Chapter Text
When the archangel picks up his Sword, and locks away its spirit, he imparts upon the human something of agonizing sensory overload followed by utter deprivation.
Whether or not Dean feels weighed down by thousands of bricks, crushing his chest, feeling limbless while also feeling the worn blistering of hands, shoulders, and arms, trying to release himself from it – whether or not it's like all the air has been sucked out of existence, leaving his lungs to collapse in on themselves while he frantically crawls on the floor, searching for a way out – whether or not it's like he's been dropped into the Pacific with cannonballs tied around his ankles, trying to reach the surface before he reaches the rocky bottom...
“Sam? Jack...?”
Everything feels real, yet nothing feels real. His senses on fire..and then absolutely nothing. To be imprisoned in his own mind, unable to control the actions of his real, physical body.
What is real?
“Cas...? Castiel...”
'This is real. I can feel it, can't I? Michael is here, and he's stashed me away, doing god knows what, to his universe, his earth. His reality.'
After what feels like hours being crushed under his own weight, the pain becomes agonizing now. To crave the relief of death – that is real. If he's wanting death, that means he can't be dead, which means he is alive. Being alive is real, right?
“I know you probably can't hear me, but-”
Thoughts swirl around him, echoing back at himself. Days seem to melt into each other. The isolation is terrifying. Nothing around him, nothing inside him. Empty. He can't seem to let go, can't seem to die...
'WE HAD A DEAL!'
“I didn't mean for this to happen. I'm lost in here. I need to get out. I need to be there with you, and Sam.”
'Come on, Dean. You can do this. Take control. Reach out.'
“This bastard dick-for-wings double-crossed me, and I...” His voice – is this his voice? – becomes hushed with necessity. “I need to make sure you got out okay.”
He pauses, hearing only a temporary silence. It's new, and... unnatural, as if there is a sudden barrier placed between the static of his mind and other parts of his brain.
Soon enough to match, the blackness is enveloping him again, a vast nothingness. There is no sense of time. Minutes? Hours, days...? He opens his eyes slowly, heavy with fog, for a brief moment wondering where he is.
'No...'
Bad memories from all over his lifetime are released, and come at him like a tidal wave. He hadn't seen it forming. Guilt, shame, and grief pour over him, shoving him down, like a small leaf in the ocean, trying to stay afloat. Suddenly, his eyes clamp shut, and he can't open them. They become like lead, and his voice chokes out to nothing. All he can do is try to reach for the surface each time a new wave would crash over him.
“Sam!”
Coughing, sputtering. The trauma becomes fresh once again, renewing its license to try to erase any healing he might have done over the years. They try to wipe away any conversations that he'd had to clear up all his self-doubts, doubts about others, apologies for the mistakes and lies, the people he had later been able to make peace with...
It is all being ripped away to reveal a hellish nightmare. Maybe this is Hell.
Dean knows he has his own version of the Pit, in his mind. Where he would retreat to in his darkest times, when he had to face the dark and the ugly. Where he would want to keep parts of him separated out from the other, better versions of himself... from his dozens of identities of which none involve fake IDs, knowing that it is the only place he really deserves to belong, after all.
Dad had left on a hunt without so much of a word, fuming at Dean for a mistake he'd made on their last one – and Sammy had run away on his watch, and disappeared for two weeks to get away from the toxic atmosphere, leaving Dean to search and search, showing up empty-handed, coming to the devastating assumption that maybe little Sammy was no more...
Dean leaving the safely locked motel room after waiting for days for their Dad to return – only for a few minutes to escape boredom and the feelings of being trapped. To play at the arcade only to have the shtriga attack Sammy while he was gone. Dad never looked at Dean quite the same after that.
The epic fight where Sam and Dad yelled and screamed at each other in the middle of the nighttime road before Sam ran off to college. The anger, the tears. And Dean left to deal with the aftermath.
The smell of burning flesh and wood as Daddy thrusts Sammy into his arms and orders him to run outside as fast as he can. For a minute he can't move, and he stares at baby Sammy, wailing away in the scorching, smoking heat of their home. But...what about Mommy?
Getting wrecked by Azazel, whispering to Sam, begging him not to kill their Dad with the Colt while Azazel was possessing him. Causing nearly all three of them to perish in the ensuing crash. Causing his own death, if he had not been saved by the deal that their Dad had cut him, resulting in his descent straight into Hell with only a few minutes to say goodbye.
When he finally broke from all the suffering and the pain at the hands of Alastair , succumbing to the offer to instead torture other souls in Hell. Enjoying the release, relief, and escape it granted him.
Terrified of what was to come, hellhounds dragging his body to the floor with their sharp teeth, clawing viciously into him, rupturing artery and vein, ripping muscle and skin...
Their own grandfather ultimately betraying them, locking away the two brothers and leaving them at the mercy of hungry ghouls. Family leaving family to die.
