Only With the Heart, for flightagain, part 1 of 2

[summergen-mod.livejournal.com]

Title: Only with the Heart: Part I
Recipient: flightagain
Rating: PG
Warnings: None
Author's Notes: Heavily influenced by

Antoine de St Exupéry’s Le Petit Prince

. Set at some point past season 9, where all of Team Free Will is human. Also, I know nothing about airplanes and aeronautical procedures, so forgive any inaccuracies, please. Many thanks to my beta!

Summary: With their plane low on fuel, Team Free Will has to land on an uninhabited island. It’s rather like camping, until Castiel starts to act strangely, Sam is plagued by nightmares and Dean isn’t sure whether he can trust his senses…

…~oOo~…

“Fantastic. Just frigging fabulous. I told you! I hate flying, Cas! And this is exactly why!”

Cas just stared at Dean defiantly. “This could not have happened if you had been flying with an angel.”

“Oh wow, how good for you!”

“Guys! Guys!” Sam stepped between them, his shoes kicking up sand. “Look, it happened. Just drop it. We have more important things to worry about now than Dean’s terror of flying.”

Dean couldn’t let it drop that easy. “Well, I was right, wasn’t I?” he groused. “If we hadn’t gotten on that plane-”

For a moment, Castiel almost looked hurt, but it smoothed over quickly. “We should be glad I managed to land her here instead of in the ocean, Dean,” he said, his tone entirely too sensible. “We could not have passed that storm front.”

“We’re stuck! On a frigging island! Without fuel!”

“Beats drowning in my book. And you screamed like a little girl when we went down.”

“Can it, Sam!”

To his credit, Sam bit down his chuckle and just grinned stupidly. Dean felt the sudden urge to punch something.

“Sam is correct, though. We should concentrate on finding shelter and water.” Castiel wiped a hand over his forehead, trying to clear off the dust and droplets of sweat and oil, but only managed to smudge everything. He looked ruefully toward their downed plane, its wheels buried in the sand. “We should return for supplies once we have found an adequate location.”

“And when it’s cooled down a little,” Sam quickly added. He was sweating buckets, as usual – Dean really didn’t know where he’d gotten those genes from. “Now, can we please get out of the sun?”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m coming. Coming, Cas?”

The beach was expansive and maybe even beautiful, the sand white and fine, but Dean didn’t really have eyes for it. His mind still so-not-helpfully flashed images of their rapid descent, even though it had apparently been a “controlled landing”. Dean was still shaken up, and he’d been white-knuckling even before they’d had to land on a beach.  Demons, ghost, ghouls, even witches any day, but frigging planes!

“Dean.” Castiel fell into step beside him. “I’m sorry.”

“Forget it, Cas.”

“I asked for your trust and let you down. Again. I apologize.”

“Seriously, Cas, don’t worry about it, okay? You couldn’t have flown us through that storm. You did the right thing, taking us down.”

“If I had been a better pilot-”

“Okay, just shut up about that, now! You’ve become a qualified pilot in less time than any of us could have managed, and you’ve only been human for what – a year now?”

“Eleven months and 23 days,” Cas said. Of course he would know it to the date. He could probably give Dean the hour, had he asked.

“Exactly. I know how much this meant to you, okay, buddy? I don’t regret coming with.”

“Even now?”

“Even now. Hey, we stopped the Apocalypse together. We can handle escaping from a desert island.”

“Not so much desert, Dean, look!” Sam pointed straight ahead.

The seemingly endless stretch of beach met with a collection of rocks, cutting them off from whatever lay beyond with just sand and the sea in their backs. There were quite a few palm trees, and a recess between the rocks, almost like a little canopy. It was shade, and it looked rather welcoming.

“Shelter”, Sam declared, satisfied, “Maybe there’s even fresh water filtering through those rocks.”

“There are water-cleaning tablets in Grace,” Castiel said.

Dean would never get over the incredibly girly name Cas had chosen to give his small plane, but after Cas, of all people, had pointed out that Dean called the Impala “baby”, he’d kept his mouth shut.

“That’s great, Cas.” Sam strode ahead, examining the recess. “So we need weapons and blankets, and a fire, and maybe a first-aid kit, just in case. No signal rockets on the plane, I guess.”

Cas shook his head. “Regrettably, no.”

“Okay, first things first. We need to have a place out of the sun, and this is it. It’s also safe and defensible. So I’ll set everything up here and you head back to the Grace to fetch stuff?”

“Heh.”

Sam shot Dean a bitchface. “What is it now, Dean?!”

