tampered | log; on-going

Current Music: mommy are the angels dead? - nathan larson

log; on-going

When; RIGHT NOW.
Rating; PG-13 for Ruby's mouth. And making assumptions about Heaven, hi.
Characters; Castiel (

ordered) & Ruby (

blackeyedskank)
Summary; You should never judge a person until you have walked a mile in his shoes; alternatively, an angel and a demon walk into heaven...
Log;

It's silent. If Ruby were anymore cliche she would say something as trite as silent as the grave, but she knows better. Her grave was more than six feet deep and the hole at the end of it opened into a bigger hole that opened into a Pit and that Pit opened into the fire. Sometimes she wonders if anyone thought to bury her when they found her, bloated and decaying, or if there was anything left after she went down under, ready to spend half a century poking and prodding and being poked and prodded. She doesn't remember when she got off the line and turned her hypocrisy on, doesn't remember when she decided that she wasn't going to forget who or what she had been. But she remembers the wind and the sun and the seasons: what they felt like as they changed and turned. She remembers being a live and the way bare grass felt under bare feet, what it was like to laugh because something was funny, to be happy just to be happy. When she was young, she probably imagined that would be heaven - utter bliss and contentment, the sun always shining, feeling happy all at once and all of the time.

She doesn't know where she is or whose dream she has stepped into. It's too quiet to be reality, too still to be a dream. Her footfalls don't make any sound as she steps across green grass and stares into a sky so bright and blue it's white. There is no sun but the glare is harsh regardless, and Ruby lifts a hand to her forehead and squints in the distance, feeling for a breeze, straining for a sound. A sinking feeling in her gut spreads alternating hot and icy fingers across her belly, and Ruby has more inclination to believe that she is somewhere she doesn't want to be as she catches sight of a figure in the distance, almost too far to get close to.

Without thought, she walks, making her way through a pocket of reality that remains vague and undefined. It could change in an instant, become something else. Ruby keeps her eyes on the glare of the nonexistent sun and makes her way across the naked field, the grass undisturbed as she goes.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

While the rest of the City slept, one Angel found himself wandering amidst dreams of his own. Dreams that were in fact memories; the very ones he took solace in each and every day. This had been the place where he had been created. This had been the place where he had grown. And this had been the place in which he had become Castiel. It was a memory of a distant but unforgotten place. One which he hoped to return to, and yet one he wasn't sure he would ever see again outside of his memories. With the war raging on, he didn't know how much he could be sure of any more. But there was still one thing that never wavered, and it was for that very reason that Castiel had yet again found standing amidst that empty space.

Despite the location, his vessel remained intact; further proof that this wasn't as real as he would wish it to be. But that made it no less important. It was still warmth and comfort. This was his home, no matter how far away his orders took him. Even fighting through the bowels of Hell, he had never once forgotten this place. And he never would, for as long as he continued to exist. Thoughts of his fallen brethren ran through his mind. Yet another thing that could never be forgotten. They had been born here, and they had died in His Creation. To protect His children.

His Father was close; his brothers even closer. And closer still was one demon. A demon he knew all too well. "You aren't meant to be here." They may be memories, but they were of a place that Ruby had long since been denied access to. Her decisions had been her own, and the consequences had been clear from the moment she had made that choice. She would never be allowed to step foot in his home, no matter what she did now.

It's impossible to have gotten that close that quickly, but Ruby hears Castiel's voice as if they'd been walking side by side the entire time. She raises her hands again, shields her eyes from the glaring in the sky, and looks at his shoes. It's an interesting concept and not something that she thinks about every day. Like elbows on boys and what girls' toes look like, she finds herself surprised to learn that Castiel is wearing shoes, and it's enough of something fixed and random that she can pull herself out of the sky and back into her own mind. Although there is no black smoke and her body doesn't scream, she feels like she's just been yanked out and thrown back into the meat unceremoniously. Castiel's face is only more of a reminder of what she is and what she's doing.

"You think I bought a one way ticket for this?" she asks with bared fangs, her voice a low hiss, nearly a whisper. It's almost like being human: forced under a microscope you're looking at yourself through, judging all your past misdeeds and actions through a critical eye, realizing that the life you've led, while maybe it wasn't what you expected, has been entirely your fault. There are a dozen spells at least warring for dominance in her head, Latin words and ingredients that she remembers from five hundred years ago, but her tongue is ash in her mouth except for the bite she deals and the words have no purpose on their own.

