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They’ve been quiet, mostly. Ever since they’d discarded the plan, ever since Eileen had left, ever since that night, it’s been silent. At least it has been for Sam. He’d barely made it out of bed the day after, and it hadn’t been until after eleven o’clock in the morning. It’s not like Dean would’ve let him go on a run and pretend everything was okay, anyway.
The drive home from the casino had been painfully tense. Eileen hadn’t been able to say a thing to him, much less look at him. As far as Dean and Cas, all they could do was send concerned, confused looks in his direction. Sam could feel them wondering why he hadn’t broken that orb and cast the spell to seal Chuck away for good, and when the time came for him to explain, he hadn’t been able to. As the feeling of his kiss with Eileen still burned on his lips, he offered them the fact that he’d believed what he’d seen and nothing else.
They’d accepted it rather quickly, to his surprise. It seemed that the three of them were done doubting each other’s decisions, Sam figured as he collapsed into his bed that night, exhausted.
Dean had asked the next morning about it and Sam did little more than ignore the question, so he didn’t ask again.
There was very little notable change, since then. He sent Eileen a text at least once a day. At first to make sure that she had found a place to sleep, and then to make sure that she was safe, and then just for the sake of talking to her. For the sake of knowing that she was still there and that one day she might come back.
There was an ache in his chest that he carried with him most of the time. An ache that refused to go away. He wonders if it will.
The only positive that came from anything that had happened that day was that the odd, uncomfortable rift between Dean and Cas seemed to have been fixed. They were back to spending more than a minute in the same room together, talking, and looking at each other. Sam had tried to ask his brother about what had happened in Purgatory, but Dean had simply bit his lip and shook his head, replying with, “Nothing I really want to talk about, Sammy.”
Sam spent most of his own time staring down at the page of a book, reading none of it, and thinking about what he had done. Or, rather, hadn’t done. That’s what he was doing now, eyes trained on the same sentence of the worn spellbook in his hands and listening to his thoughts scream in his head.
Dean had left not too long ago. Something about a food run and needing some fresh air. Cas had offered to go with him, but Dean had declined him with a few delicate words and a gentle smile. Sam knew that he’d only told Cas to stay so that at least one of them could keep an eye on him. Like he was fragile. Moments away from breaking.
He didn’t mind that assumption. If either of them had been through the same, Sam would be just as worried.
Really, though. He was fine.
He gives up on reading the book with a quiet sigh, instead opting to glance around the library from his place in his chair as if he was looking for something more interesting to occupy his time with.
Cas was sitting down at the table on the other side of the library, his eyes fixed down at a book of his own. Sam couldn’t see the title from where he was, but he could tell by the way that the angel kept tapping his fingers against the books cover that it was legitimately interesting to him. That was just one of Cas’s little habits that Sam had come to notice over the years.
Sam’s thoughts turned up the volume a bit, mulling over the little bits of the future he’d seen.
The one moment that had had Cas in it had been when Jody called about Claire. It was cruel how lovely the beginning of that scene had been. He and his three favorite people simply existing together without the weight of God’s plans on their shoulders, only for it to come crashing down with just one phone call. Chuck had pulled him away from it all before he’d been able to see what was to follow. He wondered what that would’ve done to Cas. What the angel would’ve felt about losing his other kid.
Truthfully, despite the pain that had thrummed in his chest at the loss of Claire, his resolve had remained strong. Strong enough that he continued his quest through the future.
That resolve, as desperate as it had been, stumbled when the Dean that would have been spat out the news that Cas wasn’t around.
Of course, he’d figured then that “wasn’t around” meant “dead.” Sam had almost backtracked time to figure out the how and why, but he’d been so stunned by that idea that his hand had twitched the stopwatch forward instead of back.
He’d been lucky enough to learn through the memory that followed.
As the words “the Mark” and “Ma’lak box” tumbled, distraught and angry from his brother’s mouth, Sam had just about fallen to his knees. There was only one Mark that Dean could’ve been talking about. To hear that it had come back, and this time on Cas’s arm, was an intense blow that Sam hadn’t been able to ignore.
