—Day 77—
Vera puts down her stethoscope with a sigh that Dean decides to interpret as a good sign. “So you managed your entire dinner—”
“Delicious wet bread and almost-meat,” he says with relish, not mentioning the canned vegetable whatever because he’s working on blocking it from his memory. “Any chance of a hamburger? Maybe with actual cow in it?”
“Dream on.” She looks at him speculatively. “But you can have your bread dry, how’s that?”
“I’ve never been so happy in my life.” Stretching, he feels a faint twinge in his ankle, but it’s pretty much healed now, and he looks forward to testing that one day with more than trips to the bathroom. Looking at his right arm, newly bandaged and dressed that morning by Cas after Vera removed the stitches, he flexes his hand, watching the fingers spread slightly in response before he relaxes them, the feel of the soft blanket grainy and rough, the barest sense of pressure against the pads.
Even with the stitches off, his arm’s a mess: between the bites themselves, the stitches he tore out several times during the fever, and the spread of infection that needed drainage cuts, all he can really tell is that it looks like shit and won’t look much better when the bandages come off permanently. Motor control is an inconsistent and limited work in progress, but at least that’s progress and he’s got a tennis ball living on his bedside table to prove it. The nerve damage, however, is a lot less certain. Sensation is returning to his fingers in dribs and starts, but the space between his elbow and five inches above his wrist on his inner arm is still a dead zone no matter how much Vera pokes at it.
“It’s still healing,” she assures him when she sees where he’s looking, picking up the chart and absently making a few notes. “Dean, we really won’t know until you’ve had more time to work with it, but at this point, practical mobility is a given.”
Dean licks his lips and fails to make a fist, fingers struggling briefly toward his distant palm before he lets them relax again. Closing his eyes, he rubs them clumsily against the blanket again, a reminder that at least he can feel them. “I can’t even hold that damn ball for more than a few seconds without dropping it.
“You will,” she answers, so transparently sure he almost believes her. “Alicia picked up a few more books on physical therapy on her last run. We’re gonna take it slow, but as long as you don’t rip anything open, progress is up to you. Be smart: if I see you’re overdoing it, you lose your unsupervised tennis ball privileges.”
“I shoot with that hand,” Dean answers; he does, and he will again one day. “I’m gonna be careful.”
“Yeah, I believe that,” she snorts, finishing her notes before standing up. “Okay, in honor of you not being dead for three weeks and no sign of relapse or secondary infection, I get to leave the cabin for a few hours and Amanda’s making me dinner to celebrate. She hates to cook, but she’s really good at it, so this is a once in a lifetime event. You wouldn’t believe what she can do with canned anything. Do not get sick tonight or I’ll kill you myself.”
Dean crosses his arms and smirks up at her. “Date night?”
“Get your mind out of the gutter. She’s my best friend and my roommate.” Vera’s eyes narrow. “For some reason, we haven’t had a lot of time to talk lately.”
“Seriously?” He stares at her. “She’s insanely hot, terrifyingly dangerous, and lives with you. And you want to talk?”
“You aren’t giving me romantic advice, are you?” she asks incredulously. “Tell me you’re not doing that or I’ll never stop laughing and Amanda will be pissed I missed dinner.”
He scowls at her. “Might help your mood, just saying.”
“My mood—”
“Vera, he isn’t armed, and you’re far too ethical to attack him when he’s too weak to defend himself,” Cas interrupts from his doorway slouch, ignoring Dean’s glare. “I understand it can be difficult to remember under duress, but should you forget, I’d have to stop you and possibly lecture you on how none of us can kill Dean no matter the provocation, in lieu of mowing duty.”
“Because he’s our leader,” Vera snarls, staring at Dean hatefully. “What about hurting him? Nothing serious, I promise. It’ll heal. I’m a nurse. I know how to do that.”
“Amanda’s waiting on the porch to escort you home for dinner,” Cas offers, tipping his head against the frame. “Should I tell her that you and Dean are too busy arguing about your potential sex life—”
“Cas!”
