both of their lives are testaments to that.
"I didn't know that," Castiel comments quietly.
Dean shrugs. "No reason why you would."
It's an offhanded comment, not loaded in any way, but Castiel is surprised to find that it stings nonetheless. It's ironic, really: he knows Dean's darkest secrets, has held his soul in his hands; and yet, when it comes to the minutiae of Dean's everyday life, he's shockingly ignorant in most respects.
"Well, this is a bust," Dean mutters, oblivious to Castiel's change in mood. "I'm not getting any readings off this thing."
He shakes the EMF meter, taps the readout like it might be broken. Castiel is about to respond when he senses it, something toxic in the air, the unmistakable taint of sulfur filling his nostrils and settling in the back of his throat until he wants to gag. It's a presence, a malevolence reeking of decay and rot that's instantly recognizable after all the months he spent working with Crowley, and it hits him full-force, making the hairs on the back of his neck prickle.
"Dean, wait," he says.
Dean frowns in confusion, but stops walking. "What is it, Cas?"
"Demons."
Dean's head snaps up, looking around in alarm. "Are you sure? Where are-""
"Dean!" Castiel's shouted warning comes too late as a large, baldheaded man bigger even than Sam steps out from a thicket of trees behind Dean, swinging at him with what looks to be a section of lead piping. There's an audible thunk as metal meets skull, and Dean hits the floor.
Castiel forces down the inescapable fear and rage that come with seeing Dean unconscious and sprawled on the ground, moving seamlessly into battle mode as his millennia of combat training kicks in. He tugs on his shredded grace, willing his sword to manifest, but then out of nowhere a woman's voice - a familiar woman's voice - is reciting an incantation in Enochian as hands catch and grab at his clothing.
He has just enough time to feel a brief flare of panic as he's reminded once again of the spells used in Purgatory to keep him submissive, and then he's hurtling face-first into an endless blackness that reminds him a little too much of falling.
Sam keeps a copy of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder: How to Survive the Aftermath in a Destroyed Psyche in his side pocket. The top of the book peeks out with a series of dog-eared pages, crinkled and turned gray from palm-sweat and midnights seated in Bobby's den-chair. When he first received the book, it had the fresh-print smell of a book right off the presses, as though the ink would still be wet when he cracked it open; and Sheriff Mills had inscribed the inside in a cramped scrawl.
Give it time, Sam, she wrote.
He touches the book now and feels the pages flit beneath the pad of his finger. He feels dirty and unwashed in the dry-cleaned suit, still wearing the filthy t-shirt he slept in last night underneath the suit and the tie. This must be what it's like to be a demon, he thinks, wearing another person's meatsuit. Dirty on the inside; squeaky clean to everyone else.
Inside Capital Q BBQ, the locally-praised restaurant along Galveston's Seawall Boulevard, the smells of slow-cooked pork drift over the countertop, and Sam practices breathing through his mouth, cutting down the virulent smell of burning, charred meat. This is not the worst. It smells like Hell, like his own burning flesh, but Sam knows it's not.
It's the weathered old man who sits in front of him, balancing a wool crushable Stetson on his knee and a glass of whiskey in the other. Conway has deep etchings in his face, wrinkles around his eyes like fine lattice-work, burned there in shades of gold and tan by the sun across decades spent on docks, ships, and the coast.
He fills those wrinkles with tears. They slide from his eyes, and this is what forces Sam to turn away, this is what makes the smell of burning meat seem inconsequential and unimportant. This pain reflected from one man to another; give it time, Sam. But he gave it time, and time isn't fucking enough.
That's no way to think, Sam remonstrates himself. Think positive. You can do this.
He takes a steadying breath. The book listed a series of exercises, and Jodie Mills walked him through others, efforts at biofeedback, listening to his body and quieting the increasing frantic anxiety that beats like bats caught in a church bell, desperate to break through the iron.
He counts backwards, from ten down to one, and slowly the sound of the old man, whose grown son went disappearing off the coast last week, filters back to him, through the haze of images that shuffle back and forth - Adam, Michael, Lucifer.
"I know he's dead," the man sniffs. "You get used to the idea of that, losing your life at sea. But I ain't never gettin' used to this idea that he goes missing, and that's supposed to be casual. That business just goes on and nothing stops, nothing stops for a single life. Dropped like a stone in a barrel of brine. Christ." The man moves the flat of his palm through his tear tracks, spreading them across his cheeks with no effort to make them go, only to clear the path for more tears, more grief.
I can't keep doing this, Sam thinks. Seeing them like this.
It cuts places inside that Sam doesn't like to think about; it takes him back to the Cage. When the book talks about triggers, it talks about them in the dramatic, the grandiose; it never talks about the small things. The fragility of tears, for instance, and that even archangels have them, and archangels cry, just as people do.
Especially when they're trapped in a cage.
Sam breathes in. He holds it and counts up to ten this time. He breathes out, swallows, prompts the old man gently. "You were there…" He thinks about taking the worn hand that rests against the hat, where the old man taps his fingers against the wool, in his own hand. He doesn't do it. Sam knows that the man wouldn't feel it, knows that his hands and fingers are numb, numb down to his core. Regardless of the tears flowing down his cheeks, he feels nothing at all.
"I was there," Conway confirms.
Sam nods. "Tell me what you saw. I'm here to help."
"What does the eff-bee-eye want with a drunk fisherman?" the old man rails suddenly. "Govun'ment doesn't care about us. Never has. They put their restrictions on the fisheries and kill our ocean. They let the oil companies dump enough oil into the sea to keep us treading through black for the rest of our lives. We cut open fish, and the black is in their guts. Them oil companies are bastards. Ain't had a clean catch in more than a year. And you care about my son, boy? You care for his welfare?"
Sam goes still, thinks, dirty from the inside out in his clean suit. "Yes," he whispers.
The old man squints. "I believe you."
"Tell me, Mr. Conway. I can't bring back your son. But-"
The old man squints up at Sam, interrupting with, "You gonna kill the blackness for me, then?"
Sam pauses in his effort to bring up his notebook. "The blackness?"
Conway nods emphatically. "There was a blackness in that seawater." He pauses, brings the glass to his lips and swallows the whiskey. Sam smells it on the air, just beneath the rude push of pulled-pork into his nostrils. After a moment, Conway speaks again. "I was waiting for Jack to pull in. He had a smaller boat, just an 18-footer Grady White, y'know?"
