The sun is low on the horizon as Castiel makes his way over to Dean’s cabin, carrying nothing but the bag over his shoulder. Camp Chitaqua is mostly silent; most alphas and omegas have paired off with their mates by now, or whatever partner they’d chosen for the season. Only a few betas are milling around, and they pay him no mind. He and Dean have their reputations, but there is never any doubt about which cabin Castiel will find his way to, just as there’s never any doubt about who Dean will open his door for, no matter how many omegas or beta females try to change their minds in the interim.
His pills shake in his pocket as he walks, their bottle rubbing against the weed he keeps next to it, but he’s sober. Well, almost sober. His mind is still dulled from the joint he smoked that morning, but an entirely different haze is starting to overtake him. The fog of rut is a different alteration, and while this is his eighth rut, he still is not used to it. Already his thoughts are growing sluggish in his head, replaced with an unbridled energy that flows through every vein in his body and sets his extremities abuzz. His pre-rut hasn’t fully melted into the main event, not yet, but he’s close, and his steps quicken until he’s standing at Dean’s door.
He barely knocks once before Dean is swinging the door open. The omega probably saw him coming, or caught his scent through the open window; Dean has always had an impeccable nose. When he was an angel, Dean had caught his scent a few times while flying, before he even landed, something no human or angel had ever managed before.
“Hello, glorious leader,” Castiel smiles, taking in the sight of Dean. He smells delectable already, pine and oil receding to the almost salivating sweetness of apple pie and citrus. His skin is red and flushed, and his pupils are dilated. They’re not going to have to wait long before their cycles have them both.
Dean rolls his eyes and grabs Castiel by the neck of his shirt. Already his grip is weaker than it should be, heat sapping his strength. “Get in.”
Castiel obeys, and Dean shuts the door behind him. Dean’s nest is already half-built on his bed, consisting of only his own clothing. He’s quick to grab Castiel’s shoulderbag, and Castiel doesn’t miss the contented sigh that escapes his throat as he rifles through Castiel’s clothing. It’d be easier if Dean asked for them earlier in the season, as he did when he used to maintain a nest outside of heat. That must’ve been two years ago, now. Dean only builds nests on the cusp of heat now, and he never asked for Castiel’s clothing elsewise.
As Dean gets to work, Castiel busies himself with securing the cabin. His instincts hum as he secures each lock on the door, before locking the window and securing it with a few boards. He then checks the walls of the cabin for any entry points, the support beams for any imperfections. He shoves a supply rack in front of the door just in case. Alphas who’ve had ruts Before have told him that securing the surroundings in the last throes of pre-rut has always been an instinct, but it’s an especially strong one now. Croats don’t get heats or ruts during the mating season, and only the betas and pups remain to protect Chitaqua for the next three days.
“Cas,” Dean says from behind him, and Castiel turns. Dean has the biggest cabin in Chitaqua, as befitting his station, and securing the cabin has given Dean more than enough time to build his nest. The omega sits in the middle of it, still clothed.
Castiel shucks his jacket and throws it at him, and Dean is quick to add it to the nest. Castiel takes off his shoes and walks to the threshold, where he waits. His body is thrumming now, so focused on Dean’s scent he can barely think. When Dean crooks his fingers in a welcoming gesture, Castiel wastes no time before climbing into his position at Dean’s side.
“You sober?” Dean asks, because Dean is still, stubbornly, annoyingly, anti-Castiel’s drug habit.
Castiel cups Dean’s cheek, running his thumb along the hard line of Dean’s frown. It’s the first time he’s touched him in months, and he closes his eyes as he enjoys the thrill it sends up his spine. “There isn’t a sober alpha or omega left in this camp.”
Dean’s lips almost jerk up into a smile. “You know what I mean.”
“I’m sober,” Castiel replies, and Dean tilts his head to the side.
Castiel wastes no time before rubbing the scent gland on his cheek against him, mixing their scents in a way that sends his instincts singing. He’s almost made peace with them, those all-too-human urges that had been fully absent while he was an angel. It’s easier to do so in times like this, when both he and them want the same thing, an agreement that only really happens around Dean. Dean raises his wrist’s glands to Castiel’s own neck, and that’s even better. He feels his body relaxing as the haze grows stronger and heat begins to pool in his abdomen.
He moves on to the other side of Dean’s neck, and Dean twines their hands together, skin hot as their scent glands slide against one another, before rubbing his own cheek against Castiel’s jugular. Castiel breaks his hands away to run his wrists under Dean’s shirt and up his sides, pulling off Dean’s shirt as he does. The haze is starting to overtake him now, demanding more, and soon he’s kissing and licking at Dean’s neck, pulling those sweet sounds from Dean that he forgets how much he misses until he hears them again. Dean’s own hands find their way to Castiel’s stomach, and the scent of them together becomes dominant in the room, enough to make Castiel’s head spin. They become a flurry of motion as they scent each other, touching each piece of exposed skin they can reach.
Dean pushes Castiel onto his back to straddle him, and Castiel goes more than willingly. He rests his hands on Dean’s hips, still covered by his jeans. Dean is panting above him, face and chest red, hands hot against Castiel’s chest, pupils blown wide. Castiel needs to get those pants off. He needs it more than he’s ever needed anything before.
He unbuckles Dean’s belt, the haze in his mind so strong that the action is needlessly complicated. Dean makes quicker work of Castiel’s own, his years of heats making his experience far outweigh Castiel’s skills. Castiel shimmies out of his pants quickly, and whines when Dean raises himself off Castiel’s lap to take off his jeans. The whine dies when Dean seats himself back onto Castiel’s lap, skin almost burning where it touches Castiel’s own.
