Chapter Text
Castiel breathes a sigh of relief as he steps through the front doors of the Hoover Building, escaping the stifling humidity that prevails even so early in the morning. Summers in Washington, DC are a punishment — the meteorological equivalent of having a hot, wet towel pressed against one’s face — especially when Castiel is trying hard to present a neat appearance.
He squares his shoulders inside his best suit as he steps up to the rear of the security line, shuffling his slow way to the badge scanner. Being summoned to a meeting with Assistant Director Campbell can only mean one of two things: a disciplinary issue, or an opportunity to rise up through the ranks.
Castiel has reached the front of the line now. He nods to the security guard and presents his briefcase for inspection as he slides his badge across the scanner. It gives a satisfying beep before the light turns green.
A disciplinary issue seems unlikely, Castiel reflects as he snatches up his briefcase and continues to the elevators, cramming himself into the nearest one alongside a group of half a dozen other agents. He has been keeping his head down, teaching Academy trainees the basics of anatomy and medical analysis, while otherwise minding his own business.
It must be an opportunity then. A chance to prove himself — both for his own sake, and to show his parents that he made the right choice in joining the bureau.
The elevator dings to a halt on the fifth floor, and Castiel lets the bodies of the other agents carry him out of the crowded cabin. He crosses through the bullpen on his way to the senior staff's private offices, nodding greetings at familiar faces. Some return the nod, but most are distracted by conversations or by the nearly incessant ringing of their phones.
He reaches the door to Assistant Director Campbell’s office at thirty seconds to nine, according to his wristwatch. He waits, fist raised, for the second hand to tick out the rest of the minute.
When the watch shows nine a.m. exactly, he knocks on the door. At a slightly muffled “come in,” he steps into the room.
Assistant Director Campbell’s office is the sort of unremarkable, impersonal space that most leaders in the bureau cultivate — as if there is something indecent about showing even a shred of personality in the workplace. The walls are an anonymous grayish-brown, the only decorations being an American flag on a stand in the corner and a framed portrait of the President on the left-hand wall.
Campbell himself is seated behind his desk, hands steepled as he studies Castiel out of shrewd, dark eyes. “Good morning, Agent Novak. Please take a seat.”
“Good morning,” Castiel returns, and does as he’s been asked.
Once he’s settled opposite Campbell, his eyes flit to the third man who is in the room with them. He wears an anonymous gray suit that makes him look like every other unremarkable bureaucrat in the city, but there is something about his sunken face and large, hungry eyes that makes him… unsettling. Strangely, considering the recent anti-smoking campaign at the bureau (to which Castiel lost a regrettable three hours of his life), he's holding a lit cigarette. Watching Castiel out of impassive eyes, he takes a drag, his cheeks hollowing with it. His irises catch the light of the cherry, reflecting a strange, sulphurous shade of fire.
Who are you? The question hovers on the tip of Castiel’s tongue. It’s odd that the man hasn’t introduced himself, or been introduced.
“You’ve been with us for two years now, Agent Novak, is that correct?”
Castiel tears his attention away from the smoking stranger and returns it to Campbell. “Yes, that’s correct.”
“You have a medical degree, but chose not to practice.”
It isn’t a question, and Castiel doesn’t treat it as such. “I was recruited out of med school. The bureau seemed like the right choice for me.”
He doesn’t add that his parents disagree — in part because it isn’t relevant to the current conversation, and in part because he’d rather not reveal details about his personal life, only to find out that they’re already known to Campbell. He enjoys his work, but not necessarily the level of invasive concern displayed by the FBI for its employees’ business.
“Are you aware of Agent Dean Winchester?”
Castiel blinks, thrown by the sudden change of subject. A sideways glance informs him that the smoking man in the corner has gone still, reminding Castiel uncomfortably of a snake about to strike.
It seems unwise to look away from the man, but Castiel forces himself to do so anyway, meeting Campbell’s eyes with what he hopes is a certain degree of equanimity.
“He’s a Stanford-educated psychologist,” he says. “Highly accomplished at profiling serial killers, and an expert in occult beliefs.” Castiel hesitates, but in response to an encouraging nod from Campbell, he continues. “We had a nickname for him at the Academy. Spooky Winchester.”
The corners of Campbell’s lips curl upward, but it would be charitable to the point of foolishness to call his sharp-toothed expression a smile. “Yes, my grandson has certainly acquired a reputation for himself. Even if it may not be the one either myself or my daughter had in mind for him when he followed us into the bureau.”
Castiel freezes, mortified. He was aware that Agent Winchester was the son of Agent Mary Winchester, killed in the line of duty many years ago but still widely admired. He wasn’t aware that there was a family connection with Assistant Director Campbell as well. Why on earth did he think it would be appropriate to mention Agent Winchester’s nickname in the presence of a superior? His people skills must be rustier than he thought.
“My—” Apologies, he means to add, but Campbell cuts him off.
“And you’re no doubt aware of the division of the bureau generally known as the X-Files, which my grandson currently oversees.”
Castiel flicks another look at the smoking man in the corner, half expecting to meet unsettlingly cold eyes already trained on him. But the man has turned his back to Castiel, busy stubbing out his cigarette in an ashtray atop a file cabinet.
“Yes,” Castiel agrees. “I believe the X-Files deal with unexplained phenomena.”
Campbell makes no answer to Castiel’s statement. Instead, he says, “We're asking you to join the X-Files, Agent Novak. You will observe closely during each case and write up detailed case reports as to the validity of the findings made.”