Sam doesn't know shit about boats, but he nods like he does.
"Outboards kicking up froth at the back, he was going at a good clip, and then he cut the engine so he could ease right in. And I held the rope in my hands and for a minute, I heard this noise beneath the dock, like a man at a door, tapping his fist. You know the sound the water makes beneath a dock, boy?"
"I do," Sam says with a nod.
The man nods in turn and continues. "This steady slap, slap. But this wasn't that sound. This was like someone wanted to get my attention. Like a man at a door, waiting for me to let him in. I looked away and I stomped my foot. Sometimes we get sand sharks and the like and maybe one was caught beneath the dock, knocking itself unconscious beneath the planks. Wasn't no shark. Wasn't nothing at all."
In the background, silverware clanks and clicks against plates. Meat makes its way to hungry jaws and yawning mouths, as patrons chew and kill their food with their teeth, tearing and straining.
"I look up again," Conway whispers, "and my boy. My boy was gone. And the boat was empty and rocking on the choppy waves, and I heard the tapping once more."
Conway's fingers still over the fabric of the hat. He stares at his empty glass, still seeping tears from his eyes. His collar is stained with their moisture, and Sam knows the anatomy of such grief, this endless mourning that does not stop. He does not interrupt it. He waits for Conway to find his words again and speak when he's ready.
"I came to the end of the dock," the man continues. "That's where the tapping was. I had one foot on the board and the other on the post, and I leaned down, thinking that when Jack's ship came in I didn't want nothing in the way. Maybe he was just out of sight, where I couldn't see, maybe the outboards was givin' him trouble. And I look down into the water, and there was this shadow, this blackness deep down. Dark like the oil, almost, but moving."
Conway lets loose a violent cough, but it's not a cough; it's a blind, choking sob that wends its way through his chest like a twister kicking up earth in a storm. It works through him as though it cuts through his throat all the way up and out, until his whole body is shaking, and Sam is there, drawing his bar stool close so they sit shoulder to shoulder.
Customers stare, a lady with a straw hat she bought at a tourist shop, a child with ketchup on his face, and a balding man with a french fry on its way to his mouth. Sam folds his arms over his chest and lifts his chin in a quiet gesture of come and get some, motherfuckers. Got a problem?
They don't have a problem. They shift in their seats and return to their meals, to their lives, to their clean, cookie cutter world where everything you need to fix a problem can be bought at Wal-Mart, where Dr. Phil can strip down your bullshit and make it right, and where people sleep without frown lines in their faces.
"And the blackness had my boy's face," Conway whispers. "I saw him, open-eyed and staring up from the deep. And his face… so pale. I was staring down at him like he was my own reflection, and this air bubble popped out of his mouth. It floated up and broke on the water." The old man's face is all baffled grief undercut now by astonishment, as he continues. "And when it did, I heard him. I heard his voice in that little capsule of air."
"What did you hear?" Sam asks.
After a moment the old man whispers, "I heard, Help me, Dad. And then he was sucked down into the blackness. Things moved in that blackness. They took him, hands over limbs and things I couldn't see. I didn't want to see. And when I sleep at night, I wake up twisting the sheets. I think it's the blackness, down in the deep, come to find me. It chokes me in the night. I have to catch my breath. And I don't go to the Gulf no more. I don't take the Grady out on the water ever."
The silence stretches out, and it takes Sam a moment to realize that it's total; that somewhere in these lost minutes, the customers have cleared out and even the bartender is faded and leaning against the wall in the distance, as though he is no more than a cardboard cut-out, and all that is real is the inky blackness of the deep, a benthic zone swallowing up beloved sons.
Conway lets out a shuddered breath. "Kill the blackness, boy. But you watch out for the things inside it."
Sam swallows, nodding. "We will."
The old man lifts his Stetson and sets it on the thin hair of his head, white and uncombed. "It doesn't get better, does it?" Conway whispers, and Sam's tongue unfolds inside his mouth where he has been holding it, tripping against his palate. He wants to tell him, Give it time.
But Sam did give it time.
And it's not working.
So he says nothing at all.
Episode 10: In the Midnight Hour (Continued)
Masterpost: Supernatural: Redemption Road (for full series info, warnings, and disclaimer)
Authors: electricskeptic and swordofmymouth
Characters/Pairing: Dean/Castiel, Sam
Rating: R
Word Count: ~26,000
Warnings: language, violence
Betas: nyoka and zatnikatel
Notes: Credit and big thanks go to nanoochka for contributing scenes to this chapter.
Art: Chapter banner by kasienka-nikki; digital painting(s) by artmetica, which you can also find here (they contain spoilers for the episode).
Summary: During a hunt on the Texas Gulf Coast, Team Free Will face their demons as the mass disappearances that span the globe threaten one of their own…
Galveston, Texas
Castiel fell asleep in the backseat, along to the hum of the engine. His forehead is resting against the window, and the sunlight refracts through and illuminates him at odd angles, shafts of light playing over the slope of his cheeks, the darkened lines of his growing stubble.
Forgot to shave again, Dean observes as he watches the angel through the rearview mirror.
The Impala, newly resurrected and gleaming with a fresh shine, picks up speed, and Dean glances at Sam over in the passenger seat. His brother's long arms are folded over his chest, and he shifts with each beat over Interstate 45 as they ascend the bridge that will take them to Galveston. He's wearing a shirt with a finger-sized hole in the collar; it needs a wash, and so does Sam.
The Gulf spreads out before them, and Dean enjoys the solitude of his sleeping brother beside him and his sleeping brother-in-arms in the backseat, the way a wolf shifts comfortably in the collective warmth of its litter mates. There is safety here, in this pack of theirs, and Dean feels the upwelling of pride like radiant heat. He does not think the host of Heaven ever had this, for all their righteousness; or would know how to hold it and keep it if they ever did.
Dean parks the car along Seawall Boulevard; the Impala's a beautiful mold of sharp angles and elegant lines, her black paint smooth over the hood, and her dark skin soaking in the sunlight. The brutal warmth and humidity of the coastline sends sweat trickling down the center of Dean's back, and he sheds his flannel, leaving it like a deflating sail in the front seat as he pitches the door closed.
Sam and Castiel remain with their eyes closed, and Dean doesn't dare wake them. He takes the short walk over cracked cement, where sand lines from past storms creep over the blacktop. A wood railing separates the street from the Gulf, and the salt hangs heavy in the air. Dean thinks he's been here before, but he can't pinpoint the exact time, or remember if he was by himself or tagging along with John.
