A warehouse in Van Nuys, CA to the streets of Fandom, Sunday afternoon

[scruffnfeathers]

Castiel was surrounded, which, well, was the plan.

The stupid, ridiculous, suicidal plan that was almost guaranteed to lead to the end of the world.

Yeah. This would be fun.

He dropped his sword, turning to look each of his fellow angels in the eye in turn. Dean and Sam were waiting outside. Sam was going to try to kill Zachariah. Dean was going to say yes to Michael taking over his body. Castiel just wanted to be done.

"What are you waiting for?"

The angels moved, and so did Castiel. He pulled open his shirt, revealing the bloody ruin of the symbol carved into his chest. He gave them just a moment to acknowledge just how freaking crazy he was, then he pressed his hand to the symbol.

And in a blinding explosion of white light, they were gone. And so was Castiel.

But gone where?

His back struck brick and Castiel blinked. The area was familiar, though it was clearly not Van Nuys. Nor was it where he usually went when banished.

His knees folded and he dropped to the pavement.

He could figure out details later. For now, he was content just to flop to the ground and breathe, for a minute.

[ooc: expecting one. The Cass is back in town! Booyah!]

Comments

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

Well Chuck had seen a lot of weird things while walking the streets of Fandom, but bloody angel laying on the ground was a new one. He broke out into a run to reach Castiel, relieved to see him back but worried since he was not supposed to be the person hurt on the ground, ever.

"Holy shit, Cass," Chuck said when he reached where Castiel was laying. He made a strangled noise in the back of his throat when he saw that there was something freaking carved into Castiel's chest. "What the hell happened to you? Are you okay?"

[scruffnfeathers]

Castiel looked up blearily. "Chuck." He glanced around again. No wonder the area was familiar. He'd spent more time here than any other location on Earth. "I'm back."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

"Yeah," Chuck said, sounding a little relieved. He glanced down at Castiel's chest again. "Seriously, what the hell happened to you?"

[scruffnfeathers]

"This?" Castiel was careful not to touch the sluggishly bleeding symbol. "I, uh. I did that."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

"Why would you ever do that to yourself?" Chuck asked, frowning. "It looks like it hurts. A lot."

[scruffnfeathers]

"It does." What was the question, again? "It's a banishment sigil. I needed a portable surface that could be easily hidden."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

So he decided cutting himself up would be a good idea. Chuck didn't even want to cover how effing crazy that was. Instead he crouched down so he could be closer to Cass' level, figuring if he wasn't freaking out about the fact that he was bleeding, then he shouldn't either.

"Where did you go?" Chuck asked. "I mean, you just left and I didn't know if you were ever coming back."

Chuck sort of realized he was the last person to be lecturing someone on just up and leaving without warning, but he had been worried, dammit.

[scruffnfeathers]

Castiel didn't end up bleeding that often.

"It wasn't on purpose," he said, maybe a little petulantly. "Shouldn't have gone at all. Apparently I couldn't make much of a difference."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

Chuck frowned again. "I'm sorry. Are things...is everything over?"

He could only assume that Castiel was back because his universe was gone and there wasn't anything left to fight for.

[scruffnfeathers]

Castiel closed his eyes and nodded. "If not now, then very soon."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

"Fuck, I'm really sorry," Chuck said, wincing. He paused for a moment, not really sure where to go from there. "...Look, I know it doesn't mean a lot considering what you've probably been through, but I'm really glad you're back."

[scruffnfeathers]

"This is likely better than oblivion," Castiel said, attempting to lever himself up. "So, yes. So am I. Did this Dean get my message? Is Angelbane alright?"

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

"The cat's fine, last I saw," Chuck said, standing up straight and offering Cass a hand. "Still pregnant."

Which was good, because Chuck wasn't about to midwife for a cat.

[scruffnfeathers]

Castiel grabbed Chuck's hand and pulled himself up. "Still? I was certain a cat's gestation period wasn't that long."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

Chuck lifted an eyebrow. "It's only been about a week and a half."

[scruffnfeathers]

"It's been several months." It turned out the Apocalypse took awhile. Who knew? "Though I suppose I should not be surprised by the time dilation." He winced slightly -- which on him was almost enough to be an out and out groan -- and raised a hand to his chest, still carefully not touching the sigil. "The island must have pulled me back."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

Chuck gave Castiel a concerned look. "Should we do something about that? I mean, my first aid skills aren't too sharp but you should probably clean that and maybe wrap a bandage around it."

[scruffnfeathers]

Castiel looked down at his chest. ". . . I don't know. As far as I know, I'm the first angel to attempt such a thing. Can it be cleaned without touching it?"

Who knew if someone could accidentally set it off and send him somewhere else.

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, I guess so. Well, I mean, you can get in the shower and wash the blood off without having to touch anything," Chuck told him. "What's the big deal about not touching it?"

[scruffnfeathers]

Showers. Right.

"It's a banishing sigil," he explained. "For angels."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

"What, and touching it sets it off?" Chuck asked. He didn't know about these things, okay? "You should definitely wrap it up with a bandage or something in that case."

[scruffnfeathers]

"There has to be blood." Of which there was plenty. "Possibly your own. I don't know, we never used it much until recently."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

Chuck thought about that for a moment. "I mean, I could help you wrap it up without actually touching it. There's a whole bunch of medical stuff at Caritas. But you're on your own for a shower if you want to get the excess blood off."

[scruffnfeathers]

"You keep medical supplies at the bar?" Yes, that was totally the important part of that statement. Mostly because it occurred to Castiel that the bar had liquor, too. A lot of it. "We could possibly just dump water of it to clean the blood off. It will likely stop bleeding, eventually."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

"Support Services left a whole bunch of supplies in there," Chuck explained. Thank you, Francine, for making him do that. "And the bar gun has a water setting. It'd be easy enough to spray you off with that."

And, yes, there was a ton of liquor there. Chuck was thinking of that as well.

[scruffnfeathers]

Castiel was quickly becoming quite the fan of liquor. "Then we should go there. I don't wish to shock Angelbane unduly."

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

Chuck shook his head a little, wondering how a cat could possibly be shocked by that. "Yeah, we wouldn't want to scare the cat. Let's go (http://community.livejournal.com/fandomtownies/5088739.html?thread=202738915#t202738915)."