Chapter Text
The Universe began, as all things do, with intent
Swathed in darkness, miniscule tendrils composed of a seemingly unknowable knowing vitality began to stir and drift. Senseless in their direction in the vast expanses of space and time, tendril upon tendril sought others and twisted into a vast swirling network of connections. Tendril touched tendril, communication jumping through them at a speed infinitely quick and always present, and the network of light and intent brought forth something new into the darkness. Bursting forth from the infinite darkness was an entity, all knowing in its intelligence and all encompassing in its physicality. It did not know its role but knew the darkness was not devoid of life and light, simply an entity meant to balance out the role it would eventually play.
God is what the newly birthed entity called itself and it was a god indeed, plucking at tendrils through the mirth and weaving them together in an expert display of its steadily expanding power. The fabric woven from the golden swirling tendrils became that of reality, a construct God could wield and manipulate as it saw fit. Reality was empty on its own and bending the fabric to its will, God began to create. Rooms rose and fell as God waved its metaphysical hands, seven domains bursting with light fading into being and cementing themselves as ornamentations in reality. Heaven was an apropos name for what had been created and God was satisfied, for a time.
There was no energy in Heaven save for God itself and that was not correct, it did not serve the purpose intended for it. Once more with intention, God reached into its intangible heart and pulled out some of his very essence to aid in the construction of its children. It called them Angels and they were perfect, each newly created soul housing an eternity’s worth of knowledge in their pulsing heart. This is not to say that Angels were alive, for they did not feel pain or understand the concept of mortality that would soon emerge from its slumber and blossom into a brilliant butterfly. Of the Angels, the Archangels reigned supreme with their god given talents and natures. Seven strong, the group carried out God's bidding with a fierce will and controlled those angels underneath them.
Castiel was one such angel, a lesser archangel born with a crack in their chassis. Known as the spear of God and the Angel of temperance, Castiel had a razor sharp wit and unflinching loyalty to the deity who had created them. It was this loyalty that created a stir, one of their siblings approaching the doors to the throne room. Glancing up, Castiel was able to recognize the essence as Lucifer.
The eldest of God’s archangels, Lucifer was strong and proud. Tasked with being a mighty warrior and guarding another one of the seven rooms, Lucifer was highly respected and feared by lesser angels who did not understand what the angel sought to do.
“Castiel, I seek an audience with our Father. Grant me entrance.”
A tick of silence, infinite and heavy, before Castiel refused. “Our Lord does not wish to speak to you, it has concerned itself with humanity and shall remain like that in the coming millennia. You may speak to Metatron if you wish or I may attempt to answer the question that burns within you.”
Lucifer’s booming voice turned sinister and for the first time in their existence, Castiel felt the inklings of human emotion stir deep within them. A swirling black mass spread throughout their energy as fear began to trickle in, a cold biting sensation. “You denied my audience with our Lord and it has neglected us, its children, in favour of those dirty stinking humans. I will not forget or forgive this slight, Castiel. When the time comes, it will not reflect favourably upon you.”
Castiel did not reply but the fear swirling in them did not fade, the seed rooted firmly in place. The coming days, weeks, months saw it grow and bloom until the hour in which it came to fruition appeared. Gabriel’s horn blew loud and clear across the heavens, a call to arms Castiel would be foolish to ignore. They did not know what it meant but donned their armour nonetheless, spear a comfortable weight in their hand.
It was war, full out uncompromising war. Castiel didn’t know what was happening but instinct overtook them as they joined the fray, slicing through squadrons of their brethren before they realized that everything felt wrong. Their fighting made no sense but it was more than that as the absence of love rushed over the occupants of Heaven. God was gone from their hearts, gone from the very fabric of their beings. It had vanished and forsaken them. Too much to bear for Castiel, they chose to flee from Heaven and their responsibilities.
The first sensation Castiel felt after they ripped their grace out of their chest was a dizzying rushing of air and disorientation as they sailed through the atmosphere, punching through the ozone layer and entering the troposphere. Friction and resistance danced between their atoms and threatened to tear them apart, the generated heat unpleasant and burning. As the twisting rush of air came to its end, Castiel felt their atoms enveloped in a cold current. This, they thought dismally, was what it felt like to be ripped apart and be unable to reform and a frigid bolt of fear shot through them. Calling for what little grace remained, the atoms blinked out of the physical world and into another astral plane.
The astral plane was a place of limbo suspended between worlds, a halfway house for lost souls who had yet to be deemed worthy of Heaven or Hell by the powers that be. Father Time held no sway and neither did hunger or thirst, basic human instincts that deceased souls no longer needed. This plane had taken the form of a long stretch of beach, gentle waves lapping at the bare feet of a man who stared out at the endless horizon. Castiel felt their atoms coalesce once more and willed them to take on an inviting shape, something vaguely humanoid but with an aura so intense that they could not hide it.