She decides that she isn't going to be intimidated or afraid. Castiel won't smite her. He won't banish her to Hell or kill her because she has a purpose, and angel as he is, he can understand the requirements of having a job to do. Memories of a silver knife and pumping blood flash in her mind but she hides them so that he won't see. "Where the hell am I and why doesn't it have a bright red exit sign pointing the way out?" Ruby moves beyond him, careful not to touch him, not to bump his shoulder, step anywhere nearer to him than is mandatory.

Her skin feels like it is beginning to blister. She wonders if God is watching.

"You have been granted something none of your kind are welcome to." Even now, his gaze remains turned upward. To the sky that isn't there. To the clouds that don't exist. It's nothing more than a manifestation, granted to them for this very reason. Ruby's presence is like an itch under his skin. It's there, a nagging sensation, but one that can't be gotten rid of so easily. He's aware of her being there, but searching for a way to be rid of her will only make the problem worse.

While it may have been new to Ruby, it was familiar to Castiel. That warmth that surrounded them. The love of his Father. It was something tangible to those with faith. And while humans may squander that feeling, he revelled in it. He had been created to do as his Father wanted, and there was no other path he would rather take. Even as he watched his brethren Fall, their Grace torn free in their moments of doubt, Castiel stood firm in his beliefs. There was a reason for everything. And so, there would be a reason for this intrusion. He just had to find what it was.

The City. Curses. Those thoughts were pushed away in favour of the here and now.

Silence follows, thought it's one that is comfortable to him. All that happens here will be that way to at least one of the two. He wants to be annoyed in some way that she is there. He thinks he should be. But it isn't possible. He's not meant to be. Not here.

The sky grows brighter. In the distance, a glow. His brothers. His garrison. Together, before all began to fall apart around them. To him, the feeling that follows their arrival is close to happiness. Elation perhaps. It is the family he once had, and the brothers he has now lost. But here, they are still together. Here, their future has yet to occur, and just maybe, Castiel finds himself lost in that feeling. It's something he misses almost as much as truly being here.

Her throat and mouth go dry, and it's impossible to breathe in that instant, all the air choked and sucked from wherever it is they are. It feels like a barbell is rolling up and down her back, perched on her neck, digging a straw into the marrow of her bones and sucking her dry. Walking, she stumbles; she doesn't fall, but her steps falter and the world turns for a moment: green grass becoming bright sky. Sense comes in like a station on a badly tuned radio, and Ruby bends double, her hands on her knees and a sick twist in her stomach.

When she's composed and less startled, she straightens up and throws a dirty look back over her shoulder at Castiel. All at once she thinks that this is some sort of trap, that he's been lying this whole time and is bringing the fire of damnation down on her in this corner where no one can see. Can angels lie? Has he ever lied? Does she care?

No, she doesn't.

The look she gives him becomes less of a look and more of a veiled threat as she comes back around, her steps so heavy that they should be loud. They should tear up grass and overturn dirt but they don't: the earth stays untouched. Ruby stops just before she reaches Castiel, one arm out to shove him, tear into him with her nails and teeth and the knife at her hip. She doesn't touch him, too scared and soft to strike.

"Did you call more of them? Are more coming?"

For the first time since her arrival, he looks at her. Really looks at her. To her reaction at all that was happening. To her host that, like his own vessel, existed in a place they shouldn't be allowed to tread. And yet it was because of that host that he found it easier to be able to understand her. Or at least, understand her feelings at the time. It was something he had only begun to learn first hand, since his return to earth.

Fear fronted by anger. The same mask that Dean used to wear, more often than not.

"You are the only one here that I have spoken to." That he could feel Uriel's presence waiting in the wings was something he was keeping to himself. This was a memory he still held some level of control over. It would play out when the time came. How long the wait would be was anybody's guess.

He should send her away. He knows that much. He doesn't want her there almost as much as she wants to leave. And yet she is still there. No exit is showing up, and no escape is being made for either of them yet. But neither is anything else changing. Not just yet. He wants a purpose to this meeting, even if it's one he has to create himself.

"Why didn't you turn back?" From reaching him. From entering this place. It wasn't either of those he really wanted answers to. The real question lay in two brothers who slept in a land far from this one. Why hadn't she turned away from the Winchester's already?

