driftfleet | Red Fish Mingle

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Red Fish Mingle

Who: The crew and (many) visitors of the Red Fish!
Broadcast: Nope
Action: Aboard the SS Red Fish
When: Nebulously after the Great Winter Soldier Violence Spree of '16

[it was bound to happen sometime. all three captains of the SS Red Fish are hauled back home in various stages of medical distress, and things have been a little weird since then.

one of these things is the super soldier with the busted metal arm that is brought in to be kept locked up in Coil's lab for a while. turns out those restraints he'd had installed did come in handy. that's a thing.

so, whether you're here to check on one of the various ailing people here, gawk at the guy chained up in the ~~dungeon~~ lab, or are just trying to live your life in relative peace and sanity, come on in!]

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[ Dean doesn't know what to say to that, finds himself too edgy and nervous for words when all he's doing is creeping up on solidifying his own terrified despair that Cas was gone gonegone. He's not sure Cas needs to hear it and he probably shouldn't lay it out on the angel now that he's just woken up but Dean is itching for it, the gravitational pull of his fear something that he doesn't know what to do with.

Especially now that Cas feels so damn good - it's not his place to ruin it, to break this down into something that's about him, but Dean is squirming with it despite his frozen stance. ]

Nothing weird about it?

[ Because there's no reason he should be a whole angel again, and yet what is it they always say about not looking a gift horse up the ass? Who knows, Dean doesn't care but he does and he's worried and this is all somewhat suspicious. Not that he isn't glad for Cas but damnit, how is he supposed to find the words. Not when he doesn't even know how to express what all went through his mind to begin with, what he faced, what he found himself facing while he watched Cas sleep. ]

[ it comes as no real surprise that dean is suspicious, and honestly, he has every right to be - by all rights cas should be suspicious too, would be if he didn't feel so fucking good. and it might still feel oddly foreign and all, but every moment his grace hums beneath his skin it feels better and better, like he's fitting into himself all over again, a relief he can't even begin to describe washing over him like a warm tide, head to toe. he'd taken what he was for granted, his power, his energy, his sense of self. he was an angel, born an angel, why should he have ever expected that he would be anything but an angel? it wasn't until his grace had drained away that he realized how vital it was, that living without it was like living in a world stripped of color and sound, like missing half of his limbs, like being numb all over and having to stumble through life as half a being.

so it's hard for him to be suspicious, hard for him to be grounded when all he wants to do is stretch his wings wide and fly, feel his grace burning through him and over him, bursting with energy and force.

dean keeps him tethered, though, and he's grateful for it, really, even if it's a buzzkill, when all he wants is to revel in it for awhile. it can't bring him down though, nothing can bring him down, not yet, not right now, and he's all but grinning from ear to ear by the time he's wandering forward again, more steady on his feet now. ]

No, not really. Feels normal.

[ Dean's not truly trying to be a buzzkill. It's not as if he's searching for ways to smack Cas down, but it should be a reasonable enough question to ask why. To want to know the reason this has happened, to want to understand what it is that's gone on here. Because as rare as good things are for them, Dean can't help but think something like this will come at a substantial price - he doesn't know. It's what he's been trained to believe though, as if they're being dangled possibility on a string and now Dean will have to watch as it's torn back without payment. Something will happen, something pained and without warrant, just like this happened without explanation.

But until then, let Cas have his moment in the sun, he supposes. He hasn't seen him this happy in- god, he doesn't know how long. It feels too unfair or a thing to try and rip that from him, to drag his smile away when it's been owed to him ever since his grace left to begin with. Dean can only let himself swell a bit with Cas' happiness, even if he can't quite understand - Dean can still garner more than enough from the smile streaked across his face.

Which is maybe why he cracks as Cas moves forward again. He'll curse himself for it later, for being weak or not standing up to his own bravado, but it's when he finds himself moving in tandem, he just can't take it back and all but tumbles the rest of the way. It only takes an instant to sweep Cas up into a stubborn, furious hug, pulling him in tight and rigid and stern. Dean's nose immediately burrows down against Cas' shoulder, holding him fast and making it that much easier to not have to say a word yet, to merely make the point that Cas, his counterpart, was gone a little too long. ]

[ even for dean, it was really only a matter of time before he broke down into this, and even if it's a little unexpected, cas is still glad for it when he feels those strong arms and that sharp tug.

he can't remember the last time dean went out of his way to do something like this, broke through that cold wall he keeps around himself to reach out and find some human contact that's more meaningful than a casual nameless fuck, but in some ways, it feels a little like a victory. like cas has won something, here, in kicking a few bricks out of that wall, melting dean down enough for him to offer a gesture like this that feels so damned simple, even if it's anything but. it's a bridge to cross, a mountain to climb, but dean managed it anyway.

it's a shame that it feels a little less potent to cas if only because he hasn't felt the passage of time. months, dean's said, but to cas it hardly feels like minutes, though strange, stretched sort of minutes, like having a vivid dream that feels so real you don't quite grasp reality for those first few moments after you wake. so it doesn't feel to him like he's been gone, but it feels that way to dean, and that's really what matters.

so cas cracks into a grin, snags him with both arms and hugs just as tight because even if it doesn't necessarily mean the same thing to cas as it does to dean, it still feels good anyway, to squeeze him tight and feel that connection. grasping tight into his shirt with one hand, cas uses the other to clap dean hard on the back. ]

Thanks, big guy.