We, Castiel notes. His eyes find the man in the corner again. This time, he finds them looking back, pale and cold as a pond in winter. Castiel suppresses a shiver. Some instinct whose source he can’t quite identify tells him the existence of the X-Files is a thorn in this man’s flesh.
“You’re asking me to… debunk the X-Files?” he asks, following that instinct to its logical conclusion.
For the first time, something akin to true amusement creeps into Assistant Director Campbell’s expression. “We’re asking you to work with Agent Winchester and report back with an objective, analytical mind. Can you do that, Agent Novak?”
Castiel takes a breath, and then he nods. After all, this is an opportunity of a kind. And, as he works to ignore the cool scrutiny of the man in the corner, he reflects that refusing it is unlikely to serve him well.
***
If Castiel began his day thinking that he was being kicked upstairs, he was mistaken — in quite a literal sense.
The X-Files division is in the basement of the Hoover Building, down a long, dark hallway and past nearly endless filing cabinets containing dusty banker’s boxes. The door, when Castiel finally locates it, is utterly bare, only a small numbered sign beside it identifying it as the office Castiel has been sent to find.
He knocks.
“Sorry,” a distracted voice comes from inside. “Nobody here but the FBI’s most unwanted.”
A small huff of laughter escapes from Castiel’s nose, surprising him. He composes his features into something far more professional and impassive before he steps through the door.
The office is dim, barely illuminated by the flicker of unforgiving fluorescents, and crammed with a labyrinthine mess of shelves and boxes. Its walls are about as far from the anonymous sameness of Campbell’s office as it’s possible to get. Its largest feature is a poster that depicts a UFO, hovering above a wooded landscape and the words I WANT TO BELIEVE, in lurid all-capitals. Other UFO-related clippings have been pinned upon the wall beside it, along with assorted photographs that show bones, injuries and what appear to be animal trails left behind in softened soil.
Agent Winchester is hunched over a laptop at the office’s single occupied desk, back to the door, but when Castiel closes the door, he spins around in his swivel chair. Castiel is suddenly extremely conscious that, for all Agent Winchester’s reputation precedes him, this is their first time meeting face to face.
Quite frankly, Agent Winchester is one of the most stunning men Castiel has ever seen. There is a lovely, almost feminine softness to his lips and eyes, yet his sharp jaw and broad shoulders make him undeniably masculine. Adding to the intriguing contrast is a wry smile that Castiel is unsettlingly eager to trace with his fingertips.
Irritated by his unprofessional response, Castiel stretches out a hand to introduce himself. “Castiel Novak,” he says. “I’ve been assigned to work with you.”
Agent Winchester rises to his feet, and Castiel adds a slightly bow-legged gait to the attributes that are strangely appealing about his new partner.
“I kinda got the impression that you were assigned to spy on me,” Agent Winchester says, grasping Castiel’s hand. Up so close, Castiel discovers a new item of interest: boyish freckles, dotted all across Agent Winchester’s face. “Who did you tick off to get stuck with this detail, Novak?”
The words are harsh, but Agent Winchester is still smiling at him, keeping their hands connected in a warm, dry touch. If Castiel didn’t know better, he’d think he was being flirted with.
“Actually,” he says, withdrawing his hand for the sake of his own sanity, “I’m looking forward to working with you. If you have any doubts about my credentials or qualifications—”
“You’re a medical doctor,” Agent Winchester says, finally breaking eye contact. Castiel takes a deep breath as Agent Winchester turns away to root through a pile of papers on his desk. “You teach at the Academy. You did your undergraduate degree in physics.”
Castiel almost gasps audibly as Agent Winchester withdraws from the pile a bound copy of an academic paper that Castiel is intimately familiar with. “Einstein’s Twin Paradox: A New Interpretation. Your senior thesis. Takes a lot of balls to argue with Einstein, Agent Novak.”
“Did you bother to read it?” Castiel asks, concealing his surprise behind an imperiously raised eyebrow.
“I did,” Agent Winchester says, sounding almost cheerful about it as he saunters past Castiel and across the room, pulling at a projection screen mounted on the ceiling. It unfurls with a whirring sound of protest. “I liked it. It’s just that in most of my work, the laws of physics pretty much go right out the window.”
Castiel makes no response to this, watching with crossed arms as Agent Winchester strides back across the office to grab a remote control off a dusty shelf. The scientific method dictates that Castiel observe impartially before he makes his judgment — no matter how much he wants to judge a man who has chosen to question the laws of physics within two minutes of making Castiel’s acquaintance.
“Maybe I can get your medical opinion on this,” Agent Winchester says. He walks past Castiel, close enough that there is a whiff of aftershave in the air, its scent just as undeniably yet subtly masculine as Agent Winchester is himself. Castiel crosses his arms tighter, feeling suddenly tense.
His tension doesn’t diminish when Agent Winchester flicks off the lights in the room. With the press of a button on the remote, an image appears on the projection screen.
The image is of a dead body. A young male, perhaps late twenties or early thirties. Castiel wouldn’t want to commit himself as to the exact time of death without a more thorough examination, but he can already tell that Agent Winchester is unlikely to ask his opinion on that.
No, it’s far more likely that Agent Winchester would like him to weigh in on the large chunks of flesh missing from the victim’s shoulder and torso.
