Chapter 4
Castiel and Dean stormed through the hospital doors, running through its corridors until they found Tony hunched over at the seats in front of the Emergency room, and rushed over at him.
“How’s he?! What the hell happened?!” Dean shouted the moment they reached him, looking over Tony in worry and concern, noticing how beat up he was with bruises and scratches.
Tony was as pale as a sheet as he looked up at them, dazed and confused, flipping his hands over in confusion.
“I don’t know. I don’t know anything and the doctors are as confused as me. They kept talking in complicated medical terms that I didn’t understand and just gave me a panic attack.” His eyes were unfocused as he looked at Dean helplessly. “I don’t know what’s happening, Dean. I don’t know anything.”
Dean sat next to him and wrapped an arm around him, trying to give him any sort of comfort as his worry ate him up. He looked helplessly at Castiel, who looked nervous and worried about Steve as he stared at Tony, not sure how to comfort him in these circumstances.
They didn’t know what happened. They just got Tony’s panicked call, then heard an explosion and Tony’s scream of Steve’s name, and the next thing they knew they were rushing over towards the hospital, expecting the worst.
“Cas, can you take him home? Try to get him to sleep to calm him down.” Dean asked Castiel, as he kept patting Tony’s shoulder to comfort him a little.
“No! I am not leaving him! I am not going anywhere away from him!” Tony yelled as he pushed away from Dean, eyes wide in panic. “I am not leaving his side!”
Castiel looked at him sadly as he stepped towards him. “Calm down, Tony. It’s going to be all right. We will stay here and make sure that Steve is-“
“No! I am the only one who was there! I am the only one who saw what happened! I am the only one who could give them answers to help save his life!”
“Your husband’s life doesn’t need saving, Mr. Stark.”
Dean and Castiel looked up at the owner of the voice, while Tony turned to face him sharply, yelling: “What do you mean?! Tell me what do you mean?!”
The doctor looked calm and solemn, even in the face of Tony’s rage, looking unaffected.
“I mean that your husband’s life is not in danger, sir.” The doctor clarified calmly.
“Do you mean that he survived?” Dean asked hopefully.
The doctor hesitated, before answering firmly. “I mean that his life is not in danger.”
“What’s the difference?” Castiel narrowed his eyes at the doctor, waiting for an explanation.
The doctor hesitated again, then sighed. “The current state of the Captain makes the difference.”
Tony’s face got even more paler at his words. “Why? why? what do you by that?!”
“I think it’s better we discuss this in my office.” The doctor sighed as he gestured to them to follow him.
“What about Steve?!” Tony insisted, stubbornly not moving.
“Don’t worry, Mr. Stark. He is being cared for by professionals and then will be moved to a private room soon.”
That answer didn’t satisfy Tony or calm him down, but he didn’t protest anymore as they made their way to the doctor’s private office.
When they sat down, the doctor was silent for a few heavy seconds, like he was hesitant to say anything, and that made all of them very nervous and worried.
“What happened to Steve?” Dean was the one to break the tense silence, unable to sit still.
“Medically speaking, Captain Rogers only has first-degree burns, that need gentle care for only two weeks.” The doctor claimed but still looked uneasy.
“Then why was he moved to a private room?” Tony demanded, looking even more worried and confused now.
“Because Captain Rogers fell into a deep coma that we have no idea of its cause, sir.” The doctor announced, looking just as confused as them.
Tony, Dean, and Castiel exchanged very nervous, worried looks as the doctor continued: “Because in normal coma cases, all the body’s normal functions and vitals decrease to its lowest, due to the decrease of the vitals to the lowest possible way, but in the case of Captain Rogers, everything is confusing. All his functions and vitals are working perfectly and just fine as if he is fully awake and very healthy and functional. On the other hand, his brain waves and function are at their lowest, not even enough to function his body systems, and that’s against everything we know about medical and scientific rules.”
Tony was now successfully as pale as the dead. “And what does that mean?”
The doctor exhaled nervously. “That’s what we are trying to know, sir.”
“And if you didn’t?” Dean asked, trying to hold in his own panic and worry.
The doctor hesitated again, before looking away from them while biting his lower lip bitterly.
“That will mean that Captain Rogers will stay in his coma. Forever.”