His eyes lock on the gray-blue spread of the ocean, its still and too-quiet surface. In the distance he can see a hulking platform, which he suspects is the ferry dock, the next stop on their little adventure. Sharp smells tickle his nose: wet sand, and fish, and salt. He leans against the railing, drinks in the peace, and wonders what the sea has in store for them. If this is in fact something that could end the world, like Sam seems to think.
Between them, Dean and Sam have visited their fair share of places with bad or unpleasant weather, so despite the discomfort they aren't in a position to complain too bitterly about the heat, not after the South Dakotan winter they so narrowly escaped. The sun is shining so pleasantly above their heads, and the bath-warm Gulf waters lap against the side of the ferry in a soothing suck and pull. Still, Dean's shirt is stuck to his torso in approximately eighty different places, and even Castiel looks uncomfortable, fluttering the hem of his t-shirt to try and encourage air flow. Too bad there's no breeze to speak of anywhere except that generated by the moving boat.
In summer, Texas heat is unlike anyplace else on earth. It's not the dry, arid blast of a desert, nor the swampy sweat-bath of the Deep South; rather, Texas - for all it's still some parts desert and swamp both, like it couldn't pick one climate and stick with it - is at all times a soupy haze that prickles sweat on contact, everywhere, and challenges even the best of lung capacity. Thing is, it's not summer; in fact, there is only a week or so left to go before Christmas, and by all rights they should currently be experiencing temperatures in the mid-sixties, not the high-nineties. Not a single meteorological expert had a good explanation for the sudden heatwave in the middle of December, but the unspoken consensus in the car is that it more than likely has something to do with why Dean, Sam, and Castiel are here to begin with.
"Texas, huh?" Sam says as he circles around the Impala to join Dean by the guardrail of the ferry. Almost no more than that is needed to communicate Sam's thoughts on the subject, having already stripped out of his overshirt so he's just in a t-shirt and jeans like the rest of them. They're about ten minutes into the ride across the strait from Galveston to Crystal Beach, which Dean had never heard of before this. According to Sam, it's a tiny beach town that'd been devastated by Hurricane Ike a few years back and was starting to rebuild. It's also the site of a number of recent happenings they're en route to investigate. Disappearances. Strange weather patterns.
It's weird to be back on the road. It's the first hunt since…well, since just about everything. Since they lost Castiel to godhood, and since they saved Castiel only to lose him again, this time to Purgatory. It's also the first hunt since Sam had his head filled in with memories of his time in the Cage. So Dean's nervous, cautious, a little too watchful. Sam and Cas are both ticking bombs that could go off at any moment. Even so, working a case might be just what they all need to inject some normality back into their lives. Plus, Bobby's been threatening them with bodily harm if they didn't Get out of my damn house and go see what the hell is going on!
Castiel shifts closer to Dean, and Dean watches how the wind pulls at his friend's hair, blowing it wild across his face.
"So remind me again what we've got," Dean says, pulling himself away, for the time being, from watching Cas stare listlessly out at the churning waters of the strait. Sam idly mentioned they might see dolphins in the Gulf, and since they left the ferry terminal Castiel's been watching the waves for any sign of those slippery gray backs and smoothly curved fins, shifting his focus every so often to the brown pelicans swooping about on the breeze or the frigate birds that have hitched a ride on the ferry, occasionally perching on the rails or fluttering between the few parked cars.
Dean doesn't know what could possibly be so fascinating about marine life, to an angel anyway, but he's also of a mind to let Castiel do whatever he wants. If it'd bring him some measure of peace from the war that's been waging inside him, it seems, at every waking moment, Dean would almost let Castiel key affirmations across the side of the Impala. Almost. They barely finished fixing her up in time for this trip, and if Dean can be honest it's pained him a little to be away from her for more than a few minutes at a time, a little overcome by the reality that she's not just back on the road and once again in perfect running condition, detailing as sleek and gleaming as the day his dad drove her off the lot, but that he and Castiel made her that way. Together.
From his messenger bag, Sam pulls out a bundle of newspaper clippings and the notepad he's been using to scribble down theories and observations. Ever since he and Bobby started watching the global airwaves for signs of what Castiel called "powerful portents," they've had their work cut out for them. At the first sign of something unusual that didn't require crossing an ocean or more than three time zones, they knew it was their chance to investigate.
"It's the same sort of stuff we've been hearing about everywhere else," Sam says, "but the first string of incidents to fit the profile in North America. This one mostly concerns mass disappearances; over a dozen people have gone missing from Crystal Beach and Galveston in the last couple weeks alone. In communities this small, it's not the kind of thing you can just write off as a coincidence. Not in so short a time span."
"What are local authorities saying?" Dean asks.
"Typically, they have no clue. Best theory going is the missing people might have gotten lost at sea, but there's been no rough weather and no indication any of them were avid boaters. So either they decided to take a swim with a bunch of rocks in their pockets, or-"
"Or something grabbed 'em," Dean finishes for him. "Great. Because finding the Loch Ness monster in the Gulf of Mexico was something I've always wanted to cross off my bucket list."
"Good ol' Nessie," Sam chuckles, shaking his head. "But hey, there's also a local conspiracy-theory site reporting that the disappearances are linked to the 2010 Gulf oil spill. Mutant fish out for revenge, eating poor unsuspecting townsfolk."
Dean laughs, feeling it ring deep in his chest. "And we shouldn't rule out the possibility of a sharktopus," he quips, and a glance up shows that even Castiel rolls his eyes at that one, deadpanning, "It's highly unlikely a shark would breed with an octopus."
"Cas," Sam says, shifting his gaze between the angel and Dean, and smiling like he knows something no one else does. "Do you have something against interspecies matchups?"
"Not at all," Castiel says, tone gone thoughtful. "Interspecies mating has long played a role in evolution on the planet. I suspect this ocean has several whale and dolphin hybrids. I just doubt that a shark and an octopus would be given occasion to mate."
"Tell that to the Syfy network," Dean says cheekily. Castiel's eyes flash something warm in his direction, to which Dean can only blush and drop his eyes in response, not wanting to get into an epic staring contest with his brother right there. Ever since the sparring match and the world's most awkward tattoo sitting, things have been a bit on-edge between them. Not in a bad way, exactly, more just like they're on the precipice of something that's about to happen. Dean doesn't know what that is; if nothing else, he's fairly certain he doesn't want to think about what it could be, especially not within range of Sam's knowing smiles and not-so-subtle comments. Lately, he's been loudly and pointedly clearing his throat upon arriving in any room that Dean and Castiel occupy together. In more ways than one, this trip is a needed distraction for everyone.
