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Title: Inner Demons Pairing: Crowley/Dean Winchester Rating: T Word Count: ~2.2k Summary: The so-called Drowley Summer of Love has officially come to an end, and Crowley is fine with it. Really. He is. (Spoiler alert: He is not.) Set during 10x02: Reichenbach. Warnings: Brief Instance of Self-Harm

Written for the 2023 Crowley Against Humanity Challenge, hosted by @crowleybigbang. Black card prompt: "Why can't I sleep at night?" x White card prompt: "My Inner Demons."

(Read on Ao3)

*****

If the depressingly dim and horrendously decorated Flamingo Lounge has a single redeeming quality, it’s that other than the wide-eyed bartender watching Crowley storm up to the bar, the place is mercifully, blessedly empty.

“Get out,” Crowley snaps at the man, shucking off his coat and sinking down onto a barstool. “Leave a bottle of whatever passes for decent Scotch, and get out.” He blinks; when his eyes re-open, they’re blood red. “Now.”

The bartender obliges, quickly setting the glass he’d been wiping down in front of Crowley, procuring a bottle that he places next to the glass, and all but running out of the bar.

“Smart man,” Crowley mutters to no one in particular. He snatches up the bottle and pours himself a glass of…Jameson? Really? “Dead man,” Crowley amends darkly, but making good on the threat would require going after said man, and Crowley has better—worse—more important things to do. He sets the bottle aside in disgust and knocks back his drink. It tastes like acetone, but it’ll have to do.

With a huff, Crowley reaches back to where his coat hangs and removes the First Blade—his “finder’s fee,” as he’d flippantly called it when talking to Sam. Judging by the positively murderous look in Dean’s eyes as Sam had driven away with his wayward brother handcuffed in the backseat of the Impala, Crowley himself would be paying a price if Dean ever got hold of him after this...

Well, then Crowley will just have to make sure Dean never gets hold of him after this, simple as that.

He turns the Blade over in his hands, taking in its…not craftsmanship, but rather, its underwhelming lack thereof. In the dingy fluorescent light of the bar, the Blade looks crude and unremarkable; it feels crude and unremarkable. Cut off from the power of the Mark and held by someone with no claim on it whatsoever, it’s no longer a powerful killing tool but simply a piece of old bone.

Crowley sets the Blade down on the counter in front of him and pours himself another shot of Jameson. For all his past scheming over the blasted thing, the act of actually possessing the Blade is decidedly anticlimactic. Honestly, the only reason he’d even taken the it at this point was because he could, so that Dean wouldn’t have it…

Dean stands over him, chuckling as Crowley glowers up from the floor—the bastard had pushed him. Crowley gets slowly to his feet, ignoring his still-stunned minions and ready to smack the smirk right off Dean’s face but managing to keep his anger in check…for now. “What…do you think you’re doing?”

Dean stares coolly back at him. “Oh, whatever I want.”

“Really?” Crowley counters. “Because I think you don’t know what you want. Tell me, Dean,” he sneers softly, “what are you? A demon? If so, why isn’t Lester’s wife dead? Did you feel sorry for her?” He feels a stab of satisfaction at the way Dean doesn’t meet his eye. “So maybe you’re human. Except you have those pretty black peepers, and you’re working alongside me. Why don’t you do us all a great big favor and PICK A BLOODY SIDE?!”

For a split second, he thinks Dean might strike him—good, Crowley thinks fiercely; he could do with throwing a few punches himself right about now—but instead, Dean just smiles in a way that doesn’t reach his eyes and says, “Or what?”

There’s a veneer of calm to Dean’s voice as he speaks, but Crowley hears the underlying menace well enough. He hesitates, and Dean advances, his smile turning even more feral. “Hmm? Go ahead. Make a move. See how it ends.”

