perfectantidote | IC Inbox for deerington

[Skye really shouldn’t be up and walking right now, but there’s no way she could get rest without telling Dean’s roommate what happened. They never really delved into either of their personal lives, but Dean had mentioned that someone back from his home was staying at his house.

Banged up from the car accident and eyes raw and red from crying, Skye knocks on the front door of the run down home. Hopefully they were home because she has no idea how to reach them otherwise, and leaving a note just seems too impersonal.]

Continued from here.

[ Grady's as good as his word: the door to his apartment is unlocked, as much as that matters in a town where people can drift through walls and knock down entire buildings if they want to.

Cas won't find the apartment itself to be particularly welcoming. It's mostly wreathed in darkness, though a few determined bunches of incense letting off thin ribbons of smoke in the corners mean that at least the walls aren't bleeding. Not that the lack of blood really improves the state of the place: after being partially destroyed in the spring, Grady's never really had the time or the inclination to patch it up, spending most of his time these days living over in the cabin by the lake. The outside wall in the living room-slash-open kitchen is taken up by a tarp that's been roughly repaired a few times; it twitches and ripples every so often in the cold blood-soaked wind off the mountains. Sprays of blood are overlaid across each other on the floor, some old and a few more recent. Only a few pieces of furniture survived the fight that wrecked the place.

Grady himself is sat on one of these, taking up the middle of a couch that's definitely seen better days. Candles are dotted around him on the floor and the coffee table, enough to illuminate the handgun he's in the middle of taking apart and carefully cleaning. The smell of gun oil cuts through the funk of the incense.

Like the apartment itself, he's a wreck, though he at least doesn't have anything so obvious as a weather-thinned tarp to give it away. The grief from losing Wes is recent enough that he's still moving around it like an injury, like his heart has been replaced by a hole that's raw and burning. Strangely enough, there's something clarifying about it as well, the pain setting aside the madness and exhaustion that's built up in his head like heavy bricks. He feels like he's thinking clearly for the first time in weeks, though all that's left to think about is the grim determination not to think at all. Just to survive, to act. And to seek out the closest and quickest source of oblivion he can find while he counts down the days for his husband to be brought back to him.

Speaking of which. He'll look up as Cas enters, sparing him a quick glance from his left eye -- the right covered by a leather-tooled eyepatch -- before reaching over for a rag to wipe the oil and cleaning fluids off his fingers. ]

Hey, man. You want something to drink?

[ It's not the first time he's sensed its presence. Nor second. Or even the third. On the fourth, Castiel confronts the little dinosaur with a well-placed squint of his eyes as he spots it hiding away within the trees. ]

Why are you following me?

[ He asks, as if it's perfectly natural to talk to animals, or in this case, birds. A dream guide to be precise. He didn't mind it when it hopped nearby when he was setting out more honey for the bees. So long as it didn't attack the hive, Castiel was perfectly fine being watched. The only reason he confronts it now is he knows who it belongs to. There's no mistaking the pull he feels every time its little hollow bones hopped just a little closer to him. When the bird - a crow - doesn't respond, Castiel decides to take the matter to its leader. ]

text; un; castiel

Why are you tracking me?

Castiel?

Are you busy?

[Cas will find a few things in his room, around Christmas time -

An incense waterfall, but also a large fermenting kid, so that Cas can properly jar as many goods as his heart desires. The note attached reads:

New project for us to try out? Fail spectacularly at? Not sure.
Hope the incense thing is soothing, I thought it was kind of neat.

Merry Christmas, DIY buddy.]

[Left outside the house is a dark blue basket. Inside is an associate of tea, chocolates, a box of lemon drops, a bottle of wine and a copy of Charles Dickens, Christmas Carol. A blue Tardis-shaped card attached to the basket says, 'Santa' in silver marker.]

On the eve of the 24th, a brightly colored dreamguide vested in black and yellow comes marching into your space. A golden hue surrounds it, shimmering with every flicker of its wings creating a venerable light show. Hanging from its short limbs is a ziplock bag with a few tablespoons of honey and no note attached. Freshly collected, the little buzz maker circles around you once, twice, and on the third drops the bag above you - hope you catch it. Once it's made its delivery it will go on its merry way.

IC Inbox for deerington

no subject

action - forward dated to the 26th

text; un: castiel

text. un: jack

[Sometime Around Christmas]

Action; no reply; December 24th

24th of December