Her throat is still dry and the air smells more and more acrid, the kind of pinching smell that belies demons, only this is much sweeter, and it burns her nostrils and her lungs and makes her eyes water. She looks at the ground, their shoes facing each other, and wonders again how odd and strange a thing it is to have in common. She's still staring at their shoes when she says, "That doesn't exactly instill feelings of comfort."

For a moment her eyes roll black when she looks up, but the world and the sky and the ground and the smells are so utterly unbearable that she brings them back to blue quicker than she ever as before, her fingernails digging into her palms. His question comes at her through a glass, muffled and absorbed by cotton and a ringing in her ears. There are eyes on her back, watching, pointing, waiting, wanting, and when she looks at Castiel there's enough rage and disdain in her gaze to melt a tire iron, though it isn't directed at him. This rocky truce they stand on is shaking and crumbling but it is a truce, at least in her eyes. They can use each other, find the other useful.

But she's had it. The atmosphere makes her cranky, makes her sick, makes her want and regret and human. She grabs the lapels of his jacket and pulls so that his face is in close proximity to hers. Voice low and deeper than normal, eyes not black but wanting to be black, she says, "Why don't you use that omniscience of yours and tell me my own business?"

She's sick of people asking her and telling her to justify her actions. She's sick of things that she's done in order to push this whole thing forward. Part of her hates who she's become and part of her loves it so much she can taste it all through her mouth. She'll never have what is here, and what she wants is so far away it's only possible to see sometimes. "I have no choice."

It will always be safety where Ruby finds danger. Comfort where she finds distress. They are complete opposites in almost every way. However, unlike every other demon, Castiel hasn't yet had a reason to consider her a true threat, despite all that she is doing with Sam. It is Dean's job to stop that. Just as it was Ruby's job to keep him alive while Dean wasn't around. She is seen as important to Sam, who in turn is important to Dean. The same man that is needed to bring an end to the apocalypse. That gives her importance where others would not see it. Should any of his siblings find their way in to the City, there is no telling whether they will be as tolerant as he is. After all, she has already been present in their past, so no matter the outcome here for the demon, she has served her purpose in their own world. Time can't be altered that far.

Just as she isn't a threat, she isn't an ally either. So as she makes a move against him, Castiel can't help but tense ever so slightly. There's a spared look to her grip on his coat, and nothing more, outwardly. He can't trust her, even here in his memories. Perhaps especially here where there is information that, should she pay attention, isn't meant for her eyes. Hers or anybody else's, aside from those already involved. But this is one small favour he is granted in her being a demon first and foremost. These are grounds that don't stand in her favour and never will.

"Because of Lilith?" And Ruby's betrayal of the demon. But if that had been the only reason, then it would have been simple enough for her to keep hidden until all was done with. She was managing well enough so far, despite making herself known to the brothers countless times already. If she wants to remain hidden, Castiel knew she could find a means somehow. So what else is it?

Ruby isn't the type of person to hide, not from something like this, not in reality, anyway. She can slither with the rest of them and makes herself scarce when the moment is not her own. She knows how to blend in with the darkness like a whisper, and she knows how to mask her intentions behind a wall in order to deceive and manipulate. Lilith scares her. The prospect of going back to Hell and being served to Lilith on a platter, her simpering and scuttling bitch for years Ruby can't count on all her fingers and toes... it terrifies her. Just as the angels terrify her. Just as Alistair had terrified her, even when she'd been doing as all good demons do.

She plays it close to the chest and doesn't let them see her weak spots or her strong sides, but when faced with unlikely odds and the smell and taste of heaven filling her mouth, none of it seems to matter anymore. Ruby knows her place, she knows her role, and she knows that Castiel knows her role. But he's too impassive, too calm and collected. He is what Ruby is in the dead of night, in the shadows of early morning. Outside of her element, she drowns, and it's not fair that she should have to be brought here, that she should have to see this. Not when she can't ever have it.

Her hands are still fisted in his lapels, and she shoves him without warning. She can smell the angels over the scent of dew-grass. Blue eyes narrow and pinch, and she moves away from him again, turning in the opposite direction while calling over her shoulder, "You're fighting the same battle I am, and you know it. If you thought for a second that I wasn't being useful, you'd turn me into a shit stain on the bathroom carpet. Or someone would tell you to, since you're incapable of making your own decisions."