And Crowley…doesn’t make a move. Not so much because he knows perfectly well that Dean will gut him if he does, but because…because damn it, even though Crowley’s furious with Dean, and even though a large part of him would like nothing more than to lash out and make Dean feel at least a fraction of the betrayal Crowley himself is currently feeling, another, even larger part of him wants to lash out at himself for being stupid enough to think that this confrontation hadn’t been inevitable, that what he had with Dean Winchester, of all people, could ever last…

Dean huffs; then, in a low growl, he delivers his coup de grâce: “I ain’t your friggin’ bestie, and I ain’t taking orders from you. When I need to kill, I’ll call. Until then, stay out of my way.”

It’s as good a knife wound as any, even if it doesn’t actually pierce Crowley’s meatsuit. He feels himself on the precipice of a scream as hurt, anger, and an all-too-familiar sense of worthlessness coalesce into a writhing maelstrom of self-loathing and despair and foolish, feverish want—to strike Dean, to kiss him, to kill him, to just…have him in some way, or at the very least, to not lose him, not like this…

Open your eyes, Dean, he thinks furiously, desperately in Dean’s direction. See what I see, feel what I feel—

But Dean doesn’t hear him, doesn’t see, doesn’t feel. There’s nothing but hatred in the hollowed-out blacks of Dean’s eyes—hatred, and Crowley’s own pitiful, dejected reflection staring back at him, and…and fine. It’s fine. He's—

“Fine.” Crowley draws himself up, centuries of practice in play as he keeps his voice flat. “It’s over.” He feigns a shrug, addressing his minions. “What can I say? Crazy ones—well, they’re good for a fling, but they’re not relationship material.” He looks squarely back at Dean as he speaks the last bit, hoping it stings.

If it does, Dean doesn’t show it. “Are you done?” he demands, and this time, Crowley nearly does strike him, nearly does knock Dean to the floor and stand over him and shout until his voice goes hoarse and—

“We’re done,” he states levelly instead. It’s almost funny: even to Crowley’s ear, it actually sounds like he means it. He lets out a clipped, bitter laugh. “You know what, Dean? It’s not me. It’s you.” With that, he steps around Dean and makes for the door, his minions in tow. Dean doesn’t call after him, and Crowley tells himself he wouldn’t stop even if Dean did call out. The bar door slams shut with a heavy clang behind him, and it doesn’t matter, it doesn’t matter, it doesn’t—

Crowley snarls and hurls his glass at the wall behind the bar. He’d given Dean a chance at something extraordinary, at a life free from the burden of having to give a damn about—about anything, and this was the thanks he got? For risking his life and helping Dean get the Mark and the Blade and indulging each and every one of Dean’s puerile, hedonistic, dive bar-centric whims every day for the past six months? This was what Dean gave him in return? Hadn’t they been more than that, been...been friends, been—

“Think of it,” he says conspiratorially to Dean. “The King of Hell, Dean Winchester by his side. Together, we rule. Together, we create the perfect Hell. And all of this that’s bloomed between us never ends…”

Well, so much for that, Crowley seethes. He seizes the bottle of Jameson and takes one final swig before slinging it forward to shatter alongside the remnants of his glass. So much for him and Dean and Growley and Squirrel and the whole great, big, fat, bloody lot of it!

Did you honestly think he’d say yes? jeers a judging, contemptuous voice from one of the older, more deeply hated recesses of his mind. Crowley recognizes the voice all too well—it is, after all, his own. Dean Winchester, the Righteous Man, on your side? Anyone, ever, on your side? You were all too keen to call out Dean’s indiscretion with Lester, but did it ever occur to you, pot, that you were calling the kettle black? What do you think you are, hmm?