"Whatever it is," Sam continues, thankfully oblivious to Dean's train of thought, "we're going to have to Fed up and make ourselves known to the local police before we make any effort to investigate on our own. Bobby made some calls earlier and says they've been trying to restrict access to the beach. That's kind of hard considering the whole island is a beach, but they're still making regular patrols to try and keep people out of the water."
Apparently through with watching for dolphins amidst the waves, Castiel turns and leans back against the guardrail of the ferry, shoulders back and hips out in a way Dean really, really doesn't find distracting as all hell. "What's to say we won't be ambushed by whatever it is that's disappearing these people?" Castiel asks, voice curious. "In the event of an attack it's unlikely I could do much to prevent it."
"When do we ever not get attacked by the thing we're investigating?" Dean sighs. "It's practically our number-one tactic for getting shit done."
"And Dean is such effective bait," adds Sam with a smile. "He's like monster catnip."
"Dean will not use himself as bait," Cas says with surprising force. Dean opens his mouth to respond to that, to say that he has every right to use himself as bait, but he sees the vehemence on Castiel's face and it gives him pause. For a moment he thinks not about trying to tease the angel for being a stick in the mud, but the quiet certitude in his eyes when he told Dean, You belong to me. Not for the first time, he supposes, Castiel is taking issue with Dean treating the value of his own life with such levity. Maybe that's because Castiel considers Dean his.
Dean shakes his head, swallowing against the dryness in his throat that manifests every time he thinks about that night. "Easy, Cas," he says with a soft laugh. "No one's getting used as bait."
In response, Castiel makes a sound a bit like a grunt and turns his head to look back out at the strait. Dean does not appreciate the look Sam gives him next, and thinks that if this shit keeps up, Sam tiptoeing around them like he's so clever and he knows something they don't know, they'll be obligated to have a confrontation before the week is out. Luckily Castiel doesn't seem to pick up on or understand what's had Sam so amused these days, offering up shotgun so Dean and Castiel can sit together in the car, disappearing for long walks like they really need more alone time, and Dean thinks that's probably just as well. Things have been awkward as hell the last few times he found himself alone with Cas, and since he can't make heads or tails of what's going on with them, it's best left unaddressed and unexamined.
Dean wants to move on and get Sam to recap a bit more of the information he and Bobby have gathered from their various sources - unless Dean's an active participant in the research process, he prefers to get the condensed version right before go time - but is interrupted by the other ferry passengers beginning to make their way back into their respective cars. A glance towards the front of the boat confirms they're close to reaching their destination, and with a sigh Dean gestures for Sam to start packing things up. Partly he's glad, because the sooner they're back in the car, the sooner he can turn the AC back up to full blast.
"We can talk more once we're settled at the motel," Dean suggests, wiping the back of his hand across his brow and moving to open the driver's-side door. "Something tells me we won't have to fight anyone for a room."
"Or two rooms," replies Sam, and ducks down into the passenger seat before Dean can fire a withering glare his way. It feels far less effective once he settles himself in the driver's seat and pointedly ignores Castiel's questioning gaze as he, too, gets in the vehicle. "With all these people disappearing I'm sure we can get a good rate," Sam adds smoothly, by way of explanation. "No need to cram everyone into the same room, not in this heat." Eyes twinkling, he looks at Cas in the rearview mirror. "You'll like having a bed to yourself, won't you, Cas?"
"Shared accommodations would have sufficed," comes the even reply from the backseat, and Dean narrowly avoids banging his forehead down against the edge of the steering wheel, already anticipating Sam's comeback.
"Don't even fucking say it," Dean warns him, staring him down with every inch of brotherly malice he can muster. This is how Sam works; unless it's a subject of a time-sensitive or life-threatening nature, he attempts to wear Dean down into talking about emotional shit by embarrassing him into submission. "Just don't."
"I wasn't going to say anything!" Sam protests, all innocence and puppy eyes.
"Famous last words," answers Dean, and then he's turning the key in the ignition and trying to let the reassuring purr of his baby's newly reconstructed engine ease away his annoyance.
Sam doesn't relent though. "Well," he says, voice all amusement. "Maybe you can get Cas to tell you more about those wholphins."
"Excuse me?" Dean frowns, tossing a glance at Sam before turning back to watch the vehicle in front of him begin its drive off the ferry.
"The offspring of the forbidden and tragically star-crossed interspecies mating of a whale and a dolphin," Sam says, and he's all-laughs now.
Dean has to stop himself from pulling over and throwing his annoying little brother into the Gulf of Mexico. It almost feels like old times.
Unloading all the cars off the ferry is a process that takes around five minutes, owing to the fact they're practically the only ones on the boat, and before long Dean's navigating the Impala out of the terminal and onto the main road, not that there's a whole lot of them to choose from in Crystal Beach. At first glance, the drive along the peninsula is featureless and flat, nothing more than sun-bleached grass and sparse marshland as they head east along Highway 87, bracketed by the slowly rolling waters of the bay. After a couple of miles, the beach begins to open up to sandy shores dotted with houses unique to the Gulf Coast, brightly colored and set upon stilts a good story and a half off the ground. Why anyone would want to live in a place just inviting hurricanes is beyond Dean, but as they pass an old lighthouse flanked by swaying palm trees he has to admit the place isn't lacking in picturesque charm. He can picture families spending their vacations here, running around on the beach the way he and Sam rarely did, though with the rash of recent disappearances he figures people aren't in much of a frolicking mood.
The first motel they pass - it, too, sits on stilts - is called the Paradise Oasis, and it's a painted monstrosity surrounded by one of the worst landscaping jobs Dean has ever seen. While the lawn itself is little more than dust, there are a few shrubs, palm trees, and bromeliads attempting to cling to the few patches of dying grass that seem to exist only for appearances' sake. The contrast of the blue, blue sky against the ugly pink of the motel keeps making Dean think of hospital nurseries, though it occurs to him he hasn't seen the inside of one since Lisa took him to look at all the babies through the window the day her sister gave birth.
"This place?" Sam asks as Dean pulls off the highway and into the parking lot. Even he of the garish western shirts seems offended by the color scheme, pulling a face that immediately makes Dean decide this is where they'll be staying.