“Colorado male, age twenty-nine,” Agent Winchester says, raising his voice into what Castiel recognizes from long experience as a lecturing tone. “Found dead in Lost Creek National Forest in July of 1985 — almost exactly twenty-three years ago.”
Another click of the button and the image changes to a close-up of one of the wounds on the victim’s torso.
“What do you think, Agent Novak? Can you ID what might have caused this wound?”
Castiel steps a little closer to the screen, studying the jagged edges of broken flesh. Considering their appearance, as well as the depth of the wound, only one reasonable conclusion can be drawn. “It looks like an animal bite,” he says. “The animal would have been rather large. To me, the size of the bite suggests a bigonial diameter of at least four inches.”
Agent Winchester saunters closer to the screen as well, studying the image alongside Castiel. Castiel takes a step to the side to preserve some distance between them. “So you’re saying it was a bear?”
“Not necessarily,” Castiel answers archly. He dislikes being rushed to conclusions. “But I suppose,” he concedes, “it seems the most reasonable option. The significant jaw diameter doesn’t match anything else off the top of my head; not even a mountain lion.”
“Right.” Agent Winchester bobs his head, eyes still fixed on the gruesome image. Castiel can’t tell by his expression whether he’s pleased or not by Castiel’s analysis so far, or even has any feelings about it whatsoever. “Well, the medical examiner at the time agreed with you. He put the cause of death down as a bear attack.”
“You disagree,” Castiel says. He doesn’t make it a question, because to do so would be an insult to both their intelligence. After all, why else would Agent Winchester show him these images?
“Sure do.” There is a definitely approving gleam in Agent Winchester’s eyes this time. “Want me to tell you why?”
The question is delivered with almost boyish enthusiasm, and Castiel has to admit to a certain amount of curiosity. “Go ahead then.”
Agent Winchester sets down the remote, the better to count off on his fingers. “Well, for one, seven other hikers disappeared in Lost Creek National Forest that year.” Castiel opens his mouth to raise an objection, but Agent Winchester silences him with an upraised hand. “I know what you’re about to say: people disappear in the forest all the time. But eight hikers within three months is well above the average for the area. And two, the same thing happened in 1962: eight hikers, vanishing over a period of three months. None of them were ever found. Again, same thing in 1939. Every twenty-three years, like clockwork.”
Agent Winchester grabs a clipboard off the top of a nearby shelf and hands it to Castiel. A glance reveals the clipboard to contain records of disappearances at Lost Creek, dating back through the years and marked up in neat all-caps lettering, no doubt by Agent Winchester.
Castiel just barely suppresses the instinct to roll his eyes. He should have been expecting something like this, based on Agent Winchester’s reputation among both his colleagues and superiors. “The human mind is trained to look for patterns, Agent Winchester. That doesn’t mean a pattern actually exists. There could be random spikes in disappearances due to weather conditions or reckless behavior on the part of a group of hikers.”
A small, lopsided smile appears on Agent Winchester’s face. He pushes another button on the remote, and the image of the body disappears, plunging the room into nearly complete darkness. The only illumination now are a few grayish, milky rays of sunlight that struggle to penetrate through narrow, dusty basement windows. Agent Winchester tugs on the screen until it rolls up.
“You’ve been drinking the Kool-aid, Agent Novak,” he says, more quietly than seems appropriate for a professional setting, especially when the room already feels dark and intimate around them. “What have people been telling you about me, huh?”
Castiel swallows harshly. He’s suddenly conscious of the fact that he hasn’t had anything to drink since his one and only cup of coffee over breakfast. “They feel your theories, your methods, are…”
Agent Winchester leans against the nearest wall, putting himself in Castiel’s space. Another whiff of aftershave rises up to meet him, along with a warm, pleasant smell that is not so easily categorized. “Spooky?” he asks, his smile taking on a wry note. “Do you think I’m spooky, Agent Novak?”
For several long moments, Castiel stands unforgivably frozen, clutching the clipboard like a shield between them. Finally, he finds the mental wherewithal to take a step back and clear his throat. “I think,” he says, grateful to discover that his voice doesn’t shake, “you have a tendency to jump to conclusions, Agent Winchester.”
Agent Winchester laughs — a small thing, barely amused. “Well, you’re about to see for yourself. Because guess what?” He taps the clipboard Castiel is still holding in a white-knuckled grip. “It’s happening again, so we’re going to Colorado.”
“When?” Castiel asks, trying and failing not to follow Agent Winchester with his eyes as he walks across the room to flick the lights back on. The sudden, glaring brightness makes Castiel squint.
“This afternoon,” Agent Winchester tells him, perfectly cheerful again. “So I guess you better work on booking a flight. Oh, and call me Dean. If you’re gonna be all up in my business, we might as well be on friendly terms.”
Castiel makes no immediate response to this, torn between the need to maintain a professional distance from a work colleague who is so infuriatingly attractive, and the competing desire to break down at least some of the defenses that said colleague has clearly built up around himself. For the sake of a productive working relationship, of course.
“You may call me Castiel,” he says, at long last.
“Awesome.”
Flashing a grin, Dean returns to his desk and busies himself with something on his laptop. Castiel stands where he is, feeling as though he’s just lost a chess match he didn’t even know he was playing.
***
Castiel spends the next few hours cleaning off a dusty desk in the opposite corner of the small basement office from Dean’s. He sets up his work laptop and uses the intranet platform for booking bureau travel to secure himself a seat on a flight to Denver.