When the time had come for him to make that choice, to smash the orb or to give in to what Chuck wanted, there was a reason that his eyes had fixed on Cas.
Yes, there was Claire. There was Donna. There were the monsters running wild. There was Eileen and there was his brother electing to give up. That pathetic end. Those had been painful blows. The dead emptiness of Dean’s eyes as he’d admitted to the pointlessness of their continued hunting had caused Sam’s heart to twist painfully and had been more than a key factor when it came to his decision to drop that orb.
But simply the idea of Cas in that box had been what forced his eyes shut as he fell to his knees and dropped the spell to the floor, unable to watch as he threw away their chance.
Sam hadn’t had much time to dwell on it then, but he did now. Now, as he watched his best friend flip through the pages of a book.
He wondered how long it took for the Mark to corrupt Cas. He wondered when the first signs of contamination had made itself known. It was disturbing in a whole new way to imagine the Mark on Cas’s arm rather than his brother. That Mark burning through the purity of his best friend and turning it into something dark and evil and beyond dangerous was hard to even picture in his head. He knew what it was like because of what had happened with Dean, but there was no telling what the fact of Cas not being human would make different.
And they wouldn’t have been able to remove it. Not without releasing Chuck.
Sam wondered how long those versions of them had scrambled to find a solution before giving in.
How far had it gone before that version of Sam and Dean had decided the box was the only option they had left? Had Cas been carving his way through those who got in his way with the angel blade and not even batting an eye? It was hard to even comprehend that. Cas, who Sam found to be one of the gentlest beings that they had ever known despite his skill in battle, killing like it was nothing.
How long had it taken to convince Dean that they didn’t have a choice? That there was nothing left to do.
Sam grimaced, his stomach lurching.
He wondered if Cas had been too far gone to understand that he was losing it. The more Sam thought about it, the more clearly he could picture Cas telling the two of them that there was no other choice and no option, that all that was left was the box. He might have even begged them to do it. Cas was just as likely to climb into that box on his own, before the Mark could truly begin to take effect.
Even if that had happened, had the evil in the Mark forced Cas to struggle and to fight against that fate?
The Dean in those scenes made it seem like Sam hadn’t been around to lock Cas away. Maybe there was something hidden among those words that Sam could make note of, but the only thing he could imagine was that he himself hadn’t been strong enough to be in the room. Sam can hardly believe that he would’ve forced Dean to do it alone, so maybe his brother had asked for that. Demanded it, more likely.
Sam closed his eyes for a moment. He could imagine Cas screaming, begging to be let out of that box. Crying out for his brother and for him with that deep voice of his. In Sam’s mind, he could hear those screams that would rip any mortal throat to shreds. He could hear the animalistic crying out, the begging.
They’d buried the box. Not thrown it into the ocean. Perhaps that was the two of them rationalizing, telling themselves that if they ever found a cure that they could just dig Cas back up. Would Cas have screamed through that process–the process of shoveling scoop after scoop of Earth onto the box–or would he have stopped and resigned himself to his fate?
Sam didn’t know which was worse.
He pictured Cas desperately scrabbling against the roof of that box until his fingers bled and were shaved down to the bone, only for them to heal so he could do it again, over and over again, until he couldn’t bring himself to anymore.
Cas had never liked small spaces. The Impala seemed to be his limit. Sam had always wondered if it was something to do with his wings, or maybe his true form already feeling confined to a body that was significantly smaller.
He can barely imagine Cas in that box. Cas, who can’t sleep and can see in the dark and would have an angry, thrumming Mark pulsating pain and pure rage up his arm in waves. Cas, who would be unable to go insane. Unable to retreat into his own mind like many in solitary confinement did.
The angel wouldn't even be able to fucking die.
And he would want to. God, what else could he want? Alone in a box with nothing but his angry thoughts and insanity. He'd want to die. Anyone would want to die.
Cas would try it, too. That's what scared Sam. Even with the Mark, Cas would try driving his angel blade into his own chest in desperation, and when it would fail, he'd try again. Again and again. When he finally came to accept that it wouldn't work, he'd just be hurting himself for the sake of hurting himself.