"Better than nothing," Dean says. "I'm sure this town ain't exactly drowning in motel options." Sam groans at the wisecrack before Dean even has a chance to jab him in the ribs and add, Get it?
"I'll go see if the manager is willing to give us a reduced rate," Sam says with a sigh, unfolding all six and a half feet of his body from the Impala and pausing to stretch his arms over his head. The blast of heat from outside alone is enough to make Dean's skin prickle with sweat on contact. "They can't be that busy with all these disappearances going on, not even this close to Christmas."
"At least one of those rooms had better have two queens," Dean shouts after him when Sam walks away in the direction of the motel office, his shaggy head vibrating with laughter.
It's too fucking hot for Sam to be in this good a mood, Dean thinks, especially not with the end of the world - again - possibly weighing down the purpose of this whole trip. Just once, Dean wishes they could take off on a job and have it be easy; especially this close to Christmas, it'd be especially nice to enjoy the holiday and the availability of a beach at such close proximity. Not that Dean has ever been one for beaches, but he could be, maybe, if given the opportunity. Hell, even Cas could probably benefit from a few hours out in the sun - his skin is white enough to give the Edward Cullen wannabes of the world a run for their money. But from the sound of things, they'll be lucky if this job gives them any time at all to catch their breath in between shaking down the locals for information.
With a noise of disgust at how quickly his body has managed to drench itself in sweat yet again, Dean peels himself off the seat and back into the sunshine, noting from the corner of his eye that Castiel takes a moment longer to do so, looking contemplatively at their choice of lodgings with an otherwise expressionless face.
"You okay?" Dean asks, popping the trunk so he can fish out their duffle bags. There's three taking up space in the trunk now - his, Sam's, and Castiel's. Dean smiles at that, and perversely, he thinks they grossly over-packed for a trip that ought to require the least amount of clothing possible, but driving from South Dakota to Texas required they pack for two totally different climates, anticipating both cold and hot. He hands the right one off to Castiel and adds, "You've been pretty quiet for most of the drive," like the angel is otherwise a regular chatterbox.
"These disappearances have been weighing on me somewhat," Castiel admits after a pause. He meets Dean's eyes only briefly before glancing away. "I can't help thinking they must have something to do with-" Voice cracking, he looks down at his hands and then again off at the horizon, the deceptively calm waters that brought them here. "With what I did," he finishes. "Families are entering the holiday season anticipating a time of joy and togetherness, and instead they've been losing their loved ones."
Dean wants to fix Castiel with an angry glare at the suggestion, but the damn angel won't even look at him. "Hey," he tosses back, trying to keep the edge from his voice, "that's not why we're here. Right now there's nothing to say any of this has the first thing to do with the stuff Tamara was talking about or with your stint playing God for that matter, and even if it does, you're of no use to us on this job if you just mope around blaming yourself when you could be helping people."
That comes out far harsher than Dean intends, so he tries so soften it, going up to where Castiel leans against the Impala with his free hand wedged into the front pocket of his jeans. Which, Dean admits to himself, is weird. Cas is dressed casual, in dark Levis and a soft gray t-shirt. Dean reaches out to skim his fingers down Castiel's arm, and even here in the sweatiest, hottest climate around, the touch sends a little shiver through him he sees answered in the quiet breath Castiel draws in through his teeth.
"Don't you go around assuming this is on you, man," Dean says. Castiel opens his mouth to protest, but Dean is right there knowing what he's about to say. "Don't, Cas. Let's just get this job done and save the self-flagellation for later."
Hesitating, Castiel eventually nods, albeit not in a very convincing way. Dean figures that's probably as good as he's likely to get for now and releases his arm, breathing a quiet sigh of relief when he sees Sam emerge from the door to the manager's office, crossing the parking lot back to the car in less than ten long strides.
"Got us two rooms," Sam informs them cheerfully and tosses one of the keys in his hands towards Dean. It escapes no one's notice that he keeps the remaining key for himself, the matter seemingly decided who's going to be bunking down with whom. At this point Dean doesn't even have the energy to argue with him, desperate to be inside where there's - hopefully - a functioning AC unit. He could room with Attila the Hun for all he cares, though Cas is preferable by far. "They're both doubles, but the manager threw us a two-for-one deal. Said he hasn't had a single visitor since locals started vanishing and was grateful for the business. Even if he did seem to think we were crazy for being here."
Stifling a snort, Dean throws Sam's duffle bag to him. "Jury's still out on that one." Sam acknowledges the truth of this with a small smile and turns back to the motel; Dean is right behind him but pauses when he senses Castiel hanging back. "What's wrong?"
"I…think I would prefer a room to myself," he says reluctantly. "You should be with your brother."
At first Dean can only pause in response, unsure how to address that or the immediate and unexpected sting of disappointment that tightens his throat. Annoyed, he attempts to squash it down; it isn't like Castiel just rejected his fucking invitation to prom. "Why?" he asks instead, lamely, hearing the infuriating smallness of his own voice. Get a fucking grip, he tells himself, but nevertheless in the back of his mind he has to wonder what the hell happened between now and he and Castiel sharing a bed just a few weeks past, Cas saying You're mine like it was an irrefutable fact of the universe. Not that Dean is thinking about that at all, but he figured by now they were at least past having to argue about sleeping arrangements.
With a small shrug, Castiel answers, "I'd like some time to myself. And it would be good for Sam to have someone nearby, just in case…" He trails off with another weak gesture and a lift of eyebrows.
"Sam actually sleeps through the night," Dean says quietly. "And last time I checked, it was good for you to have someone around, 'just in case'." He sighs. "Are we seriously discussing this?"
"I rather not." Face troubled, Castiel holds out a hand for the room key gripped in Dean's fist. "Please, Dean, it's not…personal. You and Sam are accustomed to sharing a living space, and you and Bobby have been good to open up your home to me. But I'm also accustomed to having time to myself to meditate on things. Regroup, if you will. And there's been much for me to think about these past weeks."
Unsettled, Dean hesitates and starts to pass the key over, pausing just as Castiel's fingers close around the plastic fob. He wants to ask a million things, chief among them, Why won't you let me help? but the words get tangled up in his own feeling that he'd probably refuse help, too, if he were the one with the kind of baggage Castiel has been carrying around. Hell, he's been there. He wonders if after a certain point he's best helping Castiel by taking a step back and trusting that the angel knows what's best for himself. After all, he's trusted his friend with much more in the past; maybe not always to the best result, but they've been coming back around from that, haven't they? Learning how to lean on each other again?