After that, there is barely enough time to inform Assistant Director Campbell of his impending trip and to hurry home to pack some essentials.
The flight, at least, goes smoothly. Castiel manages an hour or so of fitful sleep. Otherwise, he watches the clouds pass by outside and considers what he knows so far of Dean, and of the case they’re going to Colorado to pursue.
Animal attacks remain the most likely explanation, but years of scientific study have taught him to analyze every facet of a problem and keep his mind open to all possibilities. If there truly is a pattern to the disappearances, as Dean suggested, it would indicate human involvement. Unlike Dean, Castiel is no expert in the psychological profiles of serial killers, but it doesn’t seem unreasonable that their minds would be drawn to the satisfying symmetry of creating a pattern like this.
Then again, if the disappearances go all the way back to 1939, any killer involved in them would have to be quite old by now — in their eighties, at a minimum. Unless, of course, the killings constitute some warped, violent version of a family business. Yes, if the original killer passed the baton to their child, it might go some way toward explaining the longevity of the pattern.
Castiel turns this explanation over and over in his mind, but remains unsatisfied with it. He only puts it aside when the plane begins its descent into Denver.
***
Dean is a nervous flyer, judging by the pale tint of his face when Castiel meets up with him at the baggage claim. But by the time they’ve picked up their rental car and embarked on the remainder of their trip to Lost Creek, Dean — who insists on driving — seems perfectly at ease again.
“You know,” he says, as he steers their unremarkable Toyota sedan onto the Interstate ramp, “if I had my way, I’d drive to every case. It’s a shame the bureau won’t allow that. Apparently, it’s a waste of time. Well, I say a good road trip is never a waste of time.” With a wrinkle of his nose that Castiel refuses to find endearing, he adds, “Though I gotta tell you, I wish we had something better for it than this plastic piece of crap.”
“Let me guess,” Castiel says. “Whatever car you drive at home is infinitely superior.” And a monument to performative masculinity, he suspects, based on previous experience with every other man who has strong opinions about cars. Still, he doesn’t say that part. His people skills may be rusty, but not so rusty that he would insult a person he’s professionally obligated to get along with.
“You’re damn right,” Dean agrees, pointing sideways at Castiel’s face as though to emphasize his point. “She’s a 1967 Chevy Impala. Finest Detroit steel. Purrs like a kitten.”
“She,” Castiel repeats. “You anthropomorphize your car?”
“All cars are ladies, Cas,” Dean says, in the tone of someone enlightening a person who is sadly deficient in essential knowledge. “And if you give them the proper respect, they’ll perform better for you.”
Cas. The nickname, thrown so casually into the space between them, echoes strangely somewhere at Castiel’s core. He is not the sort of person people usually give nicknames. In fact, he hasn’t been “Cas” to anyone since he was in school.
He dismisses that line of thought as unproductive and focuses instead on a flaw in Dean’s reasoning. “You just insulted this car. ‘Plastic piece of crap’ was the phrase, I believe.”
Dean’s head swivels to him for just a moment, surprise written all over his face before he returns his attention to the windscreen. And then he bursts out laughing. It’s a bright, infectious sound, and Castiel surprises himself by smiling.
“Damn, Cas,” Dean says, once he’s caught his breath. “I guess you’re gonna keep me on my toes, huh?”
Castiel suspects this is a rhetorical question, so he doesn’t answer. But, as he watches the mountainous landscape of Colorado flash by outside the passenger window, he finds himself rather pleased at the notion.
***
“I assure you, we looked for those hikers. If they were anyplace remotely plausible, we would’ve found them.”
Ranger Wilkins, senior ranger in charge of the station at the Blackwater Ridge entrance to Lost Creek National Forest, punctuates his statement with a challenging glare at Dean. In a way, Castiel can’t blame him. They’ve been in Ranger Wilkins’ office for all of three minutes, and Dean has all but outright accused the ranger and his staff of gross incompetence.
“Well, I guess we’ll see about that,” Dean says, infuriatingly smug. Castiel seriously considers the possibility that he’ll have to stop Ranger Wilkins from throwing a punch before this interview is over. “My colleague Agent Novak and I plan to head out first thing tomorrow and take a look around the area ourselves.”
“Uh-huh,” Ranger Wilkins drawls, looking dubiously back and forth between them. As is protocol for interviews, they’re both wearing suits and ties. “Are either of you experienced hikers? Got the proper hiking gear and everything? Satellite phone? Enough supplies to keep you fed and watered if you get lost?”
“Yeah, we got supplies,” Dean says. To Castiel’s utter mortification, he reaches into his jacket pocket and withdraws a packet of M&Ms. “See?”
A rather impressive vein pops into existence at the center of Ranger Wilkins’ forehead. His hands curl into fists on top of his desk. Dean pops an M&M into his mouth, apparently completely at peace. Castiel braces himself to break up an incipient fight.
“File your route with somebody in the office out front,” Ranger Wilkins grits out. “Or don’t. I don’t give a rat’s ass. Just get the hell out of my office.”
“Yes, sir,” Dean agrees cheerfully, stowing his M&Ms and throwing a sloppy salute as he rises from his chair.
Castiel aims an apologetic grimace at the ranger before he follows Dean out of the office, but all he gets in return is another glare.
***
After their meeting with Ranger Wilkins, they return to the motel where they’ve booked a double for the next three nights.