“—for you to appreciate the meal she spent several hours preparing, or would you rather join her and complain to her about Dean being….” Cas pauses for a moment, frowning thoughtfully. “Being himself?”
Vera gives Dean a long look, then Cas an even longer one before she heads toward the door, pausing to tell him, “Fine. See you in the morning.”
Dean watches her leave, listening to the angry sound of beads and Vera’s voice, followed by Amanda sounding soothing as they fade into the distance.
“Provocation?” he asks as Cas makes an elaborate show of getting comfortable on the other side of the bed, frowning at the pillow like it’s not up to his standards of fluffiness and its failure makes him doubt his faith in cotton and polyester stuffing. With a sigh worthy of a martyr faced with substandard torture devices, he tugs it closer and proceeds to settle stomach-down on the mattress without a single squeal of springs, which Dean’s really beginning to resent. “I was trying to be helpful—”
“Is that what that was?” Settling his chin on his crossed arms, Cas gives him a sardonic look. “Humans and their ways are often strange to me, so elucidation is in order. Please explain how telling Vera that she’d be in a better mood if she had sex with Amanda was supposed to be ‘helpful’ and not ‘incendiary’ or an excellent way to wake up in an ice bath for non-fever related reasons?”
“Have you seen Amanda?” he demands, wondering privately where that tub is now anyway. “Cas, don’t tell me you haven’t noticed—”
“That Amanda is very attractive?” Cas asks. “She was my student, for one—”
“Like pretty much everyone you’ve had sex with. Try again.”
“—and two, she’s a lesbian, in case you somehow missed that.”
“Doesn’t mean you can’t appreciate the view,” Dean answers reasonably. “Vera’s been under a lot of stress. God knows, if anyone should get a little fun, it’d be her.”
Cas raises his eyebrows, unconvinced.
“Fine, I was being a dick, too.” He blows out a breath, frowning at his bare feet poking from the hem of the yellowest scrub bottoms ever to escape the seventies. God he misses regular clothes. “It bothers me that she’s doing all this for me while hating my guts. I mean, she’s one fuck of a professional, don’t get me wrong, but it’s gotta grate a little that after all this time wanting to kill me, she’s responsible for saving my life.”
“Maybe you should talk to her about it.” Under his fascinated gaze, Cas tilts his head thoughtfully, like he’s trying to work out something really complicated, like say, human interactions. “Or should I—”
“No, oh God, no.” Cas blinks, looking startled. “Uh—okay, quick lesson on people. She’s your friend, right?” He nods slowly, which hey, progress. “And you’re my friend. I don’t need confirmation,” he adds when Cas starts to nod again. “Never—and I mean never—be the middleman in that kind of situation. It never ends well for anyone.”
“Why?” he asks immediately, because this is Dean’s fucking life. “Wouldn’t that help dissipate tension if I could—”
“Tell her what? That you’re choosing sides for reasons unknown?” Before Cas can start to answer—Jesus, he knows that look, Cas has thought about this—Dean shakes his head and tries not to look too frantic. “Put it another way; it’s not your fight. She’s your friend, and God knows, it’s not like you have a lot of those here.”
Cas is quiet for a long moment. “You’re my best friend.” Dean almost forgets to breathe, staring at him wordlessly. “What happened wasn’t your fault, and you suffer for it anyway.”
“Was it the right decision?” he asks deliberately. “I’ve been here long enough to know the answer, but you need to say it.”
“Yes,” he answers reluctantly. “It was callous, but it was necessary.”
“Then it would have been mine. That I wasn’t the one who pulled the trigger doesn’t mean anything. I would have—and one day I’ll probably have to, if I live that long. Telling her to just get over it already—that’s a dick move. There’s no good reason to do that to her.”
“It makes you unhappy,” Cas says quietly. “That’s reason enough for me.”
