So this morning was filled with Jensen/Misha related flappery, the afternoon exhausted by somewhere between 1000 and 1500 words of fic, and this evening...remains undecided even at 8PM.

So here's where the weird comes in:

I felt compelled to trash every bit of what I wrote this afternoon, because I was - to be completely frank - overcome not by what it has, but by what it lacks. So I started to think, peeled my way back through a random sampling of the pieces I've written lately, and found them lacking as well. I'm not moping, far from it. I'm trying to look at myself with a critical eye, ask the questions I would ask of any piece before I read it. I don't know where this leaves me, to be honest, though I do know I'm not looking for platitudes. I suppose I want to get better, but don't know exactly how to go about it. I do know that putting work out in the world that I don't love myself is STUPID. That's like hating yourself and yet expecting others to love you. I can only justify being that ridiculous in one aspect of my life.

Anyway. I'm going to complete every piece I owe. It may take longer, tangled as it's like to be in my fretfulness, but I'll get it done.

Maybe I'll read it all tomorrow and change my mind. Who the fuck knows?

I just want to be a positive, contributing force in fandom and don't feel like I am at this particular juncture.

So, there's that.



DrabbleFiclet Roundup of Stuff (aka Things Written to Prompt)

World Domination (PG) Twitter!Misha Crack for sigrundora
The Socio-Political Ramifications of a Shared Sock Drawer (Adult) Jensen/Misha for qthelights
Fistful of Swoon (PG-13) Jensen/Misha for kaylbunny
Back Before We Were Brittle (PG-13) Gen for thevinegarworks


Title: Shards
Rating: Adult
Pairing: Dean/Castiel

AN: This was what came out when I started to fill bauble's prompt. IDEFK why. I couldn't let it act as filler for anyone's prompt, because...just, no. It will make me sound like a pansy to admit it, but it's the darkest thing I think I've ever written for fandom...

Anyway. Consider yourself warned.

---

Blood blooms, dark stains that creep across the pale pink peaks and valleys of Castiel's lips. It calls to Dean, pulls the air from his lungs in a long, inhuman whine, breaks him open down deep, in a hidden corner he wishes he could claim only Castiel has been.

But he can't.

Castiel pleads, wraps his lips gently around the shape of Dean's name. But now, lost as Dean is to old patterns of pain, it sounds like little more than the panicked flapping of a wounded bird. They both know it's an illusion, convenience constructed of gristle and bile.

Something Dean needs but will never want.

Yet, Castiel trembles obediently against him, eyes squeezed shut as Dean tongues away the stains, painting new ones into the void with his teeth as he splits Castiel's lip anew. Castiel bares his throat, goes loose and pliable in Dean's grip when he's manhandled, lets Dean crush his face against the alley wall, bestows his muttered blessings to the crumbles of mortar melded to his cheek.

Castiel is as beautiful as he is righteous, perfect in his unflinching scrutiny of Alistair's patchwork legacy. Every time he remembers, every single time. If anyone other than Dean carves the steel into his spine, this becomes an exercise in futility in addition to being an abomination.

Dean hates himself as he loosens the belt fastened firmly at Castiel's waist, hates himself more when he strips them both only bare enough to take, to feed that hunger he can no more deny than satisfy. Castiel goes rigid against him as he works his way in with only a palmful of spit to ease the way. It hurts because it has to, but Dean rushes headlong, rutting into Castiel as if possessed. Castiel keens high and wild, but Dean can't, won't allow it. His hand moves on instinct, wraps at the base of Casitel's throat like a vise and squeezes - the choked gasp and gurgle humming against his skin until he comes, a fever bright flash of blood and screams.

Then he chokes, knees slammed against pits of gravel and glass as he gets to see his dinner in reverse. Somehow, he finds the presence of mind to turn his head, keep it from splattering Castiel's shoes, but he can't right himself, he never can after. He feels sated, and that combined with all the other shit that's so obviously wrong with him, is enough to take him apart the rest of the way.

When Castiel bends to gather him up, he's always properly pristine, as if Dean just got drunk and took a tumble, voided his stomach in the alley while he was fumbling his way back to the motel. It's almost enough to force Dean's hand, make him lash out and bloody Castiel's lip, begin again. His stomach revolts a second time, but there's nothing left to lose and his chest aches from heaving empty.

Castiel's fingers fall feather-light across the back of his neck, and Dean knows he's being mojo'd, knows the sense of serenity lodging itself in his hindbrain is borrowed, but he doesn't care. It's nothing more than a stopgap, bubblegum wedged into a dam that's sprung a dozen leaks too many, but he's grateful for it, for everything.

Even for the fact that Castiel keeps putting him back together when it's the last thing in the world he deserves.

Especially for that.

And he wants to apologize, just like he does every time, but when Castiel levers him to standing they're already back at the motel with Sam asleep not three feet away.

So he bears Castiel's forgiveness in silence. He sits on the bed when Castiel pushes him down. He drinks every drop of the water Castiel brings him to wash the sour stench of vomit from his mouth. He lets Castiel strip off his boots and ruined jeans even though it takes him longer to do it.

Worst of all, he lets Castiel press an excruciatingly chaste kiss against his temple before he disappears.