She has no idea where she's going, but she's sure there's something here she can kill.

They are both rediscovering humanity from two different starting points. It is something that sets them apart from most others that he has met. Castiel is an outsider looking in, and Ruby is an insider kicked out. He know how humans act, and yet everything can still catch him off-guard. He has seen humans and demon alike as they do their best to survive, and he has witnessed the achievements and failures made by them. But still, Ruby is a puzzle to him. One that he doubts he will ever fully understand. She has drives outside of what they are aware of, and Castiel doesn't think that is ever likely to change.

"You've already played out your usefulness." It was a challenge, of sorts. For her to give him reason. If she has already done what she was meant to do, why should they continue to keep her around? Why shouldn't they just be rid of her and free the brothers from one of the problems they face.

His thoughts drift to Alistair. Of Sam stepping in-between he and the demon and forcing the answers out of him. Of Sam, the boy with the demon blood, doing Dean's job for him, and saving them both in the process. Without Ruby, that wouldn't have happened. Dean would be back in Hell, and Castiel would have returned to Heaven. He would have failed. Without Sam. Without Ruby's influence.

He watches as she moves to leave, but makes no effort to stop her. Instead, it's just a simple sentence. "Uriel was going to kill you." Nothing more, nothing less.

She hears his voice as if it's coming through water, a sharp ringing in her ears at the building pressure, cultivated through anger and frustration and a sick half-need to wish she could stay here for the rest of her life. Ruby thinks it could be peaceful in the stillness if she didn't feel the weight and steady hand of judgment and disdain baring down on her shoulders from every direction. It's too hard to ignore, like a glaring, infected sunburn, cracked and peeling beyond recognition, and it's not fair. She and Castiel are the same in their ignorance of some things, mirror images, different sides to the same coin, and she wonders what it would be like if they had been bred into different places, if the string of fate had put him where she had been placed and vice versa, some sick parody of being switched at birth.

It's enough to keep her thoughts off of what he's said, and that in turn helps to quell the shocking anger and burn of realization through her chest. She knows what it's like when a demon dies, what happens to something that can't go back to Hell and will never go to Heaven. To utterly not exist is the terminal definition of lonely, even though you'd be unable to realize it. Death like that turns you to nothing: no more possessions, no more trips to the Pit, no more hiding and pretending to live normal lives for the demons who just like to have a little fun. An unfilled void in a void in a void, and just like that you are forgotten, discarded as a mistake and a hindrance. Ruby knows she is nothing to the angels, likely nothing to the Winchesters but a thorn, despite recent evidence to the contrary, and so Castiel's next comment arrests her.

He doesn't shout it or stress anything in it. Had she not had every sense attuned to him, honed in on him, her ears stretching and her mind reaching out with pricked fingers, she might not have heard it. But she does, and it stops her in her tracks, her boots a sickly, stuttered brown in the bright green of the grass. It takes her a moment to turn, to face him, and when she does her arms are drawn across her stomach, a phantom pain burning under her ribs.

"Was?" she asks, and Ruby doesn't have to shout it either. No matter how far apart they stand, she has a feeling that they will always be able to hear each other, connected by rotting fishing wire and rusty tin cans. "I haven't heard this story."

Her eyes narrow and Castiel swims a bit more into focus. Who stopped this Uriel from killing her? Her money is on Sam, even on Dean, but she wants to hear the answer from Castiel himself. Strangely, out of everyone from their world gathered here like they're at some kind of fucked up, supernatural picnic, Castiel is the one she believes would tell the truth. In her experience he hasn't lied: just hinted around the truth when he couldn't outright tell it, and if he's capable of sending her down a path that would make her believe angels are responsible for the current state of Dumbass and Dumbass II, then she can count on him a lot more than she's willing to admit.

Her hair tumbles over her shoulder in a sheet as she leans forward, takes a step. She doesn't want to miss one syllable. "Why? Why and why is it past tense?"

[ooc: sob I have to run to work but I will tag back as soon as I can bb <333 I LOVE YOU EVEN THOUGH YOU REJECT MY LOVE also I'm so sorry for the tl;dr ;-;]

His coat is gone now, leaving him a bright white addition to the area. And where he had once been standing, he is now sat. Any possible threat that Ruby may have once held is being set aside. Whether she is there with him or not, this is still his home, and he will relish being here for as long as he is able to. It begins with the simple task of relaxing in its warmth. In His presence that all but blankets him. It is a feeling that has long since been felt, but still remains unforgotten.