Cain mellowed, eventually. If that had been their plan, to wait until Cas had control over the Mark, the what was the fucking point? They'd be dead. They'd be dead and Cas would be doomed endlessly. Without the ability to go insane and retreat into his mind and with no emotions left. What was there to feel, if he overcame the anger?
If they'd thrown Dean into the ocean, which was still something Sam could barely imagine, he would've lost his mind and fell into a made up world eventually. Maybe that world's Michael would have eventually come around, gotten bored of hurting him and even helped him out, like Adam's Michael had.
Unlikely, but he could hope.
Cas… he couldn't have.
Would the angel have been able to hear their prayers? Sam knew he would have prayed. He would've prayed desperately, and he was positive that Dean would've done it, too. Drunkenly, especially. And when he heard those prayers, would he scoff, would he just get angry, or would he cry? Would he whisper desperately to try and reach them. To beg them to dig him up and let him out of that endless, terrifying prison.
He'd probably just want them to stop.
Sam wants it to stop.
He wants to stop thinking about this. He wants the idea of it burned from his mind. He wishes he'd never seen that reality and that he had never had this scenario placed in his brain. Because it hurts. It fucking hurts. It hurts so bad to think about and he can't stop thinking about it and his mind won't stop and he—
"-am?"
Sam looks up at Cas' voice, and he notes the sharp concern in the angel's eyes. The hunter realizes that he's shaking; that his fists are clenched white and his throat feels painful. He reaches up to touch his face, and he feels dampness.
He hadn't known he was crying.
"Sam?" Cas repeats, closing his book when the hunters shoulders lurch with a silent sob, "are you okay?"
Sam looks up, his mouth falling open to respond with a fake "yes" or "sorry, this is nothing," but it doesn't happen. Instead, he chokes out a pathetic cry and finds himself scrambling out of his chair and walking forward.
Cas stands, taking a step to approach Sam, but his movement and whatever words he'd been planning to say were cut off as Sam's arms embrace him, fierce and desperate.
"I'm sorry," Sam gasps out. His tears are falling freely now, stinging at his eyes and dripping down his nose. "I'm sorry."
"Sam," Cas says, wrapping his own arms around Sam's middle in comfort with matching intensity, "what do you have to be sorry for?"
"I- I don't." A sob racks his body. He can feel his grip on the smaller man become impossibly more intense. "Don't go," he chokes out. "Don't leave us. Leave me. Don't—"
"Sam, I'm not going anywhere," Cas mutters against his shoulder.
Sam shakes his head, watching one of his tears fall onto the fabric of Cas' coat. "In the– In what I saw, you weren't– We had to bury you. Lock you away. It– I can barely think about..."
Distantly, he registers the feeling of Cas rubbing circles into his back. "I'm right here. That's not going to happen. It's just a memory now, if you can call it that."
"I keep thinking about it. I can't stop thinking about it."
"Sam, look at me." Sam pulled back for a moment to look at Cas. He bets he looks like a wreck, but he doesn't care. Cas looks sincere, and his blue eyes are full of understanding and empathy that makes Sam's legs want to buckle. "I'm right here. Whatever it was that you saw, there is no longer a chance of it happening. It will never come to be, and I will do my best not to leave."
The younger Winchester takes a moment to nod, and the tears still won't stop. He knows that now he's crying about everything else, too. About the newest weight of saving the world. About losing Eileen. About his lost hope. About everything that had happened in such a short period of time.
He leans back in to keep hugging Cas, and the angel lets him. He lets Sam cry into his shoulder as he holds him.
At some point, the Bunker's front door opens and he hears Dean descending the stairs, but he doesn't look up. He's too tired.
He hears his brother's steps falter and then pick up again in concern, and he feels Cas momentarily lift his hand from his back to gesture something at Dean. The footsteps stop again, something is set down on the table, and then there's another set of arms around the two of them.
Sam lifts his left arm out of its death grip around Cas and moves it to his brother's lower back. It's a little uncomfortable, but he needs it.
Then, it's just them. The three of them hugging in the middle of their library. Arms around the other two as they seek to comfort and be comforted. Tired, drained and, though none of them would say it, terrified.
But there's no one he'd rather face this with.