They order pizza to the room, and Castiel watches as Dean spreads out a motley assortment of items at the foot of his bed. Despite his earlier flippant attitude, he’s surprisingly well-prepared: water purification tablets, meal replacement bars, a satellite phone and even an insulated emergency blanket are just a few of the items Castiel recognizes.
“What?” Dean asks, waspish, when he catches Castiel looking through his small arsenal. “It ain’t my first time doing a wilderness hike.”
Castiel adds this to the short but growing list of things he's learned about Dean. “It is mine,” he admits. “My mother’s military career kept us moving from base to base for most of my life. I didn’t have much occasion to go hiking.”
“Naomi Novak,” Dean says, adding a pack of lighters and a spray bottle of deodorant to the bed. “First woman to rise to the rank of four-star general.”
Castiel inclines his head to acknowledge this. “You have done your research.”
He doesn’t say that he’s spent most of his life trying to step out of his mother’s formidable shadow, while also doing his best to avoid being crushed by the weight of his father’s expectations. Dad had been thrilled when Castiel had announced his intention to follow him into the medical profession. Even his mother had declared it a worthy career goal.
“My parents don’t approve of my decision to join the bureau.” He doesn’t know what makes him say it. Perhaps the fact that Dean is half-distracted and likely not even listening, rummaging through his suitcase for whatever other treasures he keeps in there.
Dean straightens up, clutching a small first aid kit. “Why the hell not?”
It’s a question with an easy answer, though not necessarily a good one. Castiel sighs, taking a step away from Dean’s bed to drop onto his own. “My father wanted me to practice medicine, like him. My mother would have preferred to see me pursue a career in the Army, but she was content with a medical degree. They feel that working at the Academy is a ‘waste of my intellect.’”
He raises his fingers to frame the words in air quotes — a habit so long ingrained that he’s barely conscious of it anymore. Dean, however, has noticed. His lips twitch for the briefest of moments before he asks, “D’you enjoy the work you’re doing?”
“Yes,” Castiel answers without hesitation. “I enjoy teaching, but I like being in the field too. I never know what each day is going to bring.”
Dean nods, satisfied. He drops onto his bed in turn, apparently done producing items for their survival kit. “Then it’s not a waste.”
The words are spoken with a quiet sincerity that Castiel didn’t realize Dean was capable of. Discovering it now feels like reading a wonderful book and finding out you had more pages left than you thought. It also feels like a chip in the careful armor of professionalism Castiel has spent years cultivating.
In an attempt to get them back onto a safer conversational track, he asks, “Do you enjoy the work?”
Unlike Castiel, Dean hesitates a moment over his answer, rubbing one of his thumbs over the other as if lost in thought. “I do,” he concedes eventually. “‘Cause I believe in finding truth and giving people answers. I don’t know what I’d do with myself if I didn’t have that."
“Must be nice," Castiel says. "To do something you enjoy while still following the family tradition." He means it as a simple statement of fact, so there’s no reason why it should sound so much like a challenge.
“Yeah, well," Dean answers, his voice dull. "I still turned out to be a disappointment.”
Bitterness lurks in the wry curve of Dean’s smile, and Castiel’s desire for professionalism wars with a sudden urge to brighten Dean up with a bit of comfort; whatever form that comfort may take.
He’s almost pathetically grateful when a knock sounds at the door, announcing their pizza delivery.
***
They set off for the Blackwater Ridge entrance to the forest the following morning, and Dean isn’t best pleased with Castiel’s choice of footwear.
“Sneakers, Cas? Really? And dorky sneakers, which is worse.”
“I don’t see what’s wrong with them,” Castiel says, unaccountably stung at the accusation of dorkiness. He glances down at his white Nike Balance shoes, which strike him as perfectly reasonable, commonly worn shoes. “They provide good arch support.”
Dean, who is loading his backpack into the trunk of their rental and wearing an admittedly sturdy-looking pair of boots, scoffs. “Yeah, okay, old man. Don’t complain if I say I told you so when you break your ankle in the woods.”
“Just for that,” Castiel says, snatching the car keys from Dean’s grip with a viper-fast motion, “I’m going to drive today.”
Dean gapes at him, the picture of outrage at Castiel’s unexpected betrayal. “You little shit,” he says, sounding almost impressed.
Castiel fights the urge to smirk at him. “Get in the car, Dean.”
***
For all his boorish behavior the previous day, Dean does file their proposed route with the ranger office before they set off into the forest.
The two of them spent hours plotting it out the previous night, heads bent close together over maps and case records. Three hikers have disappeared in the past two weeks. None of their planned routes were exactly the same, but all of them passed by a stream approximately six miles to the northeast of the Blackwater Ridge entrance. As a result, that is where Dean and Castiel’s own route will be leading them.
Though Castiel's pride would never let him admit it, the hike is difficult and exhausting. There are no paths in this area of the forest, and he’s forced to keep a constant lookout for roots and debris that could trip him up. Also, despite the fact that they set off early and they’re somewhat protected by the thick tree canopy, the day promises to be hot. Soon, sweat begins to pearl on Castiel’s neck, trickling down to gather at the small of his back.
At least in this respect, he’s better off than Dean, who informed Castiel this morning that he doesn’t “do shorts” and donned a sturdy pair of jeans for their hike instead. Now, he looks distinctly flushed. Castiel would make fun of him for it, except every time he catches a glimpse of Dean’s pink cheeks, he can’t help imagining a different scenario in which he could make the color rise in Dean’s face. And so, for his own sanity, he leaves the subject of Dean’s flush alone.