"There are many things you haven't been told of." Another similarity between the two of them. He is as much in the dark about certain plans as Ruby is. However, it is yet another thing that Castiel will strive to keep between himself and Dean. There is already more about himself than he wants that has been admitted to others, even if words haven't been used.

A far off look crosses his face, and there is a flicker ahead of them. It's brief, but it's there. A body lies stretched out in the distance. Dark skin and a dark suit. The grass surrounding him is gone; burnt away to reveal two shadowed wings imprinted in the earth. One moment he is there, the next he is gone. Though those scorched marks remain left behind. It is a sight that will stay with him until the end of time. This is only part of an explanation. The true reason involved a conversation between he and his brother that had taken place months before. But this would explain enough, if she took the time to realise what the sight really meant.

[ooc: ABANDONMENT! ~~i'm having brainfarts again~~ still </3 for you. and tl;dr is always good]

She doesn't sit, but she does come closer, arms still over her abdomen and one hip cocked to the side as she stares down at him. They will never be in this position again, and even while standing above him, Ruby feels beneath him. It's a strange, conflicting emotion, to feel so small and so substantial all at once. Ruby wonders if this is how Castiel feels, if their similarities extend so far as to walk cautiously across the realm of feeling. They both have doubts, and this place is changing them, and Ruby can't tell if she would rather stay here and be changed or go home, know what they all know, and be changed in an entirely different way.

So she watches him, guarding herself, and the flicker catches her off-guard but Ruby is sharp and quick enough to digest it. She doesn't understand. It's obvious what she's been shown, and the image stays with her long after the body has faded, imprinted on her retinas like a scar. She looks at Castiel again, and her face isn't mocking or biting or harsh. It's open, searching. "I don't understand," she says, and there's a desperation in her voice that wasn't there before.

"Tell me." It's not a plea or a bargain. It's a request. There is no please attached or implied. She just wants it laid out in black and white. No games this time. She's as tired as the rest of them.

He knows better than to be surprised at her lack of understanding. Without context, what was there to see? This isn't the same Ruby that had spent those four months with Sam. This isn't the same Ruby that had betrayed Lilith. This is a Ruby who hasn't even heard of the first Seal breaking, prior to coming to the City. That should be reason enough for him to keep from telling her anything else. But somehow, it doesn't seem to factor in to it. Not right now. Instead, he simply looks skyward, taking a breath he doesn't have to take. It is a moment more to think. For the first time in this conversation, he isn't sure of himself. Not completely.

"If he had been given command when he first met the brothers, you would have been destroyed." It's the simple fact that there is no anger behind her request that makes it easier for him to reveal more about the past; her upcoming future. He speaks softly, quietly, a part of him not wanting to hear his own words. But the rest is forcing him to continue regardless. There is a benefit to be found in allowing Ruby an insight in to all else that was happening in their world.

"There are only a few who come in to contact with Dean and Sam. Uriel isn't one of us any more." He hasn't been one of them for longer than Castiel knew. He had even gone as far as to slay his own brothers and sisters. But this was yet another thing that Ruby didn't need to be told of. However much she deduces on her own isn't something that he is all too concerned about.

No, this isn't the same Ruby who had spent four months with Sam, but she is the Ruby who went against Lilith to such a capacity that she was thrown into an alternate universe, and this is the Ruby who's been in the City long enough to have made up for the fourth months she spent with Sam in another world, at another time. The knowledge that she has is secondhand at best, trickling down through filters and blinders, but she makes due with what she has, slicing her arm and bleeding out the frustration, working steps closer toward rebellion. That thought bursts through her mind like an explosion, and she has to be careful to chase it away here. He can see her, here. They can all see her: her soul and intention and mind naked and laid bare.

"I kind of get that impression from you," she says, not bothering to take a step closer or to sit down, even though her legs feel tired. There's the very subtle but still implied statement that Castiel is no different than the others to her, but it's a boldfaced lie and they both know it. The dead angel that had flashed through the scenery belies as much, and Ruby is quick enough to understand that nothing like that happens without purpose, and his words have only confirmed that.