Dean looks away, trying to remember the last time someone—anyone—other than Sam or maybe Bobby ever cared about something as stupid as him being unhappy. Like that mattered in the entire trauma that is his whole goddamn life: unhappy is a step up in his emotional well-being, now that he thinks about it. But Cas wants to talk Vera into liking him—a conversation even Cas can’t pretend not to know will end shitty at best—because Dean wants her to like him and he’s unhappy that she doesn’t. Because being in a militia camp is more like being in high school than high school, or so he assumes if the most recent drama that’s Kyle and Jane’s mid-dinner fight in the mess last night is any indication; it’s not like he stayed at any one long enough to get past the introductions.
(Or spam and canned pea fights ending in tears (Kyle’s) and mowing duty (both). On a guess, that may be specific to his militia camp, though.)
“Thanks,” he says. “But I got this one, okay? Just give me time and I’ll think of something. I’ll wear her down, no problem.”
“If you’re sure.”
“I’m sure.” He manages a quick grin. “I appreciate the thought.”
“As you wish.” Cas doesn’t look reassured, but Dean gets the feeling there’s something else bothering him. “There’s something else we should discuss.”
He nods, bracing himself in advance; it’s that kind of day. “Hit me.”
“Before you provoked Vera, did she have the opportunity to tell you that tomorrow morning, the IV will no longer be necessary?”
“I didn’t—-fine, no, she didn’t. Really?” He really wants to get rid of that IV. “Last night on the drip?”
“Yes, provided there are no unforeseen complications when she examines you in the morning.” Cas pauses just long enough for him to wonder what the bad news is before continuing. “Since you don’t need to be under constant observation anymore and you can see to your own basic needs, Ana, Brad, and Chuck will be taking turns staying with you during the day. Vera will still examine you every morning, at midday, and in the evening, and I’ll be here every night, of course, but you’re well enough to be trusted not to die if one of us isn’t watching you.”
Dean checkmarks ‘allowed contact with people’ on his mental progress chart. “In the cabin, not the room, right?” Because he’ll have to take off half a check for lack of privacy. Vera and Cas don’t count; they’ve seen him in every possible shitty condition, and sheer repetition burned out the humiliation and eroded his boundaries to the point of non-existence. He kind of looks forward to the day he gets those back; basic self-consciousness while naked in front of people he’s not related to or fucking isn’t so much to ask here. Or at least remember how to fake it.
“In the cabin,” Cas assures him. “They’ll check on you hourly, but they’ve been instructed to knock first and wait five seconds for your response before entering the room.”
Really. “Five seconds?”
“Vera said that was the standard for good manners,” Cas answers with a hint of satisfaction in a new human lesson mastered. “All of them have agreed to limit their interactions with other members of the camp to minimize the danger of exposing you to further infections. They’re aware of sterilization procedures while in this cabin and before and after interacting with you directly, but I’ll remind them regularly.”
Dean feels bad for them already. New shit job: watching the sick guy breathe. “What’d you have to do to get them to agree?”
Cas looks at him like he’s being particularly slow, which Dean resents like fuck. “I won’t even dignify that with a response. Are they acceptable to you?”
“Sure. I mean, you and Vera gotta be tired of being stuck in here all the time.” Belatedly, he realizes what this means and fights back the unexpected rush of disappointment. “And she said it’s time you got out of here and rejoined the world. In daylight, anyway.”
“That was a surprise to me as well,” Cas agrees heavily, sinking more deeply into the mattress and sounding baffled. “I didn’t realize I interacted so much with the world that my absence would be noticeable, or it would be to anyone’s benefit to change that.”
Or if he were Vera, striking while the iron’s hot and Cas’s non-orgasm-related interactions with the world are mandatory. If there was ever a time to establish a habit, it would be now. “Been running the entire camp from the porch while I was sleeping, huh?”
“It’s working very well, and I don’t see any reason to change that.” He grimaces, adding with noticeable reluctance, “However, she may have had a point in that you need rest, and now that you’re not as ill as you were, their presence here will be a disturbance.”
Dean makes himself nod. “And there’s shit you gotta leave here to do that takes longer than an hour at a time.”
