Chapter Text
Rage is easy.
It slithers in quietly, wraps itself around your spine and pulses through your veins like borrowed fire. The moment you taste it — truly taste it — you're undone. Because it feels like power. Like purpose. Like clarity. For a second, you finally understand the world. Even if you’re wrong. Especially if you’re wrong.
Your muscles tighten. Your thoughts sharpen. You begin to believe in things that were never true — because they’re easier. Cleaner.
You are right.
They are wrong.
You are whole.
They are broken.
You see clearly.
They’re all just… stupid.And you hate them for it.
Because hating is simpler than feeling. It’s armor. It spares you from the weight of hope, the ache of vulnerability. Hope is a knife — beautiful, but sharp. And so, you throw it away. You trade tenderness for fury, trade warmth for control. And suddenly, you don’t need anyone.
You speak in knives now.
You hurt people just to keep them from coming closer. You push. You shove. You destroy. And the more you do it, the easier it becomes. It starts small — a word, a silence. Then it grows. A shove. A lie. A corpse. You shed your softness like skin.
Weeks pass. Maybe months. Maybe years. The metamorphosis is patient, methodical. You become cold. Not just cold — empty. You call it strength. But you know, somewhere deep inside, it’s just fear. A fear so old and so deep it’s fossilized into your bones.
And still, you keep going.
You kill what’s left of the person you used to be. And then, anyone who reminds you of that person — they go too. Because memory is dangerous. It might wake something up. Something soft. Something human.
But you don’t want that.
You are hollow now. Numb. On the edge of something bottomless. The idea of death doesn't scare you — only the idea of feeling anything again. It's easier to bleed others than to sit in a room alone with your own reflection.
You're just a wounded thing in a world full of hunters.
So you become the hunter first.
No questions. No apologies. Just blood before betrayal. You break them before they break you. It's not about survival anymore. It’s about silence. About making the world as broken as you are — so you don’t have to feel so alone in it.
And the tragedy?
You’ll never see the bars of your cage. Never notice the prison made of your own skin, flesh and bone, your own breath. Every heartbeat is poison now, a slow drip of death that started the moment you mistook rage for redemption.
You're not living. You're lasting.
A dead man walking.
And Heaven?
It stopped waiting for you a long time ago.
[Castiel]
The room is hushed but for the candlelight’s flicker — low, golden, nervous. Wind murmurs through the broken panes above, rustling the edges of something holy, or something pretending to be. Castiel kneels in the center of the dim space, barefoot on the cold concrete, hands clasped, head bowed not in shame, but in reverence.
"Give me a sign… Show me you’re there.” he whispers into the silence, voice low, like a secret. “I have been trying so hard, Father. I’ve been faithful, haven’t I? You know what I’ve done, what I’ve given. Mommy. Daddy. That was for you . All of it.” His eyes open slowly, blue and glassy, trained on nothing and everything. “These are offerings, signs of my faith, of my love towards you! I know you must be proud of me: I am doing your work, your promise. I’ll give you everything and everyone you’ll ever want. Like I always did… I gave them peace, didn’t I? For you! They were broken and I—I saved them.”
A trembling sound cuts through the quiet.
He exhales, disappointed.
Behind him, a girl — no more than seventeen — whimpers against the gag in her mouth. She’s tied to a worn wooden chair, limbs trembling, cheeks raw from salt and terror. Castiel doesn’t turn at first. He closes his eyes again, pressing two fingers to the scar just under his collarbone, a quiet invocation.
Before he does his artwork he takes a few moments to confess. It’s his way of reaching out to God and telling him, explaining to him the truth and real goal of his actions. He is cleaning the world, taking out one evil human after another, making the beautiful but poisoned Earth into a neat home.
He is on a holy mission.
“She’s not crying because she’s sorry,” he says aloud, voice dry. “She’s crying because she’s still dirty.” Another whimper reaches his ears, followed by a sniff. “Like this girl… Lord, she is sinful, so sinful. To be what she is, to become what she became, it’s a stain on your divine work. She has to bleed. Only her own blood will wash her clean!”