Turning his head, the man staring at the endless waves did not seem scared or surprised though the expression on his face seemed to peer straight through Castiel. The human was of average height and build for a man in his late teens, a shock of dark black hair and a sloping nose paired with eyes that reminded Castiel of the lily ponds in the gardens of Heaven. His voice was full of grit and gravel as he spoke though a peculiar calmness seemed to radiate out of him.
“Is this Heaven?” he asked, looking upon Castiel without fear. “I know that I am no longer alive, I can feel the disconnect between my soul and its body. The feeling is strange but not unwelcome. I always thought it would hurt more than this.”
“This is not Heaven, it is akin to limbo I suppose.” Castiel replied, lowering the magnitude of their voice as the human covered his ears with his hands. “You are in the process of passing on but given that you are a devout man and have made certain prayers, I’ve chosen to seek your soul out.”
“The prayers… You mean to tell me that you’re an angel?” He asked with wide eyes, unsure of if he needed to remain relevant or if this casual tone was sufficient. The prayers had begun when the man was young and continued for a number of years, each one rife with love and adoration for God and the ways of the Angels. “I don’t need to know what it is that you seek, you have permission to do whatever it is that you need to do. My body and my soul are yours, are meant to serve you and God.”
“You shall see the splendor of Heaven, James Novak. I thank you for this gift.”
~
The first sensation Castiel felt as a human was pain. A shock of cold burned through their skin as they woke up in the male body of Jimmy Novak, eyes blurred by water. Liquid poured into their lungs and they choked as they sat up, trying to turn their head to figure out what was happening. A seatbelt restricted their movement and they reached out to tug it off, a groan of pain echoing when their limp wrist twisted painfully with the movement. Freezing water was filling the car steadily and Cas knew they needed to get out before they died, struggling with the window as the last of the air vanished from the car. Wrenching the window open enough to get out, Cas pulled themselves out of the car and into the murky depths. Algae caressed their legs and hands as if it wanted to pull them down into the lakebed for an eternal slumber and something moved through the water with an inhuman speed, shivers racing down Cas’ spine as they started rushing towards the surface. Clumsy limbs and resistance proved troublesome but they broke the surface and crawled onto the beach, coughing and hacking up water as the oxygen pushed its way back into his lungs.
“What the fuck is that?” Cas mumbled with a raw voice as they glanced out at the water, a woman with waterlogged hair and reptile slit eyes watching him for a moment before dipping back below the now tranquil waters of the lake. Trying to rise to their feet as they adjusted to their atoms being constricted into the clumsy design of a human body proved troublesome when Cas realized that their leg was not facing the correct way. Pain crashed over Cas in a tidal wave as the blood began to pour from the gash on their forehead, their limp wrist and their broken leg overwhelming them. Unable to process all of the sensations and emotions coursing through their body, they took a shambling step and then another as they focused on getting as far away from whatever was in the water. They made it as far as the road before they collapsed, legs giving way and blood spreading into the cracks of the asphalt.
Being human, as Castiel discovered, was not as easy as their observations had led them to believe. Their bodies were remarkably fragile for one, the broken leg taking months to heal and still aching every time Cas spent too long on their feet.Then there was the constant gnawing ache of hunger and thirst deep in his stomach every time he passed by something that appeared appetizing though eating proved to be challenging as everything tasted like atoms, a celestial scarecrow stuffing themselves with the bland hay they needed to sustain themselves. Sleep too was a cruel mistress, her domain plaguing Castiel with flashes of Heaven and memories of their brothers and sisters falling under their sword. Castiel woke up screaming most nights, body wracked with sobs and drenched with sweat as the emotions coursed through them. They had fought and killed their family, their blood, and choosing to rebel against an uncaring father was less about wanting attention and more about trying to outrun the guilt that plagued them. It hadn’t worked and now Castiel barely slept, choosing instead to devote their time to research and making up for the violence in their past.
The best way to do this was to become a hunter, to protect humanity like their lord had ordered but to do it on their own terms. Sleepless nights alone in motel rooms turned to nights spent in libraries and archives, ink stained hands scrawling notes into journals until their eyes couldn’t see straight. It was remarkable that humanity had been able to figure out through the years and Castiel found their admiration growing with every passing day. Evenings filled with hunter bars and casual conversations in the darkness about things best left unspoken gave Castiel a new purpose and a new mission: to hunt that which hunted humanity and bring it down with the same ruthless precision they had used to kill their family in a senseless war over free will and the desire for love from one who could not grant it.
