Chapter Text
“You were dead, Gabe. You died. I saw-”
“You saw smoke and mirrors, Cassie.” Gabe turns his stick, charring his marshmallow evenly. “Sure you don’t want one of these?”
“Smoke…” Cas mutters. There’s smoke in his eyes now, but it’s not that that’s making them water. “Your car blew up, Gabriel. There was nothing left.”
His brother shrugs. “Yeah, but I wasn’t in it.”
“I don’t understand.”
All these years, all that grief. His brother was alive. He can’t take it in.
“Come on, Cassie. It was all falling apart. They were onto us. You know that. You disappeared, I let them blow up my car and think that I was in it. What else could we have done?”
“You could have told me, Gabe. You could have told me.”
Gabe shrugs. “Yeah, I could have. But you were safer not knowing. And I was safer not knowing where you were.”
Safer. Castiel’s fists tighten, his heart beats a hollow thump. All that grief, all that guilt; he’s carried the weight of it for years. Is he angry with his brother? Yes. No. It’s too much. Too much all at once. And he can't be angry that Gabe is alive. So he just says, “You’ve found me now.”
“I found Charlie. My fun little stunts drew in this busy little hacker like a bee to honey.”
“Hey, I was discreet,” Charlie protests.
“Yes, but I was ready for you. Anyway, Cassie, now’s the time. It’s all going down, and you’ll want to be in at the kill.”
Cas sighs. He rubs his eyes. He wants to be home with Dean. Has Charlie told Gabe about Dean? No. No, she wouldn’t do that. And anyway, if she had, Gabe would already have been teasing him about his omega.
“It’s true, Castiel,” says Charlie. “Novak Holdings have fallen through the floor. And from what Gabe says, their less public enterprises are going down too.”
“All thanks to little old me,” says Gabe, popping his fourth marshmallow into his mouth. “The pornstars shall inherit the earth,” he declares.
“Pornstars.” Cas shakes his head. His brother had rattled through a tale of building up a porn empire while working to undermine the family businesses, both legitimate and highly illegal, but Cas was still struggling with the idea that Gabe was actually alive and sitting right next to him.
“Everyone likes porn,” says Gabe. “It crosses all boundaries. Music? Art?” He shakes his head and wags a finger in Cas’s face. “They’ve got nothing on the old pornografia. Your pakhans, your capi crimini - they’re all friends with the proprietor of Casa Erotica.” He leans closer and nudges Cas with his elbow. “And if said proprietor drops a little hint that certain players have overstepped their boundaries, or are planning on muscling in on rackets already sewn up tight by established family businesses… well, what are friends for, after all?”
Gabe chuckles. Charlie joins in. Cas’s head is spinning. He lets it fall into his hands.
“Come on, Cassie, buck up. With the Russians and the Italians as well as the FBI, not to mention the IRS baying for their blood-” He shakes his head. “Those cats are going down.”
He receives a hearty slap on the back.
“Come on out into the world and enjoy the fireworks,” encourages Gabriel. “My spies tell me the big bros are fangs out and fuming. We can get popcorn and watch the takedown like it’s this year’s blockbuster. Fraud, tax evasion, human trafficking, supplying drugs.” There’s the sound of hands being eagerly rubbed together. “We can park in a good vantage point and bet on who’ll get there first. FBI, ATF. Or maybe Secret Service.”
Cas sits up. “Vantage point? You know where they are?”
“He won’t tell me,” says Charlie. “But I think South America. Colombia maybe.”
“I’m not going to Colombia,” says Cas.
“No need!” Gabe’s eyes are sparkling, his face alight with mischief. “My little birds tell me they’ve gone to ground in the only place they can get a little petty revenge. You’ve been lucky, Cassie. You don’t know how close you’ve come to those assholes finding your little hideyhole.”
Cas’s stomach instantly tenses into a hard knot. His hand shoots out and grabs his brother’s wrist, squeezing hard. “Tell me where they are. Tell me now, Gabe.”
“Hey, ow! Let go! What the fuck, Cassie?”
“Tell me where they are, Gabriel!”
Gabe pulls back hard but he can’t get away. “They’re in some luxury hideout.” He waves his free hand toward the forest. “Some overgrown cabin-in-the-woods, complete with sauna and infinity pool. They’re after some slippery little omega who managed to get away from them. Good luck to that poor bastard.” Gabe yells. “Fuck! Are you trying to break my wrist?”
Cas lets him go and scrambles to his feet. He looks at Charlie. Her face is pale.
“They can’t do anything, Castiel. They don’t know where he is.”
“Where who is?”
The words are stuck in his throat, stuck in that old familiar way when he feels too much and says nothing. The growl escapes though, low and dangerous through gritted teeth.
“Phew, Cassie.” Gabe flaps a hand in front of his nose. “So much for the fresh mountain air. What’s gotten into you?”
Dean. He needs to get home to Dean. He lifts his head and scents the air, but it’s all smoke and synthetic cherries and the bitter scent of his own fear and anger.
“Cas, he’ll be okay. He’s safe.”
He shrugs off Charlie’s comforting arm.
“He-who? Hey!” Gabe waves both arms right in front of Cas’s face, which makes the growl rise up and vibrate in his chest. “What the hell’s going on here? You know the omega? The one they’re after?”
“He’s mine,” snarls Castiel. “Dean is mine.”
