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soranihimawari · 3 years

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Bella Donnas & Love

This is the final installment of the Hanahaki Disease AU featuring the Seijoh Four. This is a Mattsukawa Issei x Yin (YN/Reader) story.

Word Count: 4.3 K

Warnings: mentions of depression, suicidal attempts, mentions of burn out, and intrusive thoughts

Recommended Audience: 17+ (minors recommended to not read because of the warnings attached)

Pairing: Mattsukawa Issei x reader// MIA->MIF [Mattsukawa Issei angst to Mattsukawa Isei fluff]

Mattsukawa Issei is a simple man. He sees the world in copious amounts of black, white, and gray; it isn’t because he is colorblind either. It is because he knows his worth. Truthfully, his parental figures were always a bit worried about their son especially given the profession he has chosen to pursue. Being in the business of burning and or burying the dead, Mattsukawa Issei is a fan of the loneliest times in a lifetime: they say when we are brought into the world, we are alone, and when we pass on, we too exit the world alone. There is nothing wrong with finding a job in the business of death, but even angels have demons. And for Mattsukawa, you are an exquisite example of the dichotomy between his dark side and your eventual akin to the brighter side.

It is a known fact in Japan, the pressure to be perfect or to fit into the mold of society has been a fatal flaw throughout the years. This is the main reason why at exactly two fifty-five in the morning, Mattsukawa Issei notices a young person, hanging out on the edge of the skyscraper across his workplace. There was a late night arrival to the city morgue; he just needed to be there to sign the paperwork to turn over the embalming processes to his mentors. It was the deceased wishes to be buried in the mausoleum in the home town of their forefathers: the mountain side of Nagasaki.

You were having a rough day: you were told you by your employers that you’ve been slacking for too long getting numbers for the statistics presentation coming up with business partners across the South China Sea. Then your grandparent were strictly feeding toxic lies to your parent(s) about how you would never find a suitable partner to marry you. Quite frankly, because you put your career and studies first, you had no issues putting your family in their place. The intrusive thoughts, snide comments about your appearance, was enough for you to glance at the sleeping pills that were prescribed to you to assist in a normal pattern, to invade your subconscious. The events which led you to climb the fire escape up to the rooftop garden in your kitten heels made for a daring flirtation with death. There have been nights the last couple of months where your heart is heavy in your chest, your lungs are intoxicating you with the poisonous belladonna petals.

“What a time to find out I’m going to die a lot sooner than I thought,” you sighed into your palm. Your eyes scour the hazy city in the afterglow; after a tizzy of a day you had, you chose that perhaps this might be a sign of the universe you were better off dead. Either that or your soulmate would be in extreme pain and you didn’t want to disappoint their perception of your love. Then again, you wouldn’t know what love, honest, and kind would feel like even when you’re about to let it all go.

You are devoid of emotion as you bring yourself to your feet. A hand of yours drags across your face. The drop is high enough to entice little to severe damage like broken legs, or severe head trauma, but to be truly free, you wish to be put out of your misery as quickly as possible.

Mattsukawa sees the figure clad in a lighter powder blue and his eyes are wide with fear. The morgue worker and delivery driver had already gone off into the night to complete the rest of the deliveries of bodies to the funeral homes. As soon as he finished locking up and registering the corpses, Mattsukawa was determined to see your hair wind blowing on the rooftops. The blurred vision he sees makes the twenty-seven year old shiver. Even in his line of work, this was the second instance he wanted to save someone. He knew of you: the business woman who was suffering from a similar ailment to him. The belladonna hues from your rebellious highlights enticed him to notice how you seemed a bit off at the coffee house you frequent by the funeral parlour he had been working at.

“Excuse me,” you said, holding on to your mug. Your knuckles were white with tension, so Mattsukawa did something unexpected of himself: he gave you way, but instead of sitting on the opposite side of the restaurant cafe, he sat directly across from you. The crowd was getting to be a bit noisy, but you and him sat there staring off center, hyper fixating on the number of people sign in either direction.

“Why do you smell like belladonna?” You asked. You had a glance meet you with a harsh smile.

“It’s part of my line of work. I use it to bury the dead at the request for all nameless suiciders that wind up on my table,” Mattsukawa explains. The oils from his embalming course was enough to mimic actual belladonna, but has he noticed from her, it wasn’t coming from just his hands: it was coming from her hair. He asked a question about why you seemed so strung up lately and like a fool, you told him everything which was bothering you. If anything, this man was a silent confession box. He seemed like the genuine article, so when you check for the time, you realize it was time to leave and head back to the office to grab the final jump drive for the presentation. Things at work seemed to have gotten better since the next time you’d see your precious Mattsukawa would be in the next life. You never truly disclosed your name to him, so he made a note call you Bella or Donna (whichever you preferred really). His smile is flirtatiously coy and you felt your cheeks grow a bit warm from the moment he told you his name.

For whatever reason, perhaps Mattsukawa was feeling a bit lucky, he asked you to dinner the day before yesterday. He wanted to know you, truth and all, bruised and damaged as you were, the meds your doctor prescribed were starting to cushion the intrusive thoughts. However that changed the moment you give him a nod, he grabs your hand as you’re about to leave the cafe; gently he squeezes your fingers for reassurance.