“You’re a real life Boy Scout, Sammy!”

“Just get lost already.”

…~oOo~…

“You shouldn’t tease Sam so,” Cas said as they trekked back to the plane, following their own footsteps in the sand. Not that they could have gotten lost – there was nothing but the plane on the beach for miles. “His suggestions were all reasonable.”

“It’s just for fun, Cas. You know, affectionate.”

“Like when you informed me that a lucky charm in the cockpit would be redundant.”

“Uh, no. That… Actually, that was just a really bad pun. You know, because the pilot’s an angel. Uh. Nevermind.”

Castiel shook his head. “I have not been an angel for a long time, Dean, and I was never a guardian.” He never spoke of his angelhood without sadness in his voice and on his face. It wasn’t that he was unhappy with his human life – at least Dean didn’t think so – just that there were things he missed. Dean had to hand it to him, though – he really knew his way around the plane.

Once they’d reached it, it took no time at all before Dean was piled with three light sleeping bags, a large blanket, a first-aid kit, a spray can, Cas’s angel blade and a pistol, while Castiel unearthed a box of energy bars, a tin of soup, and a 3 gallon bottle of water. Things actually didn’t look too bad. It was almost like going camping.

Back at the shelter, Sam had constructed a roof of sorts out of palm leaves, had dug a hole for a fireplace, and was building a bonfire out of driftwood and stripped leaves, his multipurpose penknife lying on the ground beside him.

“Shame we don’t have anything to barbecue.” Dean dropped the entire pile of stuff, rescuing the gun from coming in contact with the omnipresent sand by tucking it in the back of his waistband.

Sam looked up, pushing his hair out of the way with the back of his hand.. “What’s wrong with you, Dean? Seriously, this isn’t summer camp. It might very well get really cold tonight.”

“Aww, come on. It’s not like we’re in real trouble. I mean, they’ll realize we’re lost when Cas doesn’t come back as scheduled, and as soon as the storm front is gone, we’ll radio out – right?”

Castiel nodded, carefully depositing the food on the rocks and in the shade. “The transmitter range should be sufficient once the interference has lessened.”

“See?”

Sam shook his head and kept on stockpiling leaves. “We might not even be on a tiny island. It’s hard to tell what is beyond these rocks, or how far the beach extends.”

“We are not in the proximity of any large landmass,” Castiel said.

Dean flopped down into the sand, not even caring that it got everywhere, and stared up at the darkening sky. “Remind me again why we took a case on Hawaii?”

“Because demon activity on islands is rare, Dean.” Sam fiddled with his lighter and managed to ignite the fire on first try. “And so Cas could have his first long-distance flight. You know full well why we were out in the Grace today.”

Because Cas had asked them to come. He had been proud of his accomplishments as a pilot. “Yeah, I know. Pass an energy bar, Cas?”

“Dean, I think we should ration out food.” Cas already had the hand on the box – and Dean knew he would cave if he insisted.

“Why? It’s not like we’ll get stuck here.” Dean looked towards Sam, who wore his serious face. “No way we’ll be stuck here!”

Sam and Cas exchanged a glance that was so not comforting.

“What!?”

“We might be here for a few days until rescue can reach us. They will need to have a plane or ship to spare, and as long as we have shelter and supplies…”

“Great, awesome. I’m going to bed.” Dean spread out the blanket under Sam’s roof, snatched one of the sleeping bags and retreated into the shelter. It was nestled between rocks on three sides, the entrance just a small gap, and just large enough that even a moose like his kid brother could stretch out. It would be cozy with all three of them, but it wasn’t like the car wasn’t cramped.

Dean didn’t think he’d need the gun, but better safe than sorry. Still, with Sam and Cas’s quiet conversation as a backdrop, he was asleep in no time.

…~oOo~…

Dean woke in the middle of the night. He didn’t wake up suddenly, not like when he started up at some sound or a nightmare, but it wasn’t the lazy early morning grogginess either – just a feeling that something was missing, something was wrong. He patted for the gun in the twilight, only to find that Castiel was standing at the entrance to their shelter, shifting his weight. His silhouette still looked unfamiliar in the faded jeans and the loose, ill-fitting grey t-shirt he’d chosen to wear for the flight. The sleeping bag Cas had used lay abandoned by Dean’s side, and Sam was quietly snoring on the other end of the shelter.

“Cas? What is it, buddy?”

Cas looked back at him, his eyes reflecting what little light the rising sun had to offer. “I am sure it is nothing, Dean. Go back to sleep.”

“Did you hear something?” Dean pushed himself up on his elbows, his hand closing around the gun.