She looks down at the grass again, and then up at the sky, even though it's like inserting an ice pick into her skull. "Demons aren't the only ones you can count on to be where you least expect them," she eventually murmurs, though her tone is heavy and hard enough to be heard. Ruby looks back down at Castiel, her eyes dark from the light. "We're all on the same side, even if our methods are little different. But whatever I did or whatever reason Uriel has for wanting me dead outside of racism? It's bullshit. I'm helpful and you know it."

"We have no proof." He means amongst his brothers. They haven't got any proof of Ruby's true intentions. And with the way that Sam is acting, how quick he is to jump to using his abilities, they have even less reason to trust her than usual. Yet despite that, there's still a small part of him that is willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. If she really wanted to hurt either of the brother, she had been given more than enough opportunities already. But still, she hasn't made a move against them Nothing more than just verbal berating, at least. It might not be enough to lay complete trust in her, but it's enough to keep him from truly considering her an enemy.

"And until all is made clear, our stance isn't going to change." Again it's a generalised statement. His own stance changes with each passing minute, despite knowing that it isn't how things are meant to be. He should be standing firm in the belief that she can't be relied on. She is a demon, and that should be what stands foremost in his mind.

Again, it's a thought of his fallen brother that forces its way in to the present. Uriel had been an angel, and so Castiel should have had complete and unparalleled faith in him. But despite their entire existence together, he had been proven wrong to hold that level of trust in him. What's right and what's wrong to believe keeps changing continuously. In the end, there are only two that he still trusts in completely. One is without question, and one is considered a bad choice against the standards he is held to. Yet still it isn't important to him. Their opinions that he had cared so much about are slowly being tested. He still holds the survivors as important to him, but those doubts are still there, and they only seem to be growing stronger each day.

"I thought you boys operated on blind faith." And that isn't a lie. It might be a misinterpretation or even a misconception - and maybe she's as racist as everyone else is; she never claimed she wasn't a hypocrite - but she's believed that for a long time, that part of the reason she's been so hated is not only because of what she is - black-eyed and silver-tongued and her blood beating dark red under the pale skin of the meat she's wearing - but also because of the angels' faith. A demon could never help save the world. A demon could never plan something so big as to dethrone someone like Lilith. A demon is a demon is a demon and a zebra doesn't change its stripes.

"I didn't think it took proof," she continues, walking again, around him, away from him, back toward him. It doesn't matter: she paces like a caged tiger. "I thought all you needed to run on was one word from Daddy and your angelic intuition. Proof would explain why you haven't either sent me back to Hell or turned me into a smoking pile of ashes." She stops talking, stops moving, and it's such a human reaction that she can almost separate the demon in her from the part that beats human in her head. It doesn't last; it never does. She'd felt human that night in the parking lot with Dean, had felt nearly human a number of times when considering Sam, but they never last. Ruby is nothing but smoke and a few carefully placed mirrors.

She turns to face him again, and somehow they've moved or the sun has moved or the sky has moved. An imaginary shadow is thrown across her, but when she blinks it's gone. "Does your lack of proof make you doubt as much as everything else that's going on back there?" she asks, and her voice holds all the reflective quality of projection. Ruby knows she can't be the only one, and she's intuitive enough to see past the blank expressions he always wears even if she's normally too afraid to look.

"You consider faith to be blind?" Perhaps in some ways, she was right. He was made already faithful to a being he hasn't ever met. But he has felt Him. He can still feel His presence, even now, in the City. Though it is one completely different to that he is granted in their own world. His creations exist here, and that is reason enough for Castiel to continue believing in Him. "We still make our own decisions." As was evident by the fact that angels are able to fall, and each of his siblings take different approaches to their orders. They are individual, even if they are all created for the same purpose.

Even as she moves around him, he has no trouble in hearing her voice. He can hear the quiet rustle of her clothing as she walks. He can hear the barely audible crunch of the grass under her feet. But above all that, he can hear those traces of humanity that cast her in such a different light to the rest of her kind.

"Whether I have proof or not, I have my orders. And they are Just." His doubts are something that he is only just being forced to take note of. He's mentioned them to only two other people, and he doesn't want to add a third to that equation. The brief admission to Dean had been used to help develop their connection. But those points he'd made to Anna; seeking her out after he had come to a standstill, had forced him in to finally accepting that things aren't as they should be. But no matter what this meeting with Ruby could mean for the tenuous relationship they held, it wouldn't ever be enough for him to willingly admit to his own weaknesses.

