Dean doesn't know how long he's been staring at the ceiling. Doesn't care. It's taken... a while for him to get a handle on himself. His brain is running on an extended loop, cycling through thoughts of Cas and the endless ways he wants to torture Crowley to a bloody death. His chest aches like he's hollowed out, like he's nothing but a gaping hole, and something must not have healed right because there's still a dull throbbing in his knee.
Maybe wasn't the best idea to run on shattered bone. Dean can't find it in himself to give a shit. Whatever's happening to Cas, he knows that it's infinitely worse. Dean can handle a little knee pain.
The whole time, the wolf stays pathetically glued to the mating bond, like if it waits long enough, the thing'll spring back to life. It never does though, and the silence of it is driving Dean up the fucking wall. So yeah, it took him a while to get his shit under control. But he's managing himself. Mostly.
And now he's got a plan. Or an outline, ish. Some kind of idea of what he's gonna do. He gave his pack the night, let them rest while he pretended not to mourn. Now the sun's up, and he's not sitting on his ass a minute longer.
Dean forces himself out of bed, but can't quite bring himself to leave the scent of Cas behind. He grabs a dirty t-shirt from their laundry, draping it over his shoulder and letting the scent of pine trees and damp bark envelope him as he makes his way through the den. It makes him feel like Cas is closer to him. Dean heads towards the Council room, pounding on doors as he goes as a wake up call. God fucking knows how early it actually is, but Dean doesn't care. They're going to find everybody, to find his mate, and they're going now.
With the Council, the Arch, the Seraphs and the Hunters all gathered in front of him, looking bleary eyed but present, Dean finally speaks.
"This ends," he breathes, feeling the aggression building up in his muscles. He wants to rip into something. "Today. We are going hunting, and we aren't coming back until we find them."
Murmurs of assent filter through the room, and Dean barely catches John's nod of approval from the corner of his eye.
"You headed south, last night," Sam jumps in, obviously in agreement with Dean's plan. "Farther than we'd searched on our own. All the evidence pointed west, so we didn't go much more than ten or fifteen miles south of Pack territory."
"We went twenty-five," Balthazar adds, crossing his arms with a heavy sigh. "Still nothing."
Dean wonders how far the humans could realistically be, considering they were transporting unconscious shifters, but with a car in their possession it wouldn't be unreasonable for them to be a hundred miles out, maybe more.
"Then we go further," Dean grunts, undeterred. If south is the direction Cas pulled him, then south is where they'll look.
Surprisingly, Michael is the next one to speak up.
"Last night, did Castiel call out to you?"
Dean tenses, studying Michael with suspicious eyes. He hadn't even really told Sam that that's what happened, so if Michael already knows...
"Anna," he breathes, "she did the same to you?"
Michael nods. "Before I lost her. I can't feel her now, she's too far away."
A chill runs down Dean's spine, a flash of sympathy for Michael who he knows is suffering just as much as he is. The shadows under his eyes are even darker today, a sign of his continuing sleepless nights. His skin is grey and pallid, eyes dull and far away.
"Your bond..." Dean prompts, unable to say the words out loud. It hurts too much to feel the lifeless bond, let alone actually recognizing it verbally.
"Silent. Limp. Broken. Dead. Do these suffice?"
Dean grits his teeth, tries not to flinch. And he refuses to describe his bond to Cas as dead. He won't do it.
"Yeah. Got it." Dean rubs at the scruff along his jaw, breathing deep and trying to regain some control. The wolf is pacing and anxious to get moving, its impatience spreading through Dean's veins. He tries to focus on the scent of Cas' shirt on his shoulder, but it's getting harder by the second.
"We got a full moon tonight," John grunts, getting things back on track so they can come up with some kind of plan. Dean is grateful. "Sure everybody's feeling it already. Our pack knows how to hunt on a moon. And you two," he gestures at Dean and Michael, "not sure of it, but there's a chance those bonds of yours'll perk up when the moon's out. Whatever it is that makes us shifters, it's on full force tonight."
John glances around the room, catching everyone's agreeing nods.
"Everybody rest up," he continues, apparently satisfied with the response. "Spend the day with your family, your mate, your pup. Eat, relax, and get ready for a hell of a hunt."