Castiel’s hands find their way back to Dean’s hips, and he grips them hard. He wants to flip Dean over and push into him hard, and he knows it’d be easy to, strong off his rut as he is. His instincts scream at him too. But he knows Dean, knows that he needs to let him take control at the beginning, when he still has a bit of his wits about him. And so he looks up at Dean from beneath his lashes and asks, “C’mon, Dean. Take me.”
Dean doesn’t move, and for one terrifying second, Castiel thinks he’s going to tease him, as he was fond of when they used to do this outside of heat. Castiel wouldn’t be able to control himself if Dean tried that, not with how taut every muscle in his body already is from his efforts to control his desperation. Dean, however, is too far gone to control himself either, and Castiel releases a breath as he plants his hands on Castiel’s thighs and raises himself up.
Dean’s worry at him showing up high to his cabin is always unfounded. He doesn't need to. Nothing compares to the slick slide of Dean around him, to the shiver it sends down his body and the thrill it sends up to his head. Dean is wet and warm around him, walls clenching as he adjusts to Castiel’s length, and it’s enough to make Castiel groan and dig his nails into Dean’s sides. His mind goes blank, razor focused as it is on the sensation of Dean around him. Nothing else comes close to filling the hole his grace left behind.
Dean doesn’t move, and Castiel’s instincts twitch in impatience. He’s growling before he’s aware of it, and that’s enough to make Dean open his eyes.
“Fuck,” Dean gasps. “Hold your horses.”
But he starts to move, and Castiel’s growl dies in his throat, replaced with the odd moan as Dean starts to roll his hips. He’s well-practiced at it, each roll stronger than the last, desperate to wring the relief he craves out of Castiel’s body. Castiel lets himself be used, enjoying the view of Dean on top of him, unencumbered by clothes or the multitude of walls that Dean is all too quick to construct nowadays. It’s a rare gift, and Castiel re-memorizes the smooth expanse of Dean’s chest, noticing the new scars and re-familiarizing himself with the old. He’s still just as beautiful, just as perfect, as the day Castiel made him.
Dean’s rhythm starts to falter, and Castiel seizes the opportunity to flip their positions, pinning Dean on his back. Dean’s too far gone to mind, not when Castiel slides back into him, the angle of their hips allowing him to reach that much further into him. The obscene sound of their union fills the room, slick and wet, and Castiel’s mouth waters as the desire to taste Dean fills him. Only the deeper desire to tie them together keeps him in place, fucking Dean as hard and deep as they both crave.
Dean’s fingers card into Castiel’s hair, growing tight enough to sting as Castiel increases his rhythm, and Castiel takes that as permission to kiss him. Which he does, long and hard, like a man drowning, and Dean opens up to him with no resistance. Dean’s sweet on his tongue and soft around him and Castiel loses himself in it, in the storm of instincts and skin and the wonderful concoction that is his Dean, even after all this time.
Having Dean spread out beneath him, whining for him, is better than any of the drugs, better than all the omegas Castiel tries to replace him with combined. He wraps his arms under Dean’s shoulders, pushing them chest to chest, and as he mouths at Dean’s scent gland he feels Dean wrap his legs around Castiel’s waist. They are so, so close like this, a mess of skin and sweat and sound, that Castiel can’t tell where he ends and Dean begins.
If there is any upside to Castiel’s humanity, it is this. Angels are genderless things; mating cycles are entirely out of the realm of their knowledge. Sure, Castiel had known about them, but it had been a clinical knowledge, devoid of any true understanding. There is no understanding them, not until you’ve experienced one yourself. The haze, the pleasure, the mindlessness, the love, the desire to covet, to protect, to own. To angels, mating cycles are an obscene display of human hedonism. Only now does Castiel know the beauty of them, the reason why God favours these creatures so. There is no angel equivalent for the unbridled connection it creates. For now, in this nest, Dean and Castiel are one soul, one body. There is no room for anything else.
“Cas,” Dean pants, mindless in the way he always is this close to a knot. “Cas, Cas, alpha--”
“I’ve got you, Dean,” Castiel gasps as he puts his hand over the mark he left on Dean’s shoulder, a greater claim than any other alpha will ever be permitted. “I’ve got you. I’ll give you what you want.” He always does. Always.
His hand is heavy on Dean’s shoulder as he feels his knot grow with each thrust, until it begins to catch on Dean’s entrance. He kisses Dean again as he knots him, swallowing one last whine, and grinds it into him until Dean locks around him with a shout. He kisses Dean through that, too, until the omega has to break away for breath.
Castiel reaches up to wipe away the tears falling from Dean’s eyes. Dean has always been a crier, even the few times they did this while Castiel was still an angel, before Dean began to shoulder the weight of failing the world. Dean nuzzles into his neck, and Castiel runs his fingers through Dean’s hair. None of Dean’s beta females and other omegas get to see him like this, warm and soft under the layers of ice he’s frozen himself in these past years. That knowledge, paired with Castiel’s handprint on his shoulder, are the only things keeping Castiel’s teeth out of Dean’s neck.
Castiel’s on the losing team, now. The lack of his grace is a burning hole inside him, one he fails to fill with absinthe and marijuana and amphetamines and a long strew of omegas lonely and stupid and desperate and impressionable enough to have him in their beds. Every day he wishes he could go back in time and undo it all, do it differently.
“Cas,” Dean whimpers as he clenches around him, drawing another release from Castiel’s cock, and as Castiel leans in to kiss him quiet again he knows it would’ve been no use. That handprint on Dean’s shoulder had not been a one-way claim. There was never any route he could’ve taken that wouldn’t have ended with him falling down, down, down into his place between Dean’s thighs.