Watching Cas making an effort to become one with the bed and almost succeeding, he gets the impression that any kind of effort on his part will bring this plan to a dead halt. It’s tempting; to distract himself, he focuses on the people who are going to be his new watchers. Brad’s on watch, though off the top of his head he can’t remember if he’s ever had a conversation with the guy; Ana’s on Joe’s team, so her life has just got suckier; and Chuck—he tries not to think too hard on the fact that since the day after the team leaders were burned, Chuck’s avoided being anywhere near him, but it’s not like it’s hard to figure out why. So this’ll be fun for everyone.
Which reminds him of something. “Not Alicia?”
“No.” Cas abruptly focuses on some point over his shoulder; he doesn’t straighten, but he looks like he might want to. “Not Alicia.”
Uh huh. “What’s wrong with Alicia? She’s got medical training. Why hasn’t she been helping you and Vera out anyway?”
“Nothing’s wrong with Alicia.” For a second, he thinks Cas may actually try to leave it at that, but then he sighs. “She’s very capable and she was very helpful when Vera was doing research on your condition, especially since unlike Vera, she could leave the camp to acquire the books that Vera needed, as well as lead the teams that were searching the hospitals and identify the equipment we needed. However, under the circumstances, everyone who hadn’t been exposed to you already was restricted from treating you during the fever.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know, I made it up,” he answers impatiently. “Vera was distracted, so I suppose she accepted that as infinite knowledge, I didn’t ask.” He shifts in something not entirely unlike guilt. “I couldn’t risk anyone seeing you that might be able to make inconvenient comparisons, and while I couldn’t be absolutely certain I knew all the people that Dean had sex with, I was absolutely certain who hadn’t.”
“Oh.” Crap, he forgot about that. “Him and Alicia, yeah. Was it—”
“Perhaps we should discuss Dean’s past relationships at another time.” Cas’s expression makes it clear that now isn’t a good time and never would be much better. “For now, I didn’t realize the end of a relationship could be that—awkward. For that long. And that was just as an observer.”
Yeah, he’s not up to hearing that pretty much ever; the Jane and Risa thing was enough, thanks. “How noticeable are we talking about here?”
“The most obvious are two major scars, one on his left thigh and one bisecting his left hip; one healing wound on his back, which Alicia stitched herself that would be a scar by now; three tattoos—you don’t need them, two were for very specialized rituals, and one when Dean got drunk with a tattoo artist one night…”
“She’d remember that much?” Dean asks uneasily, wondering why he’s surprised; Chitaqua is nothing if not creating new planes of paranoia.
“She’s not the only one.” Cas meets his eyes, troubled. “More than once, our survival has depended on being able to accurately identify something impersonating a member of the camp. Regular sex is an excellent way to become intimately acquainted with someone’s body, and Dean’s habit of short term serial monogamy and regular injuries assured there was plenty of opportunity for very close observation.”
It’s not like he wants to bang his predecessor’s exes (so much ‘no’ there), but Jesus. “So never let anyone see me when I’m not dressed? Avoid short sleeves, shorts, bare feet, what? Do I need to layer up?”
“As I’ve not criticized your wardrobe choices yet, I think you can assume anything you’ve worn in public until now is fine,” Cas answers dryly. “Human memory degrades with time, and combined with Dean’s habit of isolating himself after being injured, only his most recent sex partners would be able to immediately recognize the differences on sight. Alicia is a special case; our doctor had only recently been killed when Dean needed his back tended to, and that was less than a month before you first came here.” He shrugs. “It’s less of a concern now than it was before the fever. Losing almost a quarter of your body weight is far more dramatic a change, and if any difference is noticed, it’ll be put up to your illness.”
“Because being sick makes tattoos and scars disappear?” Dean stops to rewind the conversation with a sinking feeling. “Wait, when did anyone but you or Vera see me before Joe’s visit?”
“You put me in charge of the camp, and its members needed reassurance you were alive,” Cas answers, irritatingly reasonable. “The window was sufficient to reassure them you were well. Human memory is malleable and I took advantage of that; they’ll vividly remember seeing you then and as they watch you during your recovery and after, if they ever notice an inconsistency in your physical appearance—scars heal, recall can be faulty, and the rest will be relegated to imagination.”
Huh. “That’ll work?”