***
The Bunker is a bundle of nerves for the entire day. It's thick in the air, weighing everyone down. It's quiet too, with mostly everyone hiding out in their rooms in close quarters with the people most important to them.
Dean goes to his room alone. He'd like to rest up, but the wolf won't let him sleep. Even with the scent of Cas all around him, his bed is cold and the scent is a day old at this point.
There's a knock on his door, and Dean thinks about not answering, but whoever it is decides not to give him the choice.
"Dean," someone sighs, the voice and scent familiar. Dean pulls his comforter closer around his shoulders, doesn't raise his head off of Cas' pillow.
"Lisa," he mumbles. "What're you doin' here?"
She's quiet for a few seconds, and Dean feels the comforter lift and the mattress dip under her weight as she slips into his bed behind him.
"Lisa. What are you doing," he repeats, even as he instinctively settles back into her arms as she wraps them around him.
"I'm trying to help," she says softly, her warm breath brushing against the nape of his neck. "Is that okay?"
Dean hesitates. He feels wrong, being here with Lisa while Cas is out there suffering. Scared. Alone. Dean doesn't even know if he's alive. Maybe he already breathed his last exhale, maybe he wondered why Dean had given up on him. Maybe—
"Dean," Lisa cooed, combing her fingers through his hair. "Breathe."
He let out a shaky exhale, curling away from her. "Don't. I can't—"
"Shh," she continues to stroke his hair, nuzzling the nape of his neck along his hairline. "You'll find him. He'll be okay, Dean. Castiel will be okay."
Dean turns over in her arms and buries his nose against her collarbone. Her scent is comforting and familiar, not enough to bring his heart rate down but definitely something. She shifts to run a hand down his spine, still making soothing noises at each unsteady breath.
He doesn't realize that he was shivering until he stops.
"You don't have to be here," Dean mumbles, trying to reign his thoughts back in. Freaking out some more isn't going to help anybody.
"No," she sighs, "I don't. But I'm here."
They're quiet for a few minutes, the silence of Dean's room filled only with their combined breathing. Dean gives in, letting his arms wind around Lisa in return.
"Thank you."
***
They head out at dusk. Load up the truck and the jeeps and go south, following the trail Dean had set the night before. The moon is bright and full above them, and Dean can feel the wilderness of it racing through him. His wolf itches to get out, to run, to breathe the forest air and howl to the moon.
But that isn't the plan.
It doesn't take long in the jeeps to arrive at the end of Dean's trail from the night before. Dean himself doesn't remember running most of it, but Sam does and there's an obvious, messy trail through the forest leading them there. The Hunters and the Seraphs, along with some of the older soldiers like Garth and Meg and the Dominions like Uriel and Zachariah, plus the Council and the Arch all climb out and free their animals, giving in to the pull of the moon.
Dean slides into the driver's seat of the truck, Michael in the passenger seat beside him. The truck is saturated in alpha pheromones, and Dean has to grit his teeth at the edge. He wants to join the hunt with his pack, but this is how he finds Cas. He reminds himself of that over and over again. This is how he finds Cas. This is how he brings him home.
The leopards waste no time getting up into the trees, looking for visuals. They hunt on sight and sound, so it's up to the wolves to lead the charge on the scent front. That is, if they can even find a scent trail.
That's Michael and Dean's job. Get the hunt headed in the right direction, close enough that they pick up a trail, or that they can see something from the leopards' perch up high.
How the hell they're going to accomplish that though, Dean doesn't have a fucking clue. There's still nothing coming from his bond with Cas, and he can only hope that he'll feel something once the moon hits its peak. For now he's running on blind instinct, hoping for the best.
"South?" he grunts at Michael, throwing the truck into gear as the last of the wolves finish their shifts. He has some shit he'd like to say to the guy, but now isn't the time. He focuses instead on the scent of Cas that's clinging to the shirt he still has over his shoulder. They'd had to get Michael some of that god-awful synthetic slick to trigger his scent memory of Anna, and judging from the pink tint to his cheeks it must be working.
It's also more than a little awkward to share a truck cab with another alpha going through the synthetic slick experience. But Dean doesn't have the emotional capacity to process that, not at the moment.