Dean doesn’t give him any such grace. About two miles into their hike, Castiel stumbles, his ankle twisting precariously for a heart-pounding moment before it rights itself.
“Told you so,” Dean says, rolling his eyes up at the dense tree canopy.
“I’m fine,” Castiel says, between gritted teeth — partly because he’s annoyed and partly because he doesn’t want Dean to know how out of breath he is. “I’m just not used to hiking, that’s all.”
“Heads up.”
Castiel looks up just in time to see a pack of M&Ms sail towards him. He almost fumbles it, but somehow manages to clutch it in his palm instead. “What’s this for?” he asks.
Dean gives him a sharp grin that Castiel wants to knock off his face, even as he can’t seem to look away from it. “Gotta keep up your strength, old man.”
With an incoherent sound of frustration, Castiel tucks the M&Ms into the pocket of his shorts and keeps walking.
***
They reach the stream just after noon. The heat has become stifling by now, making Castiel’s shirt stick to him like a second skin. That, however, is no longer his chief concern at the moment.
He’s not entirely sure when it happened. All through their hike, he became accustomed to a constant panoply of background noise: birdsong, the buzzing of insects, the rustling of undergrowth as deer and squirrels moved through it all around them.
Here, at the edge of the stream, there is no sound at all. Even the water doesn’t seem to make much noise as it flows over its bed of rocks and silt. It’s as if someone has spread a blanket over the forest.
“Weird, isn’t it?” Dean says. He keeps his voice hushed, as though he’s trying not to draw attention to their presence in this place. “What’s your theory on the sudden lack of wildlife, Doc?”
“Maybe a predator left a scent mark nearby,” Castiel says, though in truth, he knows very little about the behavior of animals in the wild. It’s simply the only reasonable explanation he can think of. “And as a result, the other animals avoid this spot.”
“I definitely think something marked its territory here.”
Castiel looks up from the stream, surprised to find Dean agreeing with him. Dean is standing next to a tree, tracing a series of claw marks along the bark.
“Interesting that these are at the right height for a human hand, don’t you think?” Dean asks.
Well. So much for seeing eye to eye. “You can’t possibly be suggesting these marks were left by a human.”
Dean doesn’t answer right away. His eyes are still fixed on the claw marks, carved deep into the tree bark. Castiel wouldn’t be surprised to know that the tree will carry these marks for the rest of its existence.
“How familiar are you with Algonquian myth?” Dean asks.
“Not very,” Castiel answers, a sinking feeling in his stomach. He’s become so accustomed to Dean’s company over the past two days that he let himself forget the unspoken reason why he’s been assigned to be his partner in the first place: documenting the strange theories Dean spins in working the X-Files and testing their validity.
“That’s where the idea originates, but there’s a lot of different versions floating around. Some say that they’re evil spirits. But another idea is that they’re just people whose mind and body were corrupted after they tasted human flesh.”
A shiver runs down Castiel’s spine. The forest is very, very quiet around them, as though the world itself is holding its breath.
Castiel papers over his unease with irritation. “What are you talking about, Dean?”
“A wendigo, Cas. I’m talking about a wendigo.”
Castiel’s irritation is growing more genuine by the moment. “You’re seriously proposing a creature from Native American myth took the missing hikers?”
Dean shrugs, annoyingly unaffected by Castiel’s question. “It fits with the regular pattern of disappearances and with the bite marks. Haven’t you ever read Sherlock Holmes, Cas? ‘When you’ve eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.’”
Castiel casts his eyes up to the tree canopy, begging for the strength not to lose his temper. “I’m fairly inclined to include your ‘cannibalistic monster’ theory in the impossible category, Dean. You might as well tell me the witch from Hansel and Gretel took these people. Mythical stories may have cultural significance, but they’re still just stories.”
Leaning sideways against the tree, arms crossed, Dean studies Castiel. “Well, that’s where you’re wrong.”
“You know what? I give up.” Castiel stalks away from the tree, towards a different part of the clearing that surrounds the stream. “I’m going to look for any traces of what actually happened to these hikers, and you should be doing the same.”
“Don’t go too far,” Dean calls after him.
Castiel doesn’t bother to respond.
***
At first, Castiel doesn’t find much. His mind is too distracted, too preoccupied with being irritated at Dean. How can a man with such an obviously brilliant mind be so committed to crackpot theories? It’s insufferable.
Worse, Castiel should be able to shrug it off. This isn’t the first time he’s worked with colleagues who disagreed with his point of view. He’s always been able to be professional about such disagreements, and he’s never taken them to heart. For some reason, Dean is different, and that irritates Castiel most of all.
Still, he finally calms down enough to study the area around the stream with a reasonably attentive eye. The undergrowth is dense here, and Castiel isn’t an expert in reading tracks by any means. But after twenty minutes or so, he finds an area not far from the stream where a trail of destruction is visible near ground level. Plants have been flattened or torn out, branches cracked, along a nearly straight line that leads away from the stream and further into the forest. Something heavy has been dragged this way.
As Castiel crouches down to examine the damage more closely, he finds something else: a splatter of dark red, sprayed onto the leaves of a bush just to his right.
He straightens up, meaning to call Dean. In doing so, he notices that he’s no longer within view of the clearing. He must have followed the trail further into the woods than he realized.
Before he can ascertain Dean’s location, Dean’s own voice rings out.
“Cas?”
“Dean, I’m over here!” Castiel responds.