“I thought-” Cas cut himself off, shook his head. “My need to urinate must have played tricks on my senses.” He dropped back to his knees to crawl under the roof, rustling with his sleeping bag as he settled back down.

Dean rolled his eyes. “Jeez, Cas, you can’t keep saying things like that. You needed to take a leak and it messed with your head? Seriously, dude?”

Cas, as always, didn’t get the point. “Dreams are still very new to me.”

“What did you dream about then? Those fountains with those naked angel dudes with the water coming out of their…”

Cas frowned. “I don’t remember. It was nothing, I am sure.” And yet, he took care to have the angel blade within reach when he curled up on his side.

…~oOo~…

The morning came bright and early. The canopy of palm leaves offered some shelter from the sun, but it couldn’t keep the daylight out. Thankfully, it came with the good news that breakfast was actually allowed.

Sam, too, had brightened up a little – a good night’s sleep could do that to you. Dean was glad. He liked goofy-kid-brother Sam better than grumpy-spoil-sport Sam.. On the other hand, Castiel was acting shifty. He was usually a quietly cheerful human – or, at least he pretended to be. Dean knew that Cas showed his affection and happiness far more readily than when he was feeling down, even though he had picked up some of Sam’s quicksilver moods and maybe a little of Dean’s sulking. At any rate, that morning he was quiet, brooding, taciturn and distant – almost angelic.

“Hey, Cas, anything the matter?” Sam, at least, had noticed, too.

Castiel visibly started out of his reverie, no longer staring off into space. He seemed to remember that he was holding an empty wrapper and placed it back in the box, along with the one Dean had decided to just drop into the sand, before turning his attention fully on Sam. “It is nothing. I was merely in thought.”

“Dude, you’ve had your head in the clouds!”

Sam grimaced and Cas breathed a sigh. “Dean, you know I don’t appreciate your puns on the fact that I used to be an angel of the Lord.”

“Aw, come on. You’ve got to admit it was a good one.”

Instead of smiling that fond, but indulgent smile Dean had come to expect, Castiel’s expression closed off and he rose abruptly to his feet. “The storm seems to have dissipated. I will see to Grace.”

The brothers finished their breakfast, then broke camp to follow Cas. They took only the weapons and the water – there would be time to get the rest of their stuff once they knew how the rescue would go down, and it seemed stupid to take it back and forth on the off chance that there might actually be something other than seagulls and crabs on this island. Besides, they might end up spending another night.

The Grace still looked as foreign and isolated on the wide beach as she had on the evening before, and the walk there seemed to stretch endlessly. Once, Sam turned as though he’d seen something out of the corner of his eye, but when Dean whirled around, there was nothing there. Just sand and the ocean glittering in the sun in the distance.

Castiel was inside the cockpit, crouched before the console, and looking very unhappy.

“Cas?” Dean expected Cas to slip back into his habitual ‘Hello, Dean’, which had become both an in-joke and something of a ritual between them, but Castiel just gave a non-committal grunt and sat back on his haunches.

Sam crowded into Dean’s shoulder from behind. “That doesn’t sound promising.”

“It’s bad,” was Castiel’s only answer. He didn’t look up, couldn’t face them, just kept staring at the console as if he could make it work by will alone.

Dean was getting an uncomfortable prickly feeling in his neck. “What’s going on, Cas?” Maybe he’d sounded harsher than he’d meant to, but he felt entirely justified when Sam said, at the same time: “The radio is fried, isn’t it.”

Cas shook his head, then. “It isn’t functional, as you say. I don’t know how this could have happened. We didn’t crash-land, and I cannot find a fault.”

“So we’re stuck here. Like frigging Robinson Crusoe?!”

Cas looked up at Dean, that mournful kicked-puppy expression on his face.. “The analogy is accurate, I fear.”

“Okay, this-” Dean gestured at all of it – them, their surroundings, the frigging plane. “-this stopped being fun.”

“I am sorry,” Cas said, looking down at his hands.

“No, but- it’s almost like we knew. Remember when we decided to ration the food?”

“You mean, when you and Cas decided to ration the food. Like you knew.”

Sam tipped his head to one side. “Dean, I didn’t mean it like that. You promised we were over this trust issue thing.”

“Yeah, I’m over it. I didn’t mean it like that either. But come on, Sammy! Not everything has to have some supernatural explanation!”

“Fair enough. Then what is it?”

Dean ran a hand over his neck, wiping away sweat and sand. “Hey, Cas, move. Let me take a look.”