"I suppose," Michael murmurs, obviously getting a little lost in Anna's fabricated scent. All Dean smells is the sticky sweet scent of the slick, but he's glad it's working for Michael. Anything to get them closer.
So they drive. The moon drifts higher in the sky, and they keep driving. Hannah finds a set of tire tracks that lead to nowhere. They drive some more. The Pack scans every square inch of forest as they make their way south. The leopards see nothing but trees in the distance. They keep driving.
The full moon hits its peak in the sky, and it would be a stretch for Dean to say that the bond came alive. Because it doesn't. But it does...breathe. A flare of warmth as it reaches for him, pulls him slightly left. It's weak, but...
"You found him," Michael breathes, eyes focused hard on Dean's profile. He doesn't look at him, just presses harder on the gas and urges the wolves in a new direction.
"No," Dean grinds his jaw. "Not yet. But he might've found me."
Through the growl of the truck's engine, Dean hears his father's howl. Long and proud, John's wolf projecting its pleasure at the thrill of this hunt. A chorus of howls sound after that, the pitches whirling and blending together in a haunting, moonlit song. Dean feels a chill run down his spine, the urge to join in almost overwhelming. The warmth of his bond intensifies momentarily, pulls him harder forward before dying out again.
Dean drives as fast as he can, convinced that they must be getting close. They have to be.
Time seems to slow down, maybe even halt completely, as a lone howl echoes in the distance. There are a lot of wolves in the Pack, all of them unique and all of them important. Dean prides himself on knowing his pack like he knows his own hands. And so he knows, without a doubt, that the howl they just heard was Kevin.
The hunt changes pace then. The wolves know here to go, the leopards know who to follow. Dean is racing towards the pull even as the bond goes completely lifeless within him. The wolf is singularly focused on their mate, every thought a rousing chorus of CasCasCasCasCasCas.
Every second brings them closer. Dean and Michael are on the edges of their seats. Dean pushes the truck harder. Almost there. Closer.
All of the shifters come to a halt. Dean slams on the brakes and throws the car in park, letting himself out and breathing the air around him. There's a faint scent of gravel dust, but other than that it doesn't really smell like...anything. The scents of the forest, the trees, the damp earth, that's still there. But there are no hares, no birds, no life to be scented. Things are missing. And that's a more obvious scent trail than anything else they've found.
Through the bush is the very beginnings of what probably turns into a gravel road, further up. Dean can't see through the darkness and the trees where it leads to, yet, but he plans to. Without a word the wolves creep forward, following John, Rufus, Bobby, and Ellen's slow approach. They all stay off the road, intentionally.
Running parallel to the gravel leads them to a chainlink fence, not low enough to jump and high enough that it would take Dean some effort to climb over. On the other side is a decrepit looking metal building, so off-putting to Dean's senses that he knows they've found the right place.
Everything else that happens is a blur. The leopards don't hesitate to get over the fences, taking out the electrical panel on the other side to open the gates for the rest of the shifters. It's obvious they've been spotted when gunshots slice through the silence of the night, but from what Dean can hear and smell none of them hit their mark.
They have the cover of darkness here, which gives them the advantage. The five humans who step outside of the building are dispatched quickly and quietly. It's easy for the wolves to herd them away from each other, from the safety of the door at their backs.
Dean is almost surprised that there aren't more humans here, but it passes quickly. As much as Dean and the wolf both want to rip apart every human involved, they'll settle for Crowley. Just to end this.
The scent of human blood in the air settles in his lungs, and Dean is the first to enter the warehouse.
Death and pain and fear assaults his senses, sending him stumbling and just barely out of the line of fire of more guns. More wolves file in, several yelps of pain as bullets find their way into shifter flesh, but Dean's attention is razor focused. He can smell Castiel in this room, terrified and hurting but alive. Dean hardly registers his own movements as he dispatches the humans in his path.
One. Delayed reaction speed. Snapped neck. Two. Lazy hold on his pistol. Bullet to the brain. Three. Attempted surrender. Now in a heap against the wall.
Four. Crowley.
That fucking smirk is still on his face, the long barreled colt in his hand. Except it isn't pointed at Dean. It's pointed at a dirty, iron-barred cage on the side of the room. Inside it, a black panther.
