emeraldembers | Fic: Good Intentions and Distractions (Supernatural, Sam/Castiel)

Title: Good Intentions and Distractions
Fandom: Supernatural
Pairing: Sam/Castiel
Rating: NC-17 for sex, bad language, and references to consent issues.
Word count: 1451
Summary: Sam wants to know what he can still feel; Castiel attempts to demonstrate.
Spoilers: Up to and including 6x07.
Author's Notes: Written for

woodstarling who is utterly incorrigible and I love her for it.

He doesn't have time for this.

"I don't know what I can feel."

Sam isn't afraid. He pretends to be because he thinks he should be, but there's nothing sincere in the expression. He isn't pale with worry or flushed with adrenaline, isn't tense or shivering.

"I just want to know."

There isn't any love, either. No affection. Just survival instinct - the knowledge Castiel would prefer not to kill him - and the memory of friendship.

"Cas, please -"

Castiel remembers Sam's soul, gentle and shot through with pain and beauty, something that had shone bright no matter how hard the demon blood took hold.

"Shh," Castiel says. "I will."

It's just one soul. One - out of billions.

He still misses it.

The thing that animates Sam gives permission at every turn, lets Castiel break his nose, his jaw, his cheekbones. He lets Castiel take one hand by the wrist and cool it until the fingers blacken with frostbite. He lets Castiel take the other and heat it until the skin blisters.

There is no fear in Sam. No means for him to feel it.

Castiel heals him and presses his fingers to Sam's lips, nudges them open so he can touch the tongue inside. All the physical reactions are appropriate - he can still salivate, still gag, but nothing emotional comes to the surface.

"No fear." Castiel pulls his fingers back out. "Disgust?"

Sam shakes his head and Castiel grips him by the chin, tilts his head up. He remembers a time when he woke from unconsciousness to find Sam alive and Anna gone, remembers a single, brief kiss when Sam's thanks and his own increasing humanity led to confusion. Sam had left afterwards, apologetic and panicking as he shut the bedroom door, leaving Castiel to mourn his fallen sister.

He kisses Sam again now and though it is still gentle it isn't the tender, sweet thing Sam had once shared with him.

"No," Sam says when their lips part, and Castiel nods.

"You feel disgust."

"No," Sam replies. "I don't," he reaches for Castiel's tie and holds him in place, brushes his nose across Castiel's cheek. "I want."

Castiel's breath catches only a moment. "Covetousness." It's a sin built into nature, not so much an emotion as a need.

"Lust," Sam clarifies, standing up without changing the distance between them. Castiel's trenchcoat slides down his arms with a quick shove; he doesn't stop Sam, lets him open and push off his shirt, lets him remove his tie, and lets him unbutton the flies of his slacks. He's flaccid in Sam's hand. "It's not like - it's not a feeling," Sam continues, almost uncertain in his wording. "I can't think about what you feel, not really, and I don't care. I just want - I should, I know I should, but I don't."

Sam's hands are warm and clever but Castiel isn't human, arousal stirring only a little at Sam's touch. It's a courtesy on Sam's part that he makes an effort in stroking him, not a gesture born of any genuine desire to see him come. "What if I say no?"

Sam's forehead creases, not in concern but curiosity. "You don't want to?"

"Do you care?"

"No," Sam says after a moment. "And I know how wrong that is. You're this perfect and pure thing, and I want to fuck it. You."

Castiel lets his slacks fall, boxers following soon after, naked where Sam is still fully clothed. The look in Sam's eyes is part animal and objectifying, part cold logic and analytical. "You can touch me," Castiel says.

They take to bed easily, without argument or fuss. Sam's hands clutch him tight, one bruising his hip, the other firm in his hair. He's still semi-hard at most but moves in time with Sam, watches for any flicker of emotion in eyes that stay open too long; the cracks in Sam's human facade have only become more apparent as time passes, not less. This thing, this shell of Sam, it sees him as a toy - nothing more than flesh to covet and take and find release in.

It has Sam's mind, but none of the honest affection that used to reside there. "Cas, are you - crying?" Sam asks. "You said yes."

Castiel is as tired of lying as he is of war, and here is someone who will not judge him. Sam accepts him, even if only because he can't feel disgust or sorrow. "I miss so much," Castiel says, voice steady - exhausted tears don't make the same demands as miserable or angry tears. "I miss friends, family. I miss peace."

"Oh," Sam says, almost with regret, and shifts up the bed, letting go of Castiel's hip. The change of position forces Castiel's legs back against his chest and it's uncomfortable but, strangely, more intimate. Sam's arms lock under his own, almost pulling him into each thrust.

It's not enough to make him fully hard but it's strong encouragement, encouragement taking action as Sam leans further into him, the changed angle meaning pressure against his prostate with each stroke of Sam's cock. "Sam -"

"I remember feeling," Sam interrupts, pressing a kiss to his jaw. "Sometimes it's like - like sense memory? It's strong enough I almost do. Feel."

Castiel knows the warmth in Sam's eyes is a ghost, a past love that might never have been his, but he still closes his own and opens his lips to Sam's kisses. The hunger in them is real, at least. The possession.

He slides his hand between them and closes it around his erection, tangles the other hand in Sam's hair. It isn't easy to give over to physical sensation, not after spending so much time over the last year in his true form; Sam was currently in a body missing a soul, but to be an angel was to be a soul. The body was merely an accessory.

Sam speeds up, arms and shoulders tense, stops kissing so he can breathe unobstructed, each exhale cool against the damp on Castiel's lips. "Cas," he says, looking almost lost for a second, almost human, and then grunts, slamming his hips hard into Castiel's.

It feels strange, the wet heat of come inside him, but good, and when Sam's hand joins his on his erection he follows Sam's orgasm with ease.

Sam doesn't bother to roll off him, knows he can take the weight and will disappear when he needs to regardless of his surroundings.

"That felt so good, Cas."

Castiel closes his eyes and nods, tries not to consider the cost of the time he has spent here on Earth, again. For the Winchesters.

Always for the Winchesters. "If Dean finds my soul," Sam continues, "I might feel guilty about this. Don't let me."

"Why?"

"Because I always wanted to do this," he says, stroking his fingers through Castiel's hair lazily, an animal pleasure. "Before, too."

Castiel opens his eyes again, meets Sam's empty gaze. "That isn't what I meant. Why would you feel guilt?"

"You're an angel," Sam says. "I used to pray."

"Oh," Castiel replies, his own shoulders tensing at the thought of the Sam he had liked, the one he had confronted Lucifer over, feeling anxiety over something Castiel would have willingly shared with him.

This - lust and the sating of lust - this was sinful, tainted by its emptiness. But friendship taken to the bedroom, love in any form leading to touch -

He unfolds his wings, heard but not seen in Sam's world. "I have to go."

He doesn't wait for Sam's response.

Once upon a time, Heaven held all the souls that would ever be given life on Earth. Then God created free will and every soul was to own itself, to decide through its actions in life where it would go after death.

Castiel does not know how Hell first learned the value of a soul or how to buy it, but the assumption has always been the trickery of demons, a secret passed down by Lucifer.

He knows better than that now. He knows there are angels alive who have stolen that knowledge - angels who know how to wield it.

Someone who can write a contract ought to know how to break it.

He doesn't have time for this, but he will never have time if the Winchesters' questions and pleas about Sam's missing soul don't cease to distract him, and he was once promised an open door.

Balthazar's home is inviting and its owner welcoming, though his friendship is far from free.

"I thought you'd never ask," Balthazar says.

The feeling is mutual.

The End