He rises.
The candlelight flickers against his pale chest as he crosses the floor, slow and barefoot, until he’s towering above her. She won’t look at him — and that, somehow, offends him more than anything else.
A slap, sudden and sharp, echoes in the stillness.
“Stop that.” His hand is around her jaw now, tight enough to hurt. His breath is hot and frantic. “I’m talking to our Father .”
She sobs harder, eyes shut tight, trying to escape the penetrating paranoia in his eyes.
Castiel releases her jaw with a shove and steps back, breathing through his nose. His gaze drifts upward to the fractured skylight, where moonlight spills like silver milk across the concrete floor. He stretches his neck until it cracks, letting the cold of the room run its fingers across his bare skin. It calms him. Refocuses him.
“This world,” he mutters, almost to himself, “it used to be pure . Then the rot came. And now it festers in everything… in everyone.” He gestures vaguely toward her. “Especially you.”
She’s shivering now, a trembling little thing in nothing but her underwear — her clothes torn, discarded in the corner. He’d watched her for days. Followed her home. Studied her. Memorized her sins: the late-night boys, the slutty clothes, the pills, the laughter that sounded too much like freedom. She wore shame like perfume and didn’t even know it.
He bends closer. She tries to lean away but can’t — the ropes hold.
“I didn’t want it to be you,” he lies softly. “But you were so loud . You begged for this in ways you don’t even understand.”
His hand moves through her hair with disturbing tenderness, like a lover or a priest, fingers brushing the tears from her cheek as if in benediction.
A cold waft dances through the air making the flame of the candles lose their balance and Castiel smiles widely at the sensation he gets from the soft breeze.
It’s time.
“Don’t cry,” he soothes. “This is mercy. This… this is healing.”
She shakes her head — violently now — but it’s too late.
The knife glints in the low light as he draws it from behind his back. Its edge is clean, reverent. An instrument of purpose, not chaos.
When he moves, he does so gently. A whisper of motion. A stroke. A sigh.
The room is filled with nothing but the sound of gurgled breath and the slow draining of sin. Castiel watches her, face unreadable, as the final shiver leaves her limbs and the light fades from her eyes. When it’s over, he cradles her cheek one last time, like a child put to bed.
“You’re free now,” he whispers, lips close to her ear. “I gave you peace.”
He stands, bare chest rising and falling with a breath that feels too clean, too holy for the thing he’s just done. He looks up at the moon again, pale and perfect and so very far away.
“I will give them all peace,” he says.
And he smiles — serene, beatific — as the last candle gutters out.
[Dean]
Dean’s not about to try anything new. He’s always liked being the god in someone else’s hell — hearing them beg, giggling as they run, tasting the way their blood tries to bloom before the end.
The street he’s now walking smells like piss, weed, and cheap liquor — a signature blend of rot that never really leaves the back of your throat. Dean walks through it like a hymn, the kind of tune only the damned whistle. His bag hangs loose on his shoulder, half-zipped like it doesn’t care if someone gets curious.
But no one does.
They see him — and they look away.
He’s been here before. Enough that the paint on the old buildings seems to peel slower when he’s around. Enough that the cracks in the sidewalk have memorized the weight of his boots. But today isn’t about getting high or slipping into someone else's skin for a while. Today, it’s about blood. About a message. One of these bottom-feeders thought they could circle Sam like a fly on a wound — and Dean doesn’t let anyone touch what’s his.
Benny’s leaning against a rusted-out truck, cigarette glued to his lip. Dean flicks him a two-finger salute, a half-smile cutting across his face like a scar. No fire for the minnows. He’s here for the shark.
The old house at the end of the block looms like it knows its own sins. He doesn’t take the front — he never does. Just a quiet slip around the back, hands already moving like they’ve done this a thousand times. Zipper, click, silencer. Gun’s ready. Smile’s gone.