Crowley’s eyes fall on the First Blade, and a moment later it’s in his grasp. He hesitates; then, slowly, he brings the Blade up and runs it down the palm of his other hand…

A ribbon of red blooms in the Blade’s wake. Crowley watches as for a moment, the blood continues to flow…then disappears when the cut vanishes entirely, which is…good. It’s good. Plus one for demonic healing, and all that…

What was it you said to Dean? interjects the voice in an odious purr. 'Why don’t you do us all a great big favor and pick a bloody—'

Sod off, Crowley bites back, clenching his teeth and forcing himself to sit up straighter on the barstool. He doesn’t need to—He knows perfectly well what he is, damn it: he’s an arsehole, a bastard, an irredeemable villain of the highest degree, and he doesn't need anyone, least of all Dean sodding Winchester, on his bloody side! He’d somehow forgotten that over the past year or so, lost his previously unfailing sense of demonic clarity and allowed himself to get swallowed up in…in feelings, but no more. From now on, he’d be strong, would go back to thinking strictly of himself and his own best interests without losing any proverbial sleep over it, and if Dean ever did sort himself out enough to decide to pick up the phone and call him up for old time’s sake, well, then Crowley simply wouldn’t answer.

To prove it to himself, he pulls his phone from his pocket and thumbs the power button, ready to pull up his contacts and block Dean’s number once and for all, and…and as his lock screen flares to life, he finds himself staring at a photo of him and Dean, taken months ago at some middle-of-nowhere dusty dive bar whose name Crowley can’t even remember, and yet—

“I can’t believe I let you talk me into this,” he grumbles to Dean as they step out of the Impala, the ridiculous cowboy hats Dean had found at the last petrol station and insisted on buying perched squarely on their heads. “When this is over, I expect you to honor our agreement. For the next week, I pick the music.”

Dean rolls his eyes. “Whatever, man. Just do what you can to avoid cramping my style, all right? Unlike you, I plan on getting laid tonight."

The next few hours pass in a haze of cheap beer, loud country music, and the constant clack of cue sticks against resin as Dean hustles three different sods at pool…and Crowley loves every minute of it. He can’t help but marvel at how wondrous it is to see Dean like this, free and uninhibited in his flirtation not just with women but also men, the part of him that Crowley had long suspected to be locked away now on vivid, unabashed display for whoever feels like looking…and Crowley finds that he does feel like looking. He watches as Dean bends low over the pool table and expertly sinks the final 8-ball into the designated corner pocket, much to the consternation of his latest victim, and he wonders…

A few minutes later, he and Dean are back at their table, laughing and toasting Dean’s victory with fresh mugs of beer that Crowley’s starting to think isn’t so bad after all, when one of the servers walks by, and Crowley, in a moment of inspiration, holds out his phone and asks her to take his and Dean’s picture.

“Admit it,” Dean says with a wink, sounding more than a little drunk as he leans in and flicks the brim of Crowley’s hat. “You’re startin’ to like it, aren’tcha.”

And maybe it’s the booze, or maybe it’s the company, or maybe it’s the fact that Crowley can’t remember a time in recent memory where he’s enjoyed himself as much as he has tonight, but he feels himself smile back. “Maybe I am,” he concedes, and Dean laughs and claps him on the shoulder just as the flash goes off…

“Sir?” calls a voice, ripping Crowley from his reverie and setting him squarely back in the present. “Uh, Your Evilness?”

Crowley blinks, vaguely aware that two of his minions have appeared behind him, but he doesn’t respond. Instead, he unlocks his phone and goes to his photo album, flicking through the files until he finds the one of him and Dean he’d set as his lock screen.

“Sir?” says the same minion as before. “Sir, it’s time to move on.”

And it is, isn’t it? Time to move on. Time to forget about Dean Winchester once and for all, to cut out this…this weakness at its source. Time to go back to being what he truly is, what he always has been, what he always will be…

Crowley hesitates, his finger hovering over the delete icon.

“You know why I always defeat you?” he says to Sam and Dean what seems like a lifetime ago, in Bobby’s junkyard. “It’s your humanity. It’s a built-in handicap. You always put emotion ahead of good old-fashioned common sense…”

A second ticks by. Then another. Then another. Crowley stares at the image on the screen in front of him…and then he pockets his phone, allows one of his minions to help him with his coat, and leaves the bar without looking back.

#crowley #drowley #spn crowley #deancrowley #crowley macleod #crowley spn #supernatural #crowley against humanity #crowley big bang 2023 #spn #spn fanfic #inner demons #my writing

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