"I'm a demon," she spits, like she's throwing out a curse, force enough behind it to bowl over a building. "I don't have the same kind of faith as you, and whatever it is that I have, it's sure as shit not blind." Ruby doesn't necessarily need to see something to believe it, but the things that she believes in are tangible. She believes in herself, in the power and control that she has, in the things she's capable of. She believes in Sam and what he's capable of, the power that he has. And she believes in people like Dean and even Castiel, things that they can do. She believes in Lilith, knows exactly what's waiting for her when she leaves this place, and her head feels heavy and muggy with the thought of it.

She doesn't believe in the Devil, and she doesn't believe in God, but she believes in this war because she can touch it, feel it, reach out and run her fingers through the fine, poisoned silk. "You have your orders, and I've got my ideas. They run next to each other but they never seem to cross." Like she told Dean, it's not a metaphor, not some poetic interpretation. All of them walk the same path, covered in the same shadow, hoping that the same light at the end of the tunnel isn't a train waiting to run them over.

"When do I get out of here?" she asks, and this time she does sit down, crossing her legs under her body, plucking at pieces of green, green grass and tossing them to the side. At once the question encompasses too much: out of this City, out of this body, out of this dream, out of existence. She hopes that he picks up on the most immediate possibility and ignores the rest as she sits behind him, her eyes on his back. The only stare she can muster is one of careful defense, on edge and uncertain. She feels no threat from him where she has before, like they've come to some even playing field, if not an understanding, that possibly wasn't there before. There's only a dull caution how, centuries of instinct working alongside her, and a throbbing sense of realization. Lie down with dogs and you will get up with fleas.

She's already itching.

"Do you ever expect them to?" Their paths to cross. It's a rhetorical question, due to the simple fact that they were working for two very different reasons. Ruby is following her self-made choices. She may be working toward the same goal, but her reasons were personal ones. Castiel, on the other hand, follows orders handed down to him from God Himself. Or at least, that is what he believed. Since his confrontation with Uriel and his talks with Anna, even he finds it hard to believe that every order he was given prior to the City were ones that were truly Just. But he has no way of finding out for sure. No choice but to believe in what he has been told to believe. Making real decisions for himself was still a step beyond him.

There's a faint urge to turn and face the demon sitting behind him. Something that should be born from distrust, but instead verges on interest. He's interested in Ruby, even though he knows it is wrong. There are always exceptions to rules. Lucifer had fallen. Uriel had turned his back on God. They had both turned against the one being they should have had unyielding faith in. Anna had fallen, yet still she hasn't become a true enemy yet. And Ruby is a demon, who seeks to stop her own kind. The line that separates them is becoming thinner with each passing day. Being trapped within the City is only serving to make that clearer to him.

"You'll leave when you are ready to." It's a statement he's been forced in to believing about a lot of things since coming to the City. Things will always happen when the person affected is ready for them to. The brothers hadn't found a way home until they were better prepared. He hadn't followed suit until he needed to gain further information. And Ruby; well, as far as he knows, she hasn't ever left. How much longer that will last, he doesn't know. But he doubts it will be for some time yet. This version of Ruby still has her uses, whether he wants to admit it or not.

Ruby doesn't answer that question, her eyes burning through his back and into his neck, trying to melt spin and warp marrow. It pisses her off more than anything when she feels she's not being taken as seriously as everyone else because of her status as a demon. Were she human, she has to wonder, would her opinions and plans be taken with more leniency, or would she be considered the same risk, the same stretch? She has to give herself credit, though: human or not her goals are the same, even if after being human in this place her methods might have a little less of a firm footing as they did before she arrived. Take Lilith out, no matter the cost, preserve humanity, blah blah blah. She doesn't know why she wants it but she does. She's not like them, after all, just like she told Dean, truths hidden behind masks and defensive mechanisms falling out of her mouth like blood from a broken tooth.

She hums, almost to herself, and looks at her bent knees, denim stretching across her legs. It's so easy to pretend to be human, to hide with the others, even though she's not very good at it, too defensive and aggressive and violent. "No," says Ruby, eventually, and there's a twist to her mouth that raises her attitude more than a pinch. "But I expect them to get along."