“Cas!” Dean’s voice sounds no closer than before. It also doesn’t seem to originate from the direction where Castiel is fairly certain the clearing should be. In fact, it seems to be coming from the opposite direction, where the forest grows deeper.
“Dean?” Castiel calls again. He listens for the reply. It should be easy to make out, because the woods remain quiet, almost eerily so.
Castiel pushes that superstitious thought aside. There is nothing eerie about the woods. The only danger here is the wild animal that attacked the missing hikers, and Castiel is fairly confident that an animal that size will make a lot of noise while approaching him.
“Cas!” A little closer this time, but definitely from the opposite direction of the clearing. Like Castiel, Dean must have wandered further in while following a trail. “Cas, come here!”
Castiel mutters a deprecatory remark under his breath. He isn’t normally given to swearing, but Dean seems to bring it out in him. Why can’t Dean come and find him? It’s infuriating.
And yet, Castiel stalks off in the direction of the voice. He’s still hot and exhausted from the hike, not to mention irritated, and he’ll rather enjoy having a reason to vent his frustrations at Dean.
He walks for about thirty seconds until he stops again, looking around. There is no sign of Dean here — just the endless, silent green of the forest. The growth is so thick in this part of the woods that the sun barely penetrates through the canopy. Whatever light reaches Castiel feels closer to dusk than mid-day.
“Dean!” he calls, at the top of his lungs.
He’s not afraid. He’s not. He’d just like to know where Dean has wandered off to, that’s all.
In the corner of his eye, something moves. It’s fast, impossibly so, and as silent as the forest around him. Castiel spins to keep it in view, but it’s already gone.
“Cas!” Dean’s voice again, but nowhere close to Castiel. It’s coming from the opposite direction. From the clearing. “Castiel! I told you not to wander off, goddammit!”
Castiel opens his mouth to respond. Before he can, something collides with the side of his head. He goes down, as silent as the forest all around him.
***
Castiel’s head is pounding. His body is moving, but he has no say in the matter. Something has his legs and is dragging him along the ground. He swallows a whimper as his back collides with something hard and jagged.
Cautiously, he squints his eyes open. Even then it’s too much, too bright, a feeling like needles stabbed through his skull. He hurriedly closes his eyes again. Seared into the backs of his lids is an after-impression of green trees and a large, shadowy shape. It walks upright, a small head on a long neck that sits above a pair of broad shoulders. A human bone structure.
Once more, his body hits an obstacle that scrapes painfully against his side. As it does, there is a sound Castiel struggles to place. A crackle. His dazed mind clings to that sound, knowing somehow that it’s important. Something that can help.
The process of sorting through his memories is slow and shaky. He was looking for clues. Trails in the forest that could point to the hikers’ location. He was speaking to Dean about myths. Fairy tales. Hansel and Gretel. Dean was being infuriating. Dean threw him a package of M&Ms.
The crackle. Right. An idea takes shape in Castiel’s mind: colorful little breadcrumbs making trails in the forest; leading Dean to wherever he’s being taken.
One-handed, his eyes still screwed shut, Castiel feels for the package of candy in his pocket. When he locates it, he pulls it free as surreptitiously as he can. He tears a small hole in the packaging and does something he hasn’t felt inclined to do in years: he prays.
***
Everything hurts. That’s the first thing Castiel becomes truly conscious of, the next time he wakes. He has been drifting for an unknown amount of time, afloat on a sea of dizziness and pain. The worst pain is in his head and in his arms, which burn as though someone is holding them far too close to fire. Castiel tries to squirm away from the fire, but the movement only aggravates the pain.
Slowly, he realizes that there is no fire. No, his arms are burning because they're fixed in place somehow, above his head.
Just as he contemplates opening his eyes to get a better idea of his situation, the world erupts in flames after all. Light and heat explode all around him, far too close for comfort. A horrible, inhuman shriek of pain rings in his ears.
Castiel forces his eyes open. He struggles to comprehend the sight in front of him: a giant fireball has engulfed a tall, thin shape. It writhes and struggles, staggering in its dying throes. Staggering closer to Castiel.
Bang.
A shot rings out. It knocks the burning shape backwards, away from Castiel, and now Castiel sees that Dean is there, his gun raised and pointed straight at the receding figure. A discarded lighter and spray bottle are on the ground beside him. He looks ready to shoot again at a second’s notice.
It turns out to be unnecessary. The shape collapses, its screams growing quieter until they cease altogether. The fire continues to crackle, consuming whatever is left and illuminating the space where Castiel finds himself.
It’s dark and cavernous, likely somewhere underground, though the wooden braces along the walls suggest that the space is man-made. A mine, perhaps. Underneath the scent of burning meat, there are other smells that Castiel associates with death and decay.
He fights a sudden urge to be sick.
“Cas.” Dean rushes over to him. Castiel struggles to focus properly on his face, but even so, he can see the concern written there. “Hey. Hey, let’s get you down, alright?”
Dean pulls a knife from somewhere and stretches up, up, past Castiel’s head.
Oh. Now that Castiel has leisure to examine the position of his body relative to everything else, he realizes that he has not only been trussed up like a piece of meat, but the tips of his sneakers are barely making contact with the floor. He's dangling from some sort of rudimentary hook that has been driven into the rock.