Tony’s eyes were as wide as saucers now, and he opened his mouth trying to say something, but his body decided that he had taken too much bad news for one night and the next thing they knew, was Tony falling, unconscious.
***
“What’s your explanation for all this, Cas?!”
Dean asked Castiel in utter worry later in the car, after they dropped off Tony at Westchester, in the care of Erik and Raven.
After Tony fell, Dean and Castiel didn’t have the heart to move him to the Tower and leave him alone as they investigated what the hell had happened to Steve, so Erik, who was unable to come to the hospital, as he couldn’t leave the kids, offered to take in Tony, until they figure things out. Which was awfully nice of him. Being without Charles must be making Erik feel very lonely and was willing to have the company of anyone by now.
“I don’t know, Dean.” Castiel shook his head from the passenger seat, looking disheartened and extremely worried. He tried to heal Steve earlier, but nothing worked. It’s as if his grace wasn’t sure what the hell was wrong with him. It can’t fix what was not broken, so no matter how hard he tried, Steve remained unconscious and unresponsive, but no longer with First-degree burns, which didn’t make Castiel feel any better. “Tony talked about a Fireball, that chased their car with vicious insistence, and it kept chasing Steve after Tony left the car, which means that that Fireball was haunting Steve alone.”
“What if it was chasing the car itself, not Steve specifically?” Dean shrugged, trying to make sense of what happened. “Maybe it was attracted to the car’s engine or something.”
“No, that’s not it.” Castiel frowned firmly, as he recalled what they knew so far. “According to the claims of the paramedics, who arrived at the scene, Steve was thrown outside the car, about ten feet from it, already covered in burns, while the car was perfectly fine without a scratch.”
“What does that mean?” Dean swallowed nervously, already understanding what happened, but wanted to hear Castiel confirm it.
“It means that Steve thought the same thing as you. That the fireball was targeting the car, not him. So, he jumped out of the car, tried to get away from it, but the Fireball haunted him down, and-“
Castiel couldn’t bring himself to say it as he shuddered, while that horrible image jumped to his mind.
The image of poor Steve, jumping out of the car and trying desperately to escape, but the Fireball chasing him down viciously and the explosion happening.
Dean seemed to have imagined the same thing, because he shook his head hard like he was trying to get the image out of his head, before deciding firmly: “The scene of the crime.”
“What?” Castiel looked over him with a confused frown.
“All the answers we could get, we can find it from the scene of the crime. There, we could confirm if it was really a selective haunting or not.” Dean explained firmly, clinching his hands against the steering wheel so hard it was turning white.
Castiel can understand his rage and worry. Someone had hurt their family. A very important family member to them was in a deep coma, while his husband was falling apart. Both of them were important to them. They were family. And no one hurts a family member and gets away with it.
Castiel tried to relax in his chair, as Dean veered the car towards where the accident had happened.
“Should we-should we call the others?” Castiel asked quietly, not liking how alone they were in all of this. He got used to having close people around them when crises happened. Now, it was so lonely it hurt.
Dean grimaced like he thought about it already and felt the same. “We can’t. Clint is on a SHIELD mission, so he is out of range completely. Bucky and Sam are off the grid as well. There is no way to contact Thor. Bruce is still shut in his lab; you know that he warned us to not get close to his lab at all costs because of how dangerous it is. And-and as for Sam and Natasha, I don’t have the heart to call them in the middle of their vacation. It's just not fair.”
“So, we are on our own,” Castiel muttered in conclusion.
“Yeah. On our own.” Dean confirmed, clinching the stirring wheel even harder now. “Like the good old times.”
They didn’t exchange another word for the rest of the drive until they reached the scene of the accident.
The scene was already filled to its brim with SHIELD agents who took over the scene. They really don’t waste time to butt in at any given chance, Dean thought when he saw them.
Dean’s car was stopped by one of the security agents, who regarded them nervously for some reason.
Dean waved at him to clear the way, giving him a pointed look.
The agent gulped nervously as he approached Dean and regarded Castiel with the corner of his eyes tensely like Castiel might pulverize him at what he would say. “I am sorry, Mr. Winchester, but you are not allowed to be here. None of the Avengers are allowed here.”
“Have you lost your mind?!” Dean glared at the nervous man, “Since when are we not allowed at the scene of a weird accident?!”