“Yes,” Cas answers. “It will.”
Every once in a while, Dean’s reminded that Cas is terrifyingly good at the art of manipulation.
“However, for your watchers, I chose those who didn’t often interact with Dean directly as well as never had sex with him,” Cas continues with a hint of amusement. “For the second criteria, any of the male population would be relatively safe, of course.”
Yeah, no surprise there. “And Ana?”
“Like Amanda, she’s exclusively interested in women.”
Dean thinks of the number of women in the camp that aren’t either lesbians or hate him and really doesn’t like that uncomfortably low number. “So you don’t know how many he—”
“This wasn’t my usual lack of attention; I made an effort to know nothing about Dean’s activities if it were possible.” Cas’s expression tells him that was a wasted effort, but denial has been a close and personal friend. “Unfortunately, it was inevitable that there would be overlap unless I restricted myself to the limited male population, and I wasn’t willing to inconvenience myself that much just so Dean would feel more comfortable.” Before he can brace himself, Cas looks at him curiously. “Why did that bother him? I never did get a satisfactory explanation.”
“Uh.” Dean blinks slowly, scrambling to find an answer that won’t lead to having to actually think about that ever again. “Human thing, we’re weird like that. So, Vera’s right. About you getting out of here, I mean. Duty calls and everything, I’ll be fine.”
Cas nods reluctantly. “I’ll return to check on you during the day and as soon as my duties are complete every evening, of course, and I’ll provide you with a schedule of the days’ activities. Ana, Brad, and Chuck will be instructed to get me and Vera immediately if there’s any change in your condition, but if you require my presence at any time, don’t hesitate to tell them to find me.”
“No problem.”
“They will enforce my continuing order that no one enter this cabin without your or my explicit permission, but you can begin to receive regular visitors,” Cas continues. “When you’re ready, I’ll create a schedule of appropriate times to visit and how long they’re allowed to stay to avoid tiring you unnecessarily.”
Trespassers will be faced Chitaqua’s endless acres of lawn, on a guess. Then: visitors. Visitors, among whom are an unknown number of women who were involved with Dean Winchester. Fuck his life; he’s gonna need Cas to make him a reference list after all, because yeah, he’s gonna need to know.
Eventually. “I’ll think about it.” They really need a safer topic already, where all roads don’t lead to the terrifying minefield of this Dean’s sex life. “So—”
“You’re worried you’ll be bored now,” Cas says out of the blue. “Fortunately, I have a solution for that.”
Maybe talking about creepy sex was safer after all. “Uh—”
“As I told you, I reinstituted full reports from all patrol members after you appointed me to command Chitaqua in your absence,” Cas continues brightly. “They’re ready for you to review at your leisure, which you now have.”
Holy shit. “Everyone?”
“Yes.” Very faintly, he sees the uptick of one corner of Cas’s mouth. “I feel that you, as my commander, should have the opportunity to evaluate my competence as thoroughly as possible.”
“I meant to tell you about the putting you in charge thing, promise,” Dean says desperately, doing the math on six four person patrol teams times seventeen days; despite filling the jeep with reams of paper in all its many types, Chuck may need another supply run soon at this rate. “Fever, Cas. Vera was in on it!”
“Vera saved your life,” Cas answers. “Despite your best efforts to prevent it.”
Seriously? “You’re blaming me for almost dying?”
“It was extremely stressful, and perhaps this will encourage you to consider how your actions affect others,” Cas says serenely. “I haven’t decided yet if perhaps it might be useful to require everyone in the camp to submit daily reports for you to review. It would have the benefit of helping you become more familiar with the daily duties that maintain the camp as well as provide variety in your reading if you think that the patrol reports will bore you. And I certainly don’t want you to suspect even for a moment that I’m neglecting my duties. What do you think?”
Dean shuts his mouth, staring at Cas; he’ll do it, and then all Dean’s got to hope for is a camp-wide revolution to stop it. He’s pretty sure that usually, he wouldn’t like that. “Patrol’s great. Looking forward to it.”
“Excellent,” Cas says, rising to his feet. “I’ll go get them.”