"If you're having more of those damn nightmares-" he starts, and his voice catches. He has to force himself to hand the key over. "Or anything, I want you to let me know. I'm next door. And for the love of God, don't go pushing yourself to stay awake all night, you hear me? Because I'll kick your ass if you're falling asleep on the job tomorrow."
There's a gratitude in Castiel's eyes Dean doesn't expect, nor the hand, now holding the motel keys, that whips out to squeeze around his fingers. "Dean," Cas begins, and his voice breaks a little. "Thank you. Your trust means more to me than-" He trails off and looks down at their joined hands. "Just - thank you."
"Yeah, yeah." Suddenly awkward, Dean gently tries to pull away and nods in the direction of their rooms. "Get changed and meet us in our room in an hour so we can decide what to do next. And take a shower or something, you're not exactly angel-fresh."
Despite Dean's attempts to disentangle their fingers, Castiel's grip tightens once more before he lets go. "Speak for yourself," he tosses back lightly, "you reek."
With that, Castiel makes his way across the parking lot to the motel, and Dean lingers a second to pretend to lock up the car and double-check that they've got the books, fake IDs, and weapons they'll need in the trunk, though he knows for a fact he packed them all before leaving Bobby's. He can't help but breathe a small sigh of relief that the moment with Castiel is over, though of course he has no clue what just happened. At the same time, he immediately misses the pressure of Castiel's hand, the earnest thanks in his blue eyes at being given such a small amount of trust, and Dean's only attempt to explain it is that he's officially lost his marbles.
Castiel lingers for what he suspects amounts to several moments too long in the shower, turning the temperature dial down so that the spray is lukewarm, and relishing the sensation of the water sluicing away the sweat that's accumulated on his skin in the Texas heatwave. It bothers him, that he's so easily affected by something as simple as climate conditions now; it's another uncomfortable reminder of just how much he's tethered to his vessel - his body.
All the same, he supposes it would be deeply ungrateful of him to complain when he's very much aware of the fact that, by all rights, he should be dead. Or worse. He remembers, with a rush of unprecedented panic, his isolation in Purgatory, the stench of blood and burning flesh that suffused the monster encampment, the snarls and shrieks of the fanged things that hurled spells at him to keep him contained in a crude approximation of his true form. He staggers a little as the claustrophobia of it hits him square in the chest, screwing his eyes shut and breathing hard. He sets one hand against the cool tile of the shower wall, presses the fingers of the other into the vivid red mark burned into his chest.
He opens his eyes when the world stops spinning, and he's back in the luridly-painted bathroom of a motel in Texas, a million miles from that place of suffering and solitude. The water is running closer to cold now, and Castiel shuts it off, exiting the shower with some degree of reluctance. He searches through the duffle bag Dean had helped him to pack, choosing the pair of flannel sleep pants he favors and a soft white shirt, both Dean's. It's comical, in a depressing sort of way; Castiel wore Jimmy Novak's suit and trenchcoat for five years straight, barring his brief stint in a Delacroix hospital, but today he can't stand to be in the same clothes for more than a few hours thanks to a bit of heat.
The Winchesters are looking at him expectantly when he enters their unlocked room; Dean regards him with an expression of mingled concern and irritation with which Castiel feels intimately acquainted by now.
"What the hell took you?" he demands, tone even more gruff than usual. "Sam thought you'd drowned in the shower."
"I even suggested Dean go check on you," Sam says, flashing his brother a smile that Castiel can't quite decode.
"I can't drown," Castiel reminds them, the words coming out sharper than he intended. "I'm still an angel, despite my current appearance."
"We know, Cas," Sam says, and he smiles reassuringly at Castiel, so that the nasty little ball of guilt Castiel gets every time he remembers what he did to Sam tightens uncomfortably in the pit of his stomach. He deserves Sam's kindness even less than he deserves Dean's, but he's still selfishly grateful to have it. That, more than anything else, is what ultimately quells his rising irritation, and he moves further into the room to perch sheepishly at the foot of the bed.
"What are we planning?" he inquires, pointedly ignoring the way Dean is still watching him too closely. Castiel is in strategizing mode now, and it's familiar and disconcerting all at once. He recalls long meetings spent hashing out strategy with his most trusted allies, plotting the best ways to defeat Raphael's followers, guerilla maneuvers to win the civil war. He thinks of Rachel and Balthazar, dead now by his own hand. He sighs and turns back to watching the brothers discuss this latest case.
Sam has launched into a detailed breakdown of the case with an enthusiasm that suggests he's been fairly desperate to get out of Bobby's house and back on the job, but the basics as Castiel understands them go something like this: the largest concentration of disappearances in a single location took place at a nearby golf club resort a little over a week ago, where sixteen people vanished all at once in broad daylight, many of them in the middle of playing a round of let's hit balls with sticks, as Dean describes it. Furthermore, there are almost no witnesses for most of the disappearances, but one local man, a Mr. Theodore Conway, swears that he watched his son get dragged into the water from their fishing boat last Tuesday.
Castiel finds himself thinking about Mr. Conway's son: what he was like as a person, what his hopes and dreams were, his ambitions for the future. Human beings are so fragile, precious, their lives fleeting. He'd found it difficult to remember that last year, when he had been so consumed by the war; at times he had thought of his Father's most loved creations as little more than walking power sources, batteries on legs.
"So I'm thinking we should split up," Sam announces, interrupting his train of thought. "I'll go talk to this Conway guy, and you two can look into things at the golf club."
"Sam," Dean huffs, glaring at his brother. Castiel has no idea why Dean should take such offense to the suggestion, and is even more mystified when Sam appears to be trying (and failing) to suppress a smirk.
"It makes the most sense," Sam insists weakly, holding up his hands in a placating gesture. "No offense, but neither of you guys are exactly Captain Empathy when it comes to dealing with grieving relatives, and with any luck things will go a lot faster this way so we can get out of this heat."
Dean snorts. "Yeah, right. More to the point, are you sure you're gonna be okay on your own?"
Sam grins. "I'm a big boy, Dean. I can take care of myself."
"You know what I mean," Dean insists, and Castiel notes the sharp undertone of worry cutting into his voice now.
"Yeah, I know," Sam says quietly, all of his earlier levity abruptly gone. "Look, Dean, this is just something I gotta do, okay? On my own. I need to do this."