Lying to Sam over and over again in an attempt to save him from himself, not allowing him the agency he craves for himself, because Dean is the protector and Sam always needed to be saved from the fire. Without Sammy, their family is gone and Dean has nothing to protect.
Not acting sooner for every apology, fight, or forgiveness that Cas was overdue.
Not saying things that should have been said, so many years ago.
Saying things that he should have never said.
This is what he deserves, isn't it? It's not like he was ever meant for a happy ending. All the choices he's made... led him exactly to where he is now. It all ends in... suffering. Everything hurts. It all hurts so much he can barely breathe.
He's desperate, and scared. Full of heart-stopping fear. Reliving every torturous memory he's ever had, over and over again. He wishes he could numb it out, but inside his own head, everything is as fresh as if it is all happening in real-time. And the horrible cycle continues on for days.
“Cas!!” he chokes out again.
Why bother praying to the angel? He had already stormed Hell to save his ass once before. And many more times after that, on Earth, and in Purgatory.
Purgatory.
A tiny seed in the back of his mind then appears, and outright ignores his train of thought, defying all that surrounds him. It is a small glimmer of light. And it is stubborn, and strong, latching onto the ground and planting its roots without shame, or care. It pays no mind to anything else, other than to continue its mission to grow, and grow...
'You don't think you deserve to be saved?... Good things do happen, Dean.'
'And YOU! The very touch of you corrupts. When Castiel first laid a hand on you in Hell he was lost!'
'I don’t need to feel like hell for failing you, okay? For failing you like I’ve failed every other godforsaken thing that I care about! I don’t need it!'
'I'm going to find some way to redeem myself to you.'
'Cas, you just gave up an entire army for one guy.'
'If there's even a small chance that we can save you, I won't let you walk out of this room.'
'Nobody wants him here more than I do.'
'I could go with you.'
'What happens in Purgatory, stays in Purgatory.'
The seed finds its true home in the dirt, enriched with strong memories of family, loyalty and love, and it grows and grows, rapidly becoming a beautiful tree. Its roots soak up all the pain-filled water, draining the ocean in his mind. Its branches stretch outwards and up toward the sun.
The shift is stark, but so welcoming. Dean's breath returns to him, and he's gasping with relief, crying at the breakthrough. He's able to open his eyes, breathe the fresh air, move his limbs of their own accord. The chains around him are now visible, but show pitiful signs of rust and decay.
He feels a physical loosening of the hold on his mind, and reality, true reality, seeps into his consciousness, and he's no longer fighting with himself. Instead, he takes the opportunity and tries incessantly to connect back to Michael, to see what he sees, to claw his way out to the other side of this all.
The effort is short-lived. His spirit is violated, groped away and viciously thrust back into the darkness. All sense of feeling is lost, until the soul-crushing pressure returns, threatening to break him all over again.
It continues on. His hands fall to his head, gripping his hair in distress. The air has disappeared once again, and he falls back down, curling into himself.
The endless torture starts for another eternity, and then it ceases. Begins again, and then it stops, the terrifying cycle allowing him to just barely maintain the grip on the threads of his losing sanity. 'Why?'
Why can't he seem to escape? Why is he so...weak?
He cries out, frustrated beyond belief, wanting to simply disappear into nothing.
Dean is extremely resilient, Michael knows. What has felt like decades in Hell to him has certainly prepared him for a possession of this magnitude, and for this length of time without any major troubles. Michael feels Dean's pain, wrath, betrayal, resentment, grief, bitterness, anger, frustration, toughness... yet also empathy, loyalty, kindness, duty, appreciation. All of the human emotions of Dean Winchester swirl around him, enveloping his angelic being. Yes.
This vessel was indeed...made for him. It's the most perfect vessel he could have ever imagined. The power he is able to hold, now...he has never felt so unstoppable, before. If only he could have found his perfect vessel back on his own earth, just a decade back...
His musing ends when other sensations soon creep in. He recognizes the sadness, hurt...fear...
Helplessness.
Total lack of control, throwing Dean into an insane spiral of being lost within himself.
No. These are not the things he shares with Dean. And they surf over him, affecting him in an unusual, human-esque way. They most arise once Michael becomes otherwise too preoccupied with certain tasks or when he's late in re-tightening the restraints he'd placed on Dean's soul, when the man finds grounding enough to resume fiercely resisting him again with his... pitiful, false sense of hope. Such a nuisance.
He really wishes Dean would just let go. This earth is doomed for his kind, anyway. This earth is now his plaything. Michael is the supreme being on this planet. To have his Sword hovering around him like a buzzing mosquito, always trying to take the chance to inflict distraction, causing a constant itch...rather than being complacent, calm, and relaxed in Michael's hand...
It really has become so...irritating.
He will have to come up with a solution to prevent these slow-downs from continuing to occur.
Once he is done asking the twenty-third human on this earth what they want, he sighs. All... liars. He throws the human to the other side of the wall with a look of disgust, and disappears without further trace, onto his next cherry-picked location.