The back door breathes open. The living room’s empty, but Dean’s heart is already ahead of him. He knows this layout. He’s done work here before — some dirty cop that needed erasing. Mr. Cooper had called him in like a janitor for gore. Dean usually doesn’t take those kinds of jobs, but on the other hand, Cooper had offered him a three-month supply for free. It was good for him, generous and stupid for Mr. Cooper.
Dean moves through the shadows, hugging them like an old friend. A hint of adrenaline pumps through his veins as he hears footsteps closing in on him.
The first guy rounds the corner with no idea he’s already a ghost. One squeeze of the trigger and he folds like bad origami, blood blooming across the floor like spring came early. Dean watches him twitch, then still. He breathes in, slow. Blood and metal. A unique perfume he’ll never get sick of.
A bracelet on the man’s wrist catches the light — skulls, tiny and ridiculous. Dean slips it off, smiles. Number nine. He slips it into his pocket like it’s a love note. A reminder of his growing list of victims.
The next one dies with his dick out. Dean finds him in the bathroom, earbuds in, pissing away his last few seconds. Dean doesn’t shoot him — not yet. He wants something different. So, his belt comes off. Leather tightens in his grip. Then, quick as a blink, it’s around the man’s neck. Dean pulls hard and doesn’t even flinch as the guy thrashes. His face turns a cartoon red before going slack.
Dean steps back, barely breathing hard. “Put some pants on, man,” he mutters, eyes flicking down with a smirk, as he checks the man’s length. “Jesus.”
There was only one left: Mr. Cooper.
Dean moves like smoke. Finds him in the study, where the walls are stained with sweat and cheap cigars. The man turns in his chair like a pig on a spit, eyes already wide.
“Mr. Cooper,” Dean singsongs, his gun back to being his companion. “What? You thought you could try and mess with my little brother, and I wouldn’t come here to get some payback?” Dean tilts his head to the right with a wicked smile on his face.
“Winchester.” The name hits the air like a slur. “Put that down.”
Dean laughs darkly, “This thing?” He lifts the gun, just enough to remind him.
“That thing.”
There’s a moment of silence until Dean pulls the trigger. The shot rings out — one, clean, through Cooper’s hand. He squeals like a stuck thing, already grabbing for it.
“I’ll tell you how this is going to be.” Dean steps in, gun low. The copper tang of blood curls into his nose. “Pants off, Cooper.”
“W-What?”
“You heard me.”
There’s a moment. Then compliance. Old man skin and shaking legs. While he starts doing what he was told to do, Dean looks around the room, always keeping an eye on the man in front of him. His lip curls as his eyes catch something — a baseball bat in the corner.
Thick. Solid. Personal.
He picks it up. Rolls it in his hand like a prayer.
“Bend over the table.”
“You’re insane.”
“And you’re stalling.” Dean raises the bat an inch. “Bend over that table or I’ll blow your fucking brains out!” He raises the tone of his voice as impatience is starting to get to him.
With two shaky naked legs, the old man does as told. With a sudden hint of courage and rage, he growls his threat through clenched teeth, “My guys will find you and tear you apart, kiddo. Mark my words.”
Dean’s grin widens.
“You tried to fuck my brother.” The bat comes down. Crack . “With your filthy little cock.” Another hit. Blood sprays. “You die!” One more swing — and Cooper's skull folds in like rotten fruit.
He laughs at the last part, feeling blood splashing on his face. Then, the room goes quiet. Just the drip of blood and Dean’s steady breath. He stares at what’s left of Cooper and feels... good. Better than good.
He wipes his face with a sleeve. Plays a little more with the bat before dropping it next to the body. Smirks at the mess. Spits on the corpse. Then, like it’s just another Tuesday, he grabs a menthol candy from the crystal bowl on the desk and pops it into his mouth.
As he walks out — blood drying on his shirt, gun tucked away — he hums What a Wonderful World .
Because it is.