Cas made room for Dean before the console. It turned out, that, though Dean might be able to rebuild a car from scratch, he couldn’t fix this. And while Cas was an outstanding pilot, neither could he. By the time they had exhausted their energies, it had become unbearably hot on the beach, and Dean’s t-shirt was clinging to his back. Cas didn’t look any more comfortable. Sam had long since returned to their campsite, to set things up for a longer stay.

“Now what?” Dean asked, leaning against the Grace where the plane actually offered some form of shade.

Cas shrugged. He was sitting on the edge of the door, his legs dangling. He looked exhausted and human, and shrugging was one of the first really human gestures he had picked up. “The blackbox is still transmitting. We must wait for a search party to pick up the signal. One of us should remain with Grace at all times.”

“Yeah, okay. I’ll take the first shift. Go see if Sammy needs a hand.”

…~oOo~…

When Sam came to relieve him a couple of hours later, he brought water collected in half a hollowed-out coconut with ragged edges and a single energy bar to split between them. Dean’s stomach was growling, and he really would have preferred a burger and a cocktail.

“Cas says there should be another box of protein bars in the back and more soup, but it won’t last long. We should figure out how to fish or something.”

“Not funny, Sammy.”

“No, it isn’t.” Sam crunched up the wrapper with more force than necessary, and went to hunt down what little food there was still stashed in the plane, before shoving it all at Dean. Not that it was much. “Go to Cas, make sure he drinks something. You know he keeps forgetting.”

Castiel was sitting in the semi-shade by their fireplace, his hair sticking up in all directions and coated in sweat, salt and sand. Dean supposed they didn’t really have fresh water to spare, but the sight really, really made him miss showers.

Cas nodded at Dean in greeting, then watched silently as Dean put down what little additional food he’d brought. There were also a can of coke and one of lemonade, but both seemed sickeningly sweet in this heat.

Dean filled the second half of the coconut out of the water container, and handed it to Cas before flopping down beside him – not too close. It was hot enough without sharing body heat.

Cas only drank a sip that barely wetted his chapped lips before passing the water back to Dean. “How do you feel about foxes, Dean?”

“Wow, Cas. That’s a bit random.”

Castiel just watched him with that curious, intense expression, waiting for an answer.

“Jeez.” Dean leant back and knocked the back of his head against the rock. It hurt more than he expected it to, and the fact that Cas was watching him like a hawk didn’t help. “Why would I care about foxes either way? They’re just animals. Nothing supernatural about them, no matter what legends might say. On the plus side, I’m not allergic to them, so there’s that.”

“I don’t imagine they are pets,” Cas said.

“They aren’t. They’ve just been moving into the cities, looking for leftovers, as far as I know. Hell, you’ll have to ask Sam, he’s the nerdy one.”

“I have scavenged for leftovers. It can’t be a pleasant life.”

Dean was stunned into silence momentarily. He had never fully forgiven himself – or Gadreel, even though he turned out to be an ally in the end – for forcing Cas out of the bunker when the angels had fallen.. How could he, even if Cas didn’t seem to bear any grudge on that matter? Still, the former angel had always been too forgiving. “Um. I honestly don’t know, Cas. Why the sudden interest in foxes?”

Cas didn’t reply, just took another sip of water.

“Dude, you don’t have heatstroke or anything, do you?”

“I have been keeping in the shade and have ingested enough water, Dean. I was merely curious.”

“About foxes.”

Castiel met his gaze, unblinking.

“Well, I’m sure we won’t encounter any foxes here. If anything, there might be some birds.”

They left it at that. The rest of their break was spent in companionable silence.. There were no news from Sam, no attempt to contact them, no plane or ship on the horizon, and the radio remained stubbornly on the fritz. They made a can of soup for dinner, and then Cas left to relieve Sam and take the nightshift by the Grace. He took his sleeping bag and the angel blade, but he hadn’t asked any more random questions, and Dean wasn’t unduly worried.

He came to think that might have been a mistake when he found what looked like a child’s footprints when he approached the plane the following morning, to start his shift. However, Cas was fine and didn’t report anything out of the ordinary or even mentioned anything odd – right up until the point where he was getting ready to leave and asked: “Dean, are you able to draw?”

“What? No, Cas, the only thing I’ve ever drawn is sigils and devil’s traps. I’m not an artist.”

Castiel nodded. “I see.”

“Cas, hold up a second. Did you see anyone tonight? An animal on the beach, maybe?”

“There was no one.” Cas met his eyes squarely, neither nervous nor avoiding. “Do you have reason to suspect there might have been someone?”