Dean's blood runs cold. Of everything that's happening in this room, all there is to see, Dean sees exactly one of them. His mate in a cage.
"Well, well. You did show up rather sooner than anticipated."
Dean growls low in his chest. Rage is hollowing him out from the inside, burning everything else away. "Hurt him, and you'll wish I killed you."
"Hurt him?" Crowley outright laughs, the sound singing out above the harsh noises still echoing around the warehouse. The scent of death is making Dean dizzy, and his urge to stare at Cas until he's sure he's alive is almost overwhelming. "Darling, please. I've ruined him already."
"I don't believe that," Dean snarls, taking a step forward but freezing when Crowley slowly cocks his gun. Fuck.
"Suit yourself," he shrugs. "But you will let me leave, or I'll kill him and you won't ever find out. Capisce?"
Dean hesitates, and listens. The fighting around them has stopped. Over Crowley's left shoulder, coming out of a shift and adjusting to the weight of a leopard body, is Michael.
Dean blinks slowly at Crowley and cocks his head. "Ya know one time, I might've let that kind of threat fly. But I'm done being scared of you, Crowley."
Michael stalks closer, body low to the ground, muscles tensed to pounce. Unlike a wolf, Michael is equipped to take out his prey in one attack, alone. Concentrated power. Dean keeps Crowley talking.
"Ah, but isn't that exactly your problem, Dean?" Crowley grins, sick and twisted. "You are afraid of me. I own you."
"No," Dean growls, "you just wish you did. But the difference between you and me?" he lets the words hang, watching Crowley's gears work away inside his head. "You're not a predator. We are. And right now, you're the prey."
Michael is in the air before Dean even finishes speaking. He lands heavily on Crowley's back, flattening the human against the hard floor of the warehouse. The gun skitters across the floor, out of reach.
And just like that, it's over. Michael's teeth sink into Crowley's neck, severing his spine at his nape. Some part of Dean thought he would have liked to claim Crowley's life himself, would have liked to make him suffer, but his feet move him towards Cas' cage without a thought. Because Crowley's death is all that matters. He's gone. Cas is safe.
Dean falls to his knees outside of the cage. Cas' tail flicks back and forth, his body crouched like he plans to pounce any second.
"Hey, Cas," Dean breathes out, for the first time in what feels like days. "You're okay."
A low growl rumbles in Cas' chest. Dean furrows his eyebrows and tries again.
"Cas. It's me," he puts his hand against one of the bars, tempted to reach through and touch. "C'mon. You know me."
Dean's stomach clenches, searching Cas' eyes for any sign of recognition. Anything.
"What did he do to you?" Dean growls, and the panther seems to react to the sound. It inches closer, its nose twitching. Panic rises in Dean's throat. "You gotta be okay, kitten. You have to be. Hey, got that? You have to be."
The panther just tilts its head, blue eyes piercing.
"Don't fucking look at me like that," Dean snaps, and the panther only seems to look harder. "Snap out of it, okay? You're safe and—" he looks around briefly, trying to find something to get this lock open so he can get closer to Cas. "Jesus, doesn't anybody have some fucking bolt cutters? Christ—" he shifts back to Cas, ignoring any and everyone around him, "Just snap out of it. Change back. Do something."
Cas just stares at him.
Dean's heart drops. A hand lands on his shoulder. Sam.
"We'll relocate him back to the den, figure it out there. We need to get everybody out of here."
His brother is being too gentle with him. Tiptoeing. Dean knows what he isn't saying.
"Relocate. You want to knock him out." His voice is deadpan, but anything else is too much effort.
Sam doesn't need to answer. Dean reaches his fingers through the cage, encouraging the panther to sniff at his fingertips. Hopefully Cas' panther finds comfort in his scent. Out of the corner of his eye Dean sees Ellen step forward with a shot in her hand, probably from the emergency kit in the truck. They keep it stocked, just in case there's a rogue unexpectedly. They'll knock a shifter out for two, three hours max.
Cas—the panther, whatever—leans against Dean's fingers, rubs its nose against the soft skin of his bare wrist. Dean shivers.
"I'm sorry, Cas. I'm so sorry."