All of a sudden, the idea of spending even another second in this position is insupportable. Castiel’s breath is coming too short, his chest squeezing as though his own lungs mean to strangle him. He can’t breathe, he can’t—
The hold on his wrists slackens. He drops onto his feet, which refuse to support his weight. But he doesn’t fall.
Dean’s warm, strong arms have wrapped around his torso, supporting him. “Hey,” he says quietly, gently. “Hey, you’re alright. Breathe with me, Cas.”
Castiel takes a shaky breath, then another, trying to match the slow, even rhythm Dean is setting for him. Dean has lowered them both down onto the ground, Castiel all but sitting in Dean’s lap as he struggles to inflate his lungs. They’re sitting in something wet and tacky that is seeping into Castiel’s hiking shorts, but he prefers not to focus on that. Not just yet.
At last, Castiel’s breathing begins to even out. He almost regrets being able to inhale fully again, because now that the fire is burning lower and lower, the stench of decay reasserts its dominance over it. Castiel’s eyes scan the gloomy space around them. He can’t suppress a gasp when he sees three others trussed up just like him, dangling lifelessly on ropes suspended from more hooks on the ceiling. Their skin appears grayish-pale and their eyes gape sightlessly. Any hope that they may still be alive drains out of Castiel.
Those people aren’t the first to find death here either. In a corner just past these most recent bodies, there is a pile of what Castiel very much fears are bones.
“You believe me now?” Dean asks. He’s still holding Castiel, one hand stroking slowly across his back. Castiel can’t quite suppress a shiver. “That was no fucking bear, I’ll tell you that.”
Castiel glances at the body still being consumed by dying flames, the bones charred, but the skull appearing distinctly human.
“I believe in what I saw and heard,” he says, his voice smaller and more shaky than he would like. “I heard someone call my name.”
“Wendigos can mimic human voices,” Dean says. “Many of the accounts agree on that.”
“I saw the shape of a person,” Castiel persists, “dragging me through the forest. It would have taken a human to do this, Dean.” Weakly, he nods at the rudimentary hook-and-rope systems keeping the victims’ bodies suspended.
“Or something that used to be human once,” Dean counters, obviously a match for Castiel in stubbornness. “Something that can only be killed with fire.”
Castiel sighs and slumps against Dean, letting Dean’s chest carry his weight. With the earlier adrenaline rush slipping away from him, he feels suddenly exhausted. “What you call a monster is just the darker aspects of human nature, Dean,” he says wearily.
He expects Dean to keep arguing, but he doesn’t push the issue — perhaps he realizes that Castiel is in no shape to argue back. “Suit yourself, but let’s get out of here, huh? I’ll place a call on the satellite phone and we’ll see about the nearest place for a rescue chopper to pick us up. Can you stand?”
Castiel tries it. As Dean stands up, he lets himself be pulled along. His legs shake and his head pounds, but nothing appears to be broken. Small mercies.
Still, he’s grateful when Dean slips an arm around him, carrying part of his weight again as they limp along, past the killer’s smoldering bones.
“Good idea, by the way, scattering those M&Ms,” Dean says. He is close enough to Castiel that each word seems to vibrate through them both. “I might never have found this place otherwise.”
Castiel only vaguely remembers his attempt to leave a trail for Dean as he was dragged through the forest. He must have lost consciousness again shortly after. His thoughts feel vaguely foggy, and there’s a distinct possibility that he’s at least slightly concussed.
“Thank you,” he says anyway.
Somewhere ahead of them, a light is beginning to break through the gloom, growing larger with every shuffling step.
***
Castiel does turn out to be concussed, but he was otherwise very lucky: nothing broken and no permanent damage of any kind. Mostly, he’s covered in scrapes and contusions that make it nearly impossible to get comfortable.
Dean waits patiently in the hallway while Castiel undergoes a series of tests at the closest hospital to Lost Creek National Forest. After a few hours, Castiel is sent on his way with a prescription for painkillers and instructions to rest for a few days.
When Dean calls Assistant Director Campbell to make their report, he’s asked to return to DC within forty-eight hours. (Castiel, apparently, is excused from work for a few more days to recover from his injuries.) Dean repeats his wendigo theory and demands that he and Castiel be allowed to examine the charred remains. Judging by Dean’s frustration when he hangs up the phone, the request isn’t granted.
“I hate this, Cas,” Dean mutters as he throws his phone clear across the bed. “They keep asking for proof, but they won’t let me get it. Every damn time, they set me up to fail. Guess they want me to be a laughingstock more than they want the truth.”
Though Castiel doesn’t believe Dean’s wendigo theory any more than he did when he first heard it, he can’t help a small twinge of sympathy. Dean clearly holds his beliefs very strongly, and won’t give them up without a fight. So what good can it possibly do to keep him from examining the remains? If anything, conclusive proof that the killer was nothing but human should be helpful in discouraging Dean’s theories.
It doesn’t make any sense. But then again, the archaic workings of the FBI’s bureaucracy rarely do.
“I’m sorry, Dean,” he says. His head still aches, despite the fact that the curtains are closed, leaving the room largely in darkness. He’s in no mood to start another fight.
Dean turns towards him. He’s sitting at the foot of his bed while Castiel is resting near the head of his own. But even at a distance and in the dim light, Castiel can see the anger in Dean’s expression soften.
“Thanks, Cas,” he says quietly.
Dean stays at their motel for another day and another night, mostly reading books or working away on his laptop. When Castiel can bear normal light levels again and is able to move around under his own steam, Dean departs for the airport.
They don't speak of the case again.