“No, uh, no. I’m sure it’s only us three here. I guess I’m starting to imagine things. You know, cabin fever.”

“Cabin fever?”

“You know. Feeling trapped.”

“I understand.”

…~oOo~…

Sam came by to relieve Dean by midday, if he could trust his watch. It might have gotten a few grains of sand into its mechanism, and had randomly started the alarm a couple of times, but that was about the most eventful thing that had happened all morning. Sam, however, looked slightly uneasy.

“Did anything happen?”

“Not a thing.” Dean pulled a face. “This has to be the most boring thing that ever happened to us. I mean, we’ve been collecting water off the rocks, and we still have enough food for days before we run out – and then we can still see if we can catch fish or something. It’s not like we are really in any danger, but I feel like I’m going crazy without something to do!”

“And you were having a freak-out about it when we had to land,” Sam said, with a smile that seemed somehow forced.

“You know how I feel about planes!”

“In all seriousness, though – you haven’t seen anything odd?”

“I could have sworn I saw footprints in the sand this morning – but I must have been wrong. I mean, why would a child be here, and Cas would have seen something, so… Why do you ask?”

“I don’t know. It’s like… this feeling. Like we’re being watched, somehow. That, and I’ve been dreaming weird stuff.”

“Weird like normal-weird, or weird like even-for-us-weird?”

Sam shrugged. “Just… weird. It’s not bad or anything, nothing like it was when I had premonitions. It’s just I’ve never dreamed about snakes before. Maybe it’s something Lucifer left behind. Or Gadreel.”

“It’s been a year.”

“Yes, Dean, I know that. Like I said, I’m sure it’s nothing.”   

…~oOo~…

The third day brought no sign of rescue, nor any more strange occurrences. Castiel and Dean had taken a bit of time to decorate their shelter with sigils, just in case, since Dean couldn’t shake that prickly feeling at the back of his neck. He was also very hesitant to let Cas leave for his shift all on his own, for some reason he couldn’t pinpoint. Cas firmly but gently dismissed his concern, and he was right to do so. And still…

Sam and Dean used the day to investigate fishing opportunities. They didn’t have a net, of course, but Sam had tried to fashion a provisory harpoon out of sharply barbed palm leaves. That, however, fell apart before they even reached the ocean, and they ended up collecting a couple of fish that had become trapped in a tide pool and which Sam deemed edible. Nothing much happened, until Dean decided to drop by Cas in his plane, and the former angel was far from welcoming, as if he had been interrupted. There was nothing and no one in sight, except for a strange doodle Cas had drawn into the sand with his index finger – it looked a little like a cloud, but he point-blank refused to explain it.

“How important are roses to you, Dean?”

“Okay, seriously, Cas, you need to drink more water.”

Cas tilted his head and squinted up at him from where he sat cross-legged in the sand behind his doodle. “I am not dehydrated.”

“What is it with the weird questions, then? Foxes, drawing, roses – what the hell, Cas?!”

“I’ve had time to think.”

“And you’ve been thinking about roses.”

“Yes.”

“Okay…”

“They seem to me to be quite inappropriate as symbols of love. The thorns are very unfriendly.”

“Well, every rose has its thorn,” Dean said. He was rather proud of that one, but it went straight over Cas’s head.

“I suppose they are beautiful.”

“I’m not much of a romantic, Cas.”

Cas patted the sand beside him in one of those human gestures he’d seen, but hadn’t quite learned to replicate appropriately. “Sit down. Draw a sheep.”

Dean sat, and stared at Cas’s doodle. “A sheep?”

“Yes. Please.”

“I don’t…” Dean sighed, resigned, and stuck his index finger in the sand. By the time he was done, his drawing looked even less like a sheep than Cas’s. It looked like a blob with eyes, and kinda creepy.

Castiel regarded it with a curiously tilted head. “That does not resemble a sheep.”

“Well, I’m not an artist, I told you! Besides, neither does yours!”

“No, I suppose it doesn’t.” Cas looked honestly disappointed.

“All right, that’s it. Enough of this nonsense, Cas, okay? It reminds me of when you were… Just stop it. Let’s head back to the camp. The Grace will manage on her own for a little while, and it doesn’t look like rescue will come today. Sammy and I caught some fish.”

The fish tasted good enough, but their conversation felt stilted. Cas sat further away from the fire than everyone else, like he was trying to be invisible, and he was stubbornly quiet. Sam muttered something about a snake once, and Dean – Dean just didn’t know what was going on anymore. It felt as though he was slowly going insane.

…~oOo~…