“Who gave that order? Was it Fury?” Castiel narrowed his eyes at the agent, which made the guy even more nervous.
“No, sir, it was the team leader here.” The agent muttered nervously.
“Ah, let me guess.” Dean gritted his teeth, already knowing who that team leader was.
“Winchesters! I was expecting you!” A very smug, annoying voice greeted them, as he approached them with a smug, sarcastic smile.
Brock Rumlow. A SHIELD agent and the leader of S.T.R.I.K.E. a new team that was assembled by Fury for special operations. Statically speaking, he was a very skilled agent with a lot of successful missions. Personally speaking, he was a fucking asshole.
He was hostile towards the Avengers in general. He didn’t believe they deserved their fame or their special treatment. He had personal opinions about each of them. Whenever Steve had joined in one of his special missions when SHIELD asked for it, he was always hostile towards Steve and belittled him whenever he had the chance, refusing to listen to his orders.
His opinions towards the Winchesters specifically were very colorful.
He didn’t think they deserved their place. He didn’t find anything special in them, claiming that he was way better and more deserving than them at their place with the Avengers. He had very hard opinions towards Castiel. He neither trusts him nor likes him. He always hated the sight of him and made sure to make Castiel very aware of that.
They had crossed paths with him a lot in the past months. That was always a joyful occurrence for them all.
So, they weren’t really surprised to find him here, ruining their day even more.
Dean and Castiel got out of the car to face Brock, grimacing as he stood before them, grinning smugly at them.
“Rumlow, always a horror to see you.” Dean graced him with a cold smile, already murdering him fifteen times in his head.
“Winchesters, always a waste of time to see you.” Brock greeted just as coldly.
Dean was about to lose his cool like always and cuss at him until morning, but Castiel stepped in, ignoring Rumlow’s attitude. Steve was more important right now.
“Did you find anything here?” Castiel asked firmly, looking around at the agents surrounding the place, who all stopped and were watching them nervously.
“We found a lot of things,” Brock answered shortly, with a smug, sly smile.
Dean’s face was starting to get red from anger. “Like what?!”
“None of your business.” Rumlow countered coldly, regarding Dean with disdain.
Dean’s face was now bright red with pure rage, as his fists clenched instinctively. His rage was so obvious, that the security agent started to get even more nervous, his hand reaching towards the gun in his belt.
Castiel kept calm as he regarded the team leader as well. “Listen, agent, you-“
“No, you listen, Angel.” He said the last part with a sneer like it was a curse word. “The director gave this mission to me and my S.T.R.I.K.E. team. The protocol is very clear here. No creature is allowed to interfere with our work, no matter who it was, or what its position is. All you can do is wait for the results.” Then he smirked smugly. “That if they even let you look at it.”
“Oh, you son of a-!” Dean started to yell with a clenched fist raised, but Castiel gripped his hand tightly.
“Dean, let’s go,” Castiel announced very firmly, in a tone that suggested no objections.
Dean stared at him incredulously “What are you saying?!”
“I said let’s go. There is nothing we can do here.” Castiel repeated even more firmly, giving Dean a very pointed look.
He didn’t wait for Dean’s response and turned around sharply to march back towards the car.
Dean, shaking in utter rage, trailed his eyes between Castiel and Rumlow, who had a victorious smile on his face.
“Dammit!” Dean growled, before getting into Rumlow’s face and pointing at him. “This isn’t over yet!”
Then turned to catch up with Castiel in the car, and soon they were driving away. Without looking back at Rumlow, whose eyes glinted as he muttered, “You are right, Winchester. It is not over yet.”
“What the hell, Cas?! Why did you surrender to that bastard like that?!” Dean shouted at Castiel as he drove.
“There is nothing we could have done, Dean,” Castiel stated firmly, gritting his teeth in silent anger. “We don’t need any problems with any agents right now. We need to focus on Steve.”
“I am focusing on Steve!! He is our friend! We can’t just step back and let someone else handle this! We can’t!”
Castiel was silent for a few seconds before furrowing his brow. “That’s not what I am worried about, Dean.”
“What could possibly worry you more than this, Cas?!” Dean demanded angrily, eyeing Castiel from the corner of his eyes.
Castiel went quiet for a few seconds more, before answering shortly. “I am worried that this is only the beginning, Dean.”