Dean narrows his eyes, and for a second Castiel thinks he's going to continue arguing; but then his shoulders sag as he relents. "Yeah, okay," he concedes, and that's that.
As it turns out, the Crystal Beach Golf Club Resort is only a short distance from their motel, so it makes more sense for Sam to drop them off there before continuing on his own to meet Mr. Conway in Galveston proper.
"Look after her, bitch," Dean warns as he hands the keys to the Impala over. "I only just got her roadworthy again."
Sam's only response is to stick his middle finger up at them as he drives away, and Dean turns to Castiel with a long-suffering sigh and a slightly pained smile. "Shall we?"
They make their way around the putting greens mostly in companionable silence, Dean walking with his EMF meter held out in front of him. This one isn't made out of a Walkman, Castiel notes somewhat absurdly, and thinks with a strange pang that he would like to have seen Dean's homemade device in action.
"Are you okay, dude?" Dean asks after this has gone on for a while, shattering the peace and quiet. Castiel barely refrains from rolling his eyes, biting down on his growing irritation. He knows that Dean means well, but he's grown a little sick of hearing that question after the last few weeks. Not that he has anyone to blame for that but himself.
He sighs. "I'm fine, Dean. Why do you ask?"
"No reason," Dean shrugs. "Just, you seem a little out of it today, is all."
Castiel turns that over in his mind and concludes somewhat reluctantly that Dean probably has a point. "I suppose I'm just not used to being out of the house," he says slowly.
"Yeah," Dean agrees, except it sounds like maybe he doesn't agree at all. Still he manages not to comment any further, for which Castiel is infinitely grateful.
"I used to play golf for a while," Dean comments randomly after several more minutes of silence have passed between them. "Back when I lived at Lisa's."
The admission takes Castiel by surprise, and when he looks at Dean he finds the knowledge adds another layer to his perception of this strange man, a new angle by which to see him from. There's something wistful about Dean's expression, and Castiel wonders a little sadly whether Dean would be happier if circumstances were different and he had continued to live with Lisa and her son, unaware of Sam's return from Hell and everything that had followed afterwards. Probably, but it would have been a false brand of peace, like the kind Castiel had given Lisa on Dean's wishes when he'd erased her memories. A peace born of ignorance.
Would you rather have peace or freedom? he'd asked Dean once, like having one would preclude him from ever attaining the other. From what he knows of both, Castiel suspects that might just be the case. Both of their lives are testaments to that.
"I didn't know that," Castiel comments quietly.
Dean shrugs. "No reason why you would."
It's an offhanded comment, not loaded in any way, but Castiel is surprised to find that it stings nonetheless. It's ironic, really: he knows Dean's darkest secrets, has held his soul in his hands; and yet, when it comes to the minutiae of Dean's everyday life, he's shockingly ignorant in most respects.
"Well, this is a bust," Dean mutters, oblivious to Castiel's change in mood. "I'm not getting any readings off this thing."
He shakes the EMF meter, taps the readout like it might be broken. Castiel is about to respond when he senses it, something toxic in the air, the unmistakable taint of sulfur filling his nostrils and settling in the back of his throat until he wants to gag. It's a presence, a malevolence reeking of decay and rot that's instantly recognizable after all the months he spent working with Crowley, and it hits him full-force, making the hairs on the back of his neck prickle.
"Dean, wait," he says.
Dean frowns in confusion, but stops walking. "What is it, Cas?"
"Demons."
Dean's head snaps up, looking around in alarm. "Are you sure? Where are-""
"Dean!" Castiel's shouted warning comes too late as a large, baldheaded man bigger even than Sam steps out from a thicket of trees behind Dean, swinging at him with what looks to be a section of lead piping. There's an audible thunk as metal meets skull, and Dean hits the floor.
Castiel forces down the inescapable fear and rage that come with seeing Dean unconscious and sprawled on the ground, moving seamlessly into battle mode as his millennia of combat training kicks in. He tugs on his shredded grace, willing his sword to manifest, but then out of nowhere a woman's voice - a familiar woman's voice - is reciting an incantation in Enochian as hands catch and grab at his clothing.
He has just enough time to feel a brief flare of panic as he's reminded once again of the spells used in Purgatory to keep him submissive, and then he's hurtling face-first into an endless blackness that reminds him a little too much of falling.
Sam keeps a copy of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder: How to Survive the Aftermath in a Destroyed Psyche in his side pocket. The top of the book peeks out with a series of dog-eared pages, crinkled and turned gray from palm-sweat and midnights seated in Bobby's den-chair. When he first received the book, it had the fresh-print smell of a book right off the presses, as though the ink would still be wet when he cracked it open; and Sheriff Mills had inscribed the inside in a cramped scrawl.
Give it time, Sam, she wrote.
He touches the book now and feels the pages flit beneath the pad of his finger. He feels dirty and unwashed in the dry-cleaned suit, still wearing the filthy t-shirt he slept in last night underneath the suit and the tie. This must be what it's like to be a demon, he thinks, wearing another person's meatsuit. Dirty on the inside; squeaky clean to everyone else.
Inside Capital Q BBQ, the locally-praised restaurant along Galveston's Seawall Boulevard, the smells of slow-cooked pork drift over the countertop, and Sam practices breathing through his mouth, cutting down the virulent smell of burning, charred meat. This is not the worst. It smells like Hell, like his own burning flesh, but Sam knows it's not.
It's the weathered old man who sits in front of him, balancing a wool crushable Stetson on his knee and a glass of whiskey in the other. Conway has deep etchings in his face, wrinkles around his eyes like fine lattice-work, burned there in shades of gold and tan by the sun across decades spent on docks, ships, and the coast.
He fills those wrinkles with tears. They slide from his eyes, and this is what forces Sam to turn away, this is what makes the smell of burning meat seem inconsequential and unimportant. This pain reflected from one man to another; give it time, Sam. But he gave it time, and time isn't fucking enough.
That's no way to think, Sam remonstrates himself. Think positive. You can do this.
He takes a steadying breath. The book listed a series of exercises, and Jodie Mills walked him through others, efforts at biofeedback, listening to his body and quieting the increasing frantic anxiety that beats like bats caught in a church bell, desperate to break through the iron.
He counts backwards, from ten down to one, and slowly the sound of the old man, whose grown son went disappearing off the coast last week, filters back to him, through the haze of images that shuffle back and forth - Adam, Michael, Lucifer.