Their emotions remained a threat to their ability to hunt and maintain their mission and it was a sunny afternoon in Texas when Castiel found a way to push through them, to dull them down enough to be shaped in the way they needed to be shaped in. Advertised as Dark Reflections Tattoo Studio and Piercing Shop, the studio was a mix of nature and witchy which proved fascinating to Castiel. These humans had embraced the occult, were celebrating that which they did not understand, and their way of celebrating seemed to be with designs etched into their skin. Painting pictures with ink, Castiel was drawn in immediately and that day received the first of their many tattoos. The study whirring of the machine calmed the storm raging inside of Castiel’s mind as they lay face down on the tattoo chair, face peering down through the head hole and staring at the wood grain pattern swirling in the hardwood planks below.
Needles pressing into skin sparked a thrill of pain shooting through Cas’ spine and that seemed to relax them even further, the former angel knowing pain was the first human experience they had had and that it was what made them human. Angels did not feel emotion and did not feel pain and that prevented them from feeling love, the one human emotion Castiel placed above all else. Pain was penance, prayer inked deep into their skin as a reminder to never falter in their self imposed holy mission to help humanity as they had been tasked to. They didn’t know how long the penance lasted, not that they particularly cared, but the fruits of that labour brought about a pair of angel wings on their back. It was an ironic reminder of their position in life, of what they had once been and what they had vowed to never become again. The artist, a woman named Ashlynn, had become a quick friend when Cas offered his body up to her as a canvas.
Of course, peace could never last. Ashlynn was being stalked, Cas had seen it for months, and one fateful night it came to a head. Cornered in an alley by a creature with far too many teeth, Ashlynn had been ready to accept Death’s chilly embrace. But it never came. Castiel appeared in the form of an avenging angel, their blade dripping with vampiric blood and his eyes narrowed with concentration. In her shock, Ashlynn made a choice she never would have made otherwise.
Sex was a uniquely human experience, the union of two bodies and souls in the act of passion that had sacked Adam and Eve from the garden of Eden. It had seemed so messy and animalistic as Castiel observed humanity from their perch in Heaven but experiencing it as a human was something else entirely, an act nearly overwhelming in the heights of pleasure reached. Castiel had never been touched like that, had never felt so seen and vulnerable. Ashley had been a wolf and Castiel a lost little lamb subject to her whims and desires, all hands grabbing and teeth nipping and skin slapping on skin as their cries reached a blasphemous intensity. Sex took Castiel out of their head, grounded them in a physical act and wanton praise, and that was a blessing for them. When hunting was finished, research had been concluded, and chatter with other hunters failed to stave off the call of sleep Castiel would turn to sex and that worked to keep the emotions at bay.
Each new monster proved a new and interesting challenge for Castiel and they passed each test with ease, monsters falling at their feet like offerings to their lost divinity. For each new kill there came a flash of a new memory that needed to be dulled down with the comforting pain of a tattoo, Ashlynn more than happy to do it for Castiel before taking them to bed again and again. Werewolves, vampires, a particularly troublesome siren, and a whole picture book worth of monsters adorned Castiel’s legs. These horrifying pictures meshed with the angel wings and rod of Asclepius on Castiel’s shoulders and spine, the rod replaced by a spear to honour their siblings and the casualties suffered by both sides in Lucifer's battle against their creator.
As their tattoos grew, so did their fearsome reputation as a hunter who knew how to get things done.
~
An apple pie life with a white picket fence and a dog had never been in the cards for the Winchesters. If it wasn’t Mary Winchester being born into the hunter life then it had to be John’s horrific experience in the Vietnam War and if it wasn’t either of those, then it had to be a cruel capricious God playing tricks without a care in the world.
For the first four years of his life, Dean Winchester was happy. He had someone to tuck him in at night, to read him bedtime stories, to cut the crusts off of his sandwiches. It was blissful, at first, but the love began to fade and at the tender age of three Dean knew that life wasn’t fair. John was out every night doing god knows what God knew where while Mary was trying to hold down the fort, exhaustion cutting her to the quick. On more than one occasion Dean found himself crawling into Mary’s lap and winding his little arms around her to try and comfort her.
It all came to a head one cold night in September. The wind howled, lights flickered, and Dean came face to face with nightmares he hadn’t known were even possible. Mary, on the ceiling as flames licked at her, and John staring up in wide eyed horror. A screaming child was shoved into Dean’s arms and then he was running as fast as his little legs would carry him, the cold air hitting his face.
Life without a mother was cruel and Dean had very little time to adjust, forced into a life on the run and on the move. Being yanked out of schools and moved around meant he had no friends, meant he had no social skills, nothing to tie him to society and people outside of his family. It was only when his father told him that monsters were real, that Dean found his place in the world.
Monsters became Dean’s world and fighting them, his job. Between him and John and the search for revenge, years passed and Dean grew. His heart hardened, his emotions dried up, and his lived cried as he turned to alcoholism to feed the void of emptiness that never seemed sated.
Dean had been empty at thirteen and he was just as empty at twenty-four.