The silence stretches between them like twine, wrapping and wrapping and wrapping until the ball is thick and heavy. Eventually, Ruby gets up and walks to where Castiel is, somehow no longer on edge, only mildly exasperated and uncomfortable. The body will have a burn across the nose and cheekbones and up and down the bare arms, but Ruby will barely feel it, even if she feels it now. "This place isn't exactly thrilling," she points out, staring into the distance where she'd seen that dark flash of a fallen body earlier, a smudge of ink on the landscape. "But it has its perks."

Ruby doesn't know if she's talking about this dreamscape or the City itself, and she prefers it that way.

There's that note of measuring in his gaze again as he looks up toward Ruby. He's looking again for a sign. Though this time, it's for one that would show him that her words are meant in anything other than seriousness. She wants her plan to run alongside theirs, and to be noticed. But he knows otherwise. He know that, no matter what Ruby may be able to bring to the table, the simple fact that she is a demon is what will be seen first. She will be ignored. She has already been targeted, however briefly. He hasn't told her that he was the reason she had remained safe. He doesn't need to. It's another detail he'd rather keep to himself. The threats that Uriel has given out to both Sam and this demon were ones that were revoked once Castiel had pulled rank.

"You enjoy it, at times." There isn't any question in his voice. He knows, because he's seen it already. He's seen the times in which each of those from their shared world has found something to enjoy about their relocation. The curses have given each of them a reason to both enjoy the city and to hold it in contempt. But with all that's happening in their world, he can't fault any of them for enjoying the time they are granted away from their war. He doesn't fault anyone except himself.

He follows her gaze in to the distance, stopping on that familiar sight yet again. His own watch only lasts for a moment. It's already an image that is ingrained in to his mind. As are the bodies of each of his fallen brethren. He doesn't need any more reminders of how things are falling apart around them. "More than two thirds are broken." He doesn't bother explaining what he means. The Seals are being broken, and they are all but powerless to stop Lilith from completing her goal. With each one they protect, another one falls. And if Castiel was honest with himself, he'd admit that they are fighting a losing battle in keeping the Seals unbroken.

But it's one with an end. And one he knows that is going to end in their favour. Because above all else, Castiel holds absolute faith in Dean Winchester. And with that, he's knows that the end will be in sight soon.

She looks over at him again, and it strikes her as odd that she's relatively comfortable with it now, unafraid and unabashed. Though she keeps her distance, and she knows her place, there's something to be said about the way that their relationship has evolved since he arrived, not altogether too long after her. It's obvious to anyone that she doesn't trust him at all, keeps him at arm's length both in fear and out of some unspoken promise that, should she step too far, he just might find it within his so-called orders to end her entirely. But there are facets of her that he has no right to make calls on or conjectures about, and the way that she feels about this place is one of them.

"Don't tell me what I do and don't enjoy," she says, voice back to defensive and on edge. It makes her paranoid, to think that he might at all know what went on before Sam came back changed, what she let him do in order to become stronger, what she might let him do again if it means pushing them one step closer to killing Lilith.

It only pisses her off because he's right, in the end.

She snorts, more irritated than offended or actually angry, like someone's just pointed out that she's a brunette when she's so very obviously blond at the moment, and she's ready to make another comment about Castiel's presumptuousness when his voice comes out of nowhere and arrests her mid-sentence, to the point where her mouth is left somewhat open, tongue drinking down the bright light. Ruby doesn't react immediately, indifferent and blank, staring at him like he's just asked her to solve a very complicated math problem. She told Dean that she doesn't believe in the Devil, and she meant it, and she wants to know so badly what happened in four months to make her change her mind so much.

"What the hell are you idiots doing? Sitting around with your thumbs up your asses?" she explodes, turning her body to face him and taking a step closer. Castiel is taller, but Ruby's boots and looming presence tend to give her an advantage. "It's no wonder none of you have bothered killing me yet. Obviously the only way to get rid of a dog is to go to a dog."

Overlooking the fact that she had just called herself a dog, Ruby twists her mouth into a warped frown, not backing down. She's not even sure what the last Seal is, too far behind the times to keep up or know. Sam and Dean are of no use to her, and Castiel isn't the type of person to sit and share more than they already have, she feels. Ruby takes a minute to breathe but keeps her face pointed and pulled, waiting for something from the bull in the china shop.

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