"I know he's dead," the man sniffs. "You get used to the idea of that, losing your life at sea. But I ain't never gettin' used to this idea that he goes missing, and that's supposed to be casual. That business just goes on and nothing stops, nothing stops for a single life. Dropped like a stone in a barrel of brine. Christ." The man moves the flat of his palm through his tear tracks, spreading them across his cheeks with no effort to make them go, only to clear the path for more tears, more grief.
I can't keep doing this, Sam thinks. Seeing them like this.
It cuts places inside that Sam doesn't like to think about; it takes him back to the Cage. When the book talks about triggers, it talks about them in the dramatic, the grandiose; it never talks about the small things. The fragility of tears, for instance, and that even archangels have them, and archangels cry, just as people do.
Especially when they're trapped in a cage.
Sam breathes in. He holds it and counts up to ten this time. He breathes out, swallows, prompts the old man gently. "You were there…" He thinks about taking the worn hand that rests against the hat, where the old man taps his fingers against the wool, in his own hand. He doesn't do it. Sam knows that the man wouldn't feel it, knows that his hands and fingers are numb, numb down to his core. Regardless of the tears flowing down his cheeks, he feels nothing at all.
"I was there," Conway confirms.
Sam nods. "Tell me what you saw. I'm here to help."
"What does the eff-bee-eye want with a drunk fisherman?" the old man rails suddenly. "Govun'ment doesn't care about us. Never has. They put their restrictions on the fisheries and kill our ocean. They let the oil companies dump enough oil into the sea to keep us treading through black for the rest of our lives. We cut open fish, and the black is in their guts. Them oil companies are bastards. Ain't had a clean catch in more than a year. And you care about my son, boy? You care for his welfare?"
Sam goes still, thinks, dirty from the inside out in his clean suit. "Yes," he whispers.
The old man squints. "I believe you."
"Tell me, Mr. Conway. I can't bring back your son. But-"
The old man squints up at Sam, interrupting with, "You gonna kill the blackness for me, then?"
Sam pauses in his effort to bring up his notebook. "The blackness?"
Conway nods emphatically. "There was a blackness in that seawater." He pauses, brings the glass to his lips and swallows the whiskey. Sam smells it on the air, just beneath the rude push of pulled-pork into his nostrils. After a moment, Conway speaks again. "I was waiting for Jack to pull in. He had a smaller boat, just an 18-footer Grady White, y'know?"
Sam doesn't know shit about boats, but he nods like he does.
"Outboards kicking up froth at the back, he was going at a good clip, and then he cut the engine so he could ease right in. And I held the rope in my hands and for a minute, I heard this noise beneath the dock, like a man at a door, tapping his fist. You know the sound the water makes beneath a dock, boy?"
"I do," Sam says with a nod.
The man nods in turn and continues. "This steady slap, slap. But this wasn't that sound. This was like someone wanted to get my attention. Like a man at a door, waiting for me to let him in. I looked away and I stomped my foot. Sometimes we get sand sharks and the like and maybe one was caught beneath the dock, knocking itself unconscious beneath the planks. Wasn't no shark. Wasn't nothing at all."
In the background, silverware clanks and clicks against plates. Meat makes its way to hungry jaws and yawning mouths, as patrons chew and kill their food with their teeth, tearing and straining.
"I look up again," Conway whispers, "and my boy. My boy was gone. And the boat was empty and rocking on the choppy waves, and I heard the tapping once more."
Conway's fingers still over the fabric of the hat. He stares at his empty glass, still seeping tears from his eyes. His collar is stained with their moisture, and Sam knows the anatomy of such grief, this endless mourning that does not stop. He does not interrupt it. He waits for Conway to find his words again and speak when he's ready.
"I came to the end of the dock," the man continues. "That's where the tapping was. I had one foot on the board and the other on the post, and I leaned down, thinking that when Jack's ship came in I didn't want nothing in the way. Maybe he was just out of sight, where I couldn't see, maybe the outboards was givin' him trouble. And I look down into the water, and there was this shadow, this blackness deep down. Dark like the oil, almost, but moving."
Conway lets loose a violent cough, but it's not a cough; it's a blind, choking sob that wends its way through his chest like a twister kicking up earth in a storm. It works through him as though it cuts through his throat all the way up and out, until his whole body is shaking, and Sam is there, drawing his bar stool close so they sit shoulder to shoulder.
Customers stare, a lady with a straw hat she bought at a tourist shop, a child with ketchup on his face, and a balding man with a french fry on its way to his mouth. Sam folds his arms over his chest and lifts his chin in a quiet gesture of come and get some, motherfuckers. Got a problem?
They don't have a problem. They shift in their seats and return to their meals, to their lives, to their clean, cookie cutter world where everything you need to fix a problem can be bought at Wal-Mart, where Dr. Phil can strip down your bullshit and make it right, and where people sleep without frown lines in their faces.
"And the blackness had my boy's face," Conway whispers. "I saw him, open-eyed and staring up from the deep. And his face… so pale. I was staring down at him like he was my own reflection, and this air bubble popped out of his mouth. It floated up and broke on the water." The old man's face is all baffled grief undercut now by astonishment, as he continues. "And when it did, I heard him. I heard his voice in that little capsule of air."
"What did you hear?" Sam asks.
After a moment the old man whispers, "I heard, Help me, Dad. And then he was sucked down into the blackness. Things moved in that blackness. They took him, hands over limbs and things I couldn't see. I didn't want to see. And when I sleep at night, I wake up twisting the sheets. I think it's the blackness, down in the deep, come to find me. It chokes me in the night. I have to catch my breath. And I don't go to the Gulf no more. I don't take the Grady out on the water ever."
The silence stretches out, and it takes Sam a moment to realize that it's total; that somewhere in these lost minutes, the customers have cleared out and even the bartender is faded and leaning against the wall in the distance, as though he is no more than a cardboard cut-out, and all that is real is the inky blackness of the deep, a benthic zone swallowing up beloved sons.
Conway lets out a shuddered breath. "Kill the blackness, boy. But you watch out for the things inside it."
Sam swallows, nodding. "We will."
The old man lifts his Stetson and sets it on the thin hair of his head, white and uncombed. "It doesn't get better, does it?" Conway whispers, and Sam's tongue unfolds inside his mouth where he has been holding it, tripping against his palate. He wants to tell him, Give it time.
But Sam did give it time.
And it's not working.
So he says nothing at all.
Episode 10: In the Midnight Hour (Continued)