“Oh, whoa, Cassie! Look at the big, bad alpha!”
If he had time, he’d punch that teasing smirk right off his brother’s face. Returned from the dead he might be. No one makes fun of Dean, and no one makes fun of Dean being in danger.
“He’ll be okay, Cas.”
Charlie’s reassurances mean nothing. He looks at her, and hopes the words in his eyes are enough. The supplies don’t matter. He has to go. Now.
She nods. “Go, Castiel.”
“What? You’re leaving? Resurrected brother, here!”
But Cas is already on the move. He pounds over the rough grass and as his feet hit the beginning of the narrow trail, his brother’s voice fades rapidly.
Dean is alone. Dean is in danger.
But Castiel is coming.
They’re in the cabin. They’re in Cas’s home, in Dean’s home. And Dean can only grit his teeth and press his fingernails into his palms, hard, and try to keep breathing, long and slow. His breath hitches and shudders with anger.
Heavy footsteps thump, something slams–maybe the lid of the chest. Then there’s a crack, a smash, a heavy thud.
They’re ruining it. They’re ruining everything.
Dean clenches his fists tighter, the pain of his nails digging into his flesh an anchor to hold him here, between the trees, when he wants to let his anger flood through him. He wants to let the red mist rise and charge across the field and- what? What would he do? Run straight into a fist, probably and be out cold in a second. And then the bastards would take what they want: his body, his life.
So he waits.
He sees movement behind the windows. There’s more smashing.
What will they do next? Burn the place to the ground? All they’d have to do is tip over the stove and even though it’s made of heavy iron, their alpha strength would make short work of the task.
It’s time to act, before they get bored. Dean takes a deep breath. He flexes each leg and each arm. Is he up to this? He’ll have to be.
He drifts forward, toward the field. The trees thin out. He stands between them, making no effort to hide. He takes another step.
The thumping and smashing from the cabin continues. In fact, it’s louder. Someone is holding the door ajar. He can barely hear the voices through the frantic beating of his heart.
“...wasting time. They’re not here…”
“...have a little fun…”
The door pushes open wider. There’s someone there, but their head is turned toward the interior of the cabin.
Run, run, run. Dean’s instincts scream. He doesn’t move.
“...around here somewhere…”
The figure turns. Michael. His eyes fasten on Dean straight away.
And Dean is running even before he hears the shout. The shouts become howls of alphas on the scent, but they’re already dropping away behind him. Dean is fast. He’s fast and agile and as strong as he’s ever been. And he’ll have to be.
They’re after him.
He runs like a deer, flitting between the trees, his feet barely making a sound. They won’t need to hear him, though. They’ll smell him.
The ground turns to rock. Dean leaps from one outcrop to another, running, jumping, each time landing surefooted and ready for the next leap. There’s no sound behind him now. They have his scent, they’re on his trail.
Cas runs. He runs as fast as he’s ever run and surprises himself with exactly how swift he can be. The forest flashes by, but it’s no effort at all. It’s like he has wings. Because Dean needs him. All he can see is Dean: Dean cornered, Dean afraid, Dean hurt. His legs move faster, his stride stretches out even further.
He comes to the lake in no time and skirts the glassy water, startling a pair of ducks who fly up from the surface with a flurry of flaps and quacks. But as he’s about to plunge back into the forest, there’s a shout from behind him.
He skids and stops and suddenly becomes aware of his throbbing heart and heaving lungs.
“Cassie! Cassie, wait!”
It’s Gabe. His brother is running along the edge of the lake, following in Cas’s footsteps.
“No! I can’t wait.”
The distance between them rapidly closes and his brother stumbles to a halt, head down and breathing in gasps.
“I have to go, Gabe.”
“I can help.”
“No, you can’t. I can’t wait for you.”
“You won’t have to.” Gabe straightens up. “You have to be in shape to make good porn, you know, Cassie. Maybe I’m not as fit as you, but I can keep up. I can help.”
Does he want help? No. No, he wants to snarl and snap and tear up any alpha who goes near Dean, including his brother. Dean is his.
He takes a breath.
“Come on, Cassie. You don’t want to be taking on those bastards on your own.”
Common sense filters through the raging alpha instincts. “Alright. But you have to keep up.”
He doesn’t wait for an answer. His breathing has already returned to normal. It’s time to fly. So Cas runs, into the trees, up the slope, not listening to see if Gabe is following.
Dean needs him. And Cas is coming.
It goes against every instinct, but Dean slows down. He’s left them behind, and he can’t have that. He needs them to follow him, to be full of alpha confidence that they’re the big, bad invincible hunters and he’s their prey.
They are big and bad. He knows that, only too well. So Dean will have to be quick and agile. He’ll have to be clever.
He skids to a halt where there’s a faint trail up to his right. It’s just one of those animal paths that welcomes you in and then peters out in a few hundred yards, but the alphas don’t know that. Dean runs up it a little way. He ran that way earlier and his scent is still there, faintly. And so are the threads of his jacket that he dragged across a thorny branch.
He spends a few precious seconds renewing his scent, and then he turns and runs back down the trail. He can hear them coming now. He pivots and sets off again on his original path, running light and swift and almost silent.
Behind him there are shouts. They’ll catch his scent going both ways. And they’ll divide, if only for a short time.
Divide and conquer, thinks Dean as he runs. Divide and conquer.