[ Dean's not thinking of who it means the most to here - this one seemingly insignificant hug - not in any way past the thought that somehow he needs this. This contact, this odd reminder that Cas is still solid and whole and here. It was his fault that he sent him away to his death, his goddamn fault, and to think what it would've been to realize the ramifications of that gesture where Cas to never awaken. His actions finally coming to fruition before his eyes. It was a thought he was stuck with on endless repeats while staring in the depths of his liquor, standing at Cas' sleeping side, terrified to face an existence that would have been marred with the blatant gash of Cas' loss. Even while he slept, right there, Dean could've sworn he saw him start to fade. To go, to be lost entirely.

Maybe he should tone down on the clinging, back off from the hug with some kind of normal ease that he doesn't possess, but Dean has always been a man comforted by intimacy even if he won't admit to it anymore. He just doesn't know how to find it in the right kind of ways and always ends up clunky and lost, like a child who's still left trying to decipher where emotions are meant to go and how one can hold them in the palm of your hands. He's forgotten some part of him that still needs, needs the things that contact brings and a hug is like a surefire punch to the gut, a shakedown of all the things he tries so hard to push away.

He told himself he didn't need this. He was wrong.

But just like he doesn't know how to give a hug, he damn well doesn't know how to let go of one, and if anything, he's burrowed in tighter, finding respite against Cas's shoulder and cursing himself making it about him. Because this is about Cas, about him being alive, waking up, returning to himself. Filling out once more with his grace. Isn't it? Not about the things Dean wants to shout, the desperate, terror laced words that he can only detail how sure he is he'd lost something these past few weeks, and he knows now where every inch of it is.

And just what he's no longer capable of letting go of. ]

It's all you.

[ if the clinging bothers cas in any way, it certainly doesn't show.

he gets it. he knows what it's like, what it must mean. for cas, this all might have passed rather quickly, but dean's been sitting around fretting for weeks. and sure, cas could take into account the fact that dean sent him to his death, wrote him off, wrote them all off, and if he's being perfectly honest.. he's not sure that's something he'll ever entirely forgive. but he understands. it was necessary. or if it wasn't, it was time to finish the damned thing.

but that was another world. they're here now, and dean's remorse has shown, clear in his actions, in the tightness of his voice, in all the subtleties that only cas would notice. this is a new place, a new time, and like home, they're really all they have here. he has friends, and he appreciates and cares for sam and sye and all the others he's come to know here, but dean is home, and it must've been pretty damned frightening to watch him waste away here in this bed for months. that dean's relieved he's back, needs the closeness of a tight hug - cas isn't going to deny him that.

so cas allows it, doesn't pull back, doesn't loosen his hold, only rubs between dean's shoulderblades and allows him to stay as long as he needs. ]

What's that supposed to mean, huh?

You're always-

[ Dean so badly wants to clamp down on stupid words (his definition of any words at all, truly), in the same way he always does. Say nothing at all, admit to nothing. Force meaning out from behind dark stares, hope that people understand the demands he doles out in miniscule sentences, gravel toned offerings. Because putting voice to things is a struggle, a pain he gained somewhere along the way, because why speak when nothing comes out right? When words are a tangle, a mess he can't unweave himself from.

But Cas was asleep for weeks and somewhere deep down he felt an agonized pull he couldn't escape from. Stark apologies ripped from his tongue while he sat bedside, hoping that maybe if he confessed to it enough times, if he spoke words of terrified grief, Cas would sit bolt upright and come back to him. What else could he do but worry, but tell himself that this was the life he would've given himself, this was the pain he provided through his inability to come up with a solution that kept the one thing he needed by his side.

Dean knows he should probably let go, should probably step away and collect himself and brush off the weeks of dust that collected under his skin while all he did was watch and tear himself apart with aching remorse. But he can't, not yet; Cas' shoulder is too warm and present and alive and all Dean can do is collect his mistakes and hold them that much closer, that he tried to let go of the one thing he know he needs.

Cas is his safety, his place, and he thought he knew how to give that up, only to realize in the tearing of the knots between them, that all he wants to do is hold on. ]

I didn't do anything.

[ honestly, for all cas seems to know dean better than most, even he doesn't always completely understand what's going on in dean's head, or parse what it is he's trying to say. he has good ideas, most of the time, can more or less surmise what's likely going on behind those hazel eyes, but even then he can never be sure. dean's closed off, and cas isn't a mind reader. well, not anymore.

either way, maybe it's because he's been asleep for weeks, but cas isn't really sure what it is that dean's going on about, but it's clear enough that he's upset, and it isn't too difficult to understand why. ]

Hey.

[ cas pulls back, but just enough to look into dean's face, to dip his head to catch his eyes, one hand sliding back enough to grasp his shoulder, strong and solid. ]

Look, I'm here, all right? Don't worry so much.

[ Sometimes Dean hates the way Cas looks at him - the way he knows how to peel him open without any work at all. More often than not it's useful, sure, the kind of stares stuck between them that makes it so much easier to understand without the words Dean no longer knows how to say. Cas can simply unwind his head as if there's nothing to it, can lift open the lid and uncover whatever it is that Dean's so furiously trying to keep to himself.

But at times, it makes him want to squirm, writhe away and cover his face. He doesn't want to be the open book that Cas can see and yet at times, he knows he makes it impossible to even manage that. That he's wound so tightly that even Dean isn't sure where to find himself amidst it all and so he struggles within his own silence, not knowing how to express whatever it is he's feeling when he's spent his entire life trying to shove it all so far away, into the frantic depths of wherever he cannot reach.

And yet, as Dean is at least still an infinitesimal part of the same creature he always was, it never fails to bubble its way back to the surface.

You were never supposed to go, he wants to say. You're always meant to stay. With me.]

You were gone. [ Is what he says instead, flicking his gaze down to meet Cas', managing eye contact in the way he only really ever does with Cas, with a certain level of clarity he offers to no one else. ] Kind of my job to worry.

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Red Fish Mingle

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