“You’ll do great Miss. I believe in you,” Mattsukawa whispers in the last part. The cafe begins to echo again, so you couldn’t hear the last part, but you were sure it was an encouraging word. Mattsukawa was the first person in a long while to give you something so few in your battlefield mind would want (or need): hope.

“Goodbye Mattsukawa.”

With that said, you were gone from the cafe and headed back into the office where a different manager made your life hell because their normal assistant was very organized, but the constant comparison was enough to make your head explode.

Presently, you stand on the ledge, glancing down like a superhero vigilante, but just as you were about to take a dive, you feel a pair of strong arms wrap themselves around your waist. The hands are interlocked under your empire waist line and if it wasn’t for the fact your hair was probably in a ponytail prior to this predicament, you’re sure your band was lost to gravity and the wind. You thrashed about in your captor’s arms, not realizing this person was about to save you from an awful mistake.

You see, Mattsukawa Issei is a funeral employee; he dresses sharply like an agent of the Grim Reaper. He is suave and debonair; he loves watching the life cycles of the various flower arrangements in his mentors stores go throughout the seasons. His heart and soul is full of vibrancy you have yet to comprehend; Mattsukawa was always a strong individual and you could ask anyone of his friends in school what kind of person he was. So, what made you so different? Sure you were stressed out, anybody could see that, but Mattsukawa picked up on the depressive aura you emanated. Did he really want to sit in front of you that afternoon? Sure; it was mainly because he couldn’t shake this feeling ever since you were ahead of him in line to order that he was supposed to meet you here (even if you were at your lowest post appointments at the business office downtown).

You struggle to let go, but the owner of these hands does not wish to loosen their grip on you; you ask twice kindly to be left alone and the soft ortund tone of the stranger’s voice from the cafe stops you from thrashing about further.

He tumbles back and lands on his arse with you sitting on his lap, pressed against his broad chest. His sleeves from the black oxford shirt he wears is rolled up to his elbows, and his hands still are in an interlocked position. Mattsukawa has seen some pretty fucked up causes of death recently, yet this time, he wanted to save you, not bury you. He wants to see you tomorrow night at dinner in the diner close to his loft; he wants you to understand maybe death isn’t all that grand and if you struggle with your mind everyday, he wishes to someday be of importance to you. You’re in charge of your own autonomous decisions, yet Mattsukawa wants you to give him a chance to prove to you that love, hope, and for the very fortunate, miracles exist (even if you weren’t shown any).

“You’re sick,” he closes his eyes. Apparently, you pick up on the frown in his voice and somehow, you’re sixth sense of empathy decides not to fight his tonality, but rather when you subconsciously agree and call your mental state one of a landmine, he doesn’t make a fuss. It was a short exam and you realize may be life is worth living for a nano-second. You could have an entire relationship with this man from the cafe in a span of two hours, if that. The fates must have had a wicked sense of humor when pairing either of you to the other: one who works with and around death, the other has an affinity to try and cross into the next life every moment things in the sea turn too rough.

You slowly stop trying to fight him the moment you hear his voice toss in the wind. Instead, you move your hands to hover limply on his, leaning back and letting his breathing calm you. The smell of belladonna from your hair oil wafts through the air. “Suicide is not how I want your story to end.”

“You have no idea what you’re talking about or-o-or,” you stammer on. “Perhaps I don’t want to be alive anymore because people keep interfering.”

This causes Mattsukawa’s heart to gain a solid crack. You toss your head back and land harshly against his sternum, causing him to grunt and inhale sharply.

It rips seamlessly to his soul. In the past six to eight years since he entered his chosen profession, he has seen corpses from all ages, the youngest being eight who suffered from a myriad of health issues including Hanahaki because the playground friend in their preschool years was going to be theirs when the time properly came. Mattsukawa, the night he was on duty for the wake, anonymously donated the flowers that would have made the child laugh on wishes. Sure, life does have it’s moments when it tests us, yet he couldn’t wrap his head around the burn out business person from earlier this week, who was now in his arms, safe.

Unintentionally landing on his back with you on top of his chest was not how he had pictured becoming a hero. Just for one night, Mattsukawa Issei, the stern and most silent of the volleyball players in high school, was a hero worthy of saving a life.

“Argh,” he groans.

He coughs quietly away from your face when his hands loosen their hold. You chose to not chastise him about not wearing a sweater in the middle of autumn. After all, this man was the only one who would be daft enough to try and stop you. You curl into him, hiding your face in the satin finish of his dress shirt; you promise to buy him a new one as long as you let him hide your eyes and you break down. You’re crying over the smallest inconvenience and on top of feeling like a burden to the man, you consistently apologize by saying it’s no one’s fault especially his when you catch yourself in your darkest moment.

Mattsukawa listens to your request: with one hand, he covers your left side of your face, the right is patting your hair down, reassuring you that he will console you until the sobs stop and the sniffles remain.

“You’re lucky I live and work not too far from here doll,” he whispers into your hair. You’re calming down as you hiccup the last couple of bubbles of air. You nod in understanding the words he was saying, but you still have your eyes closed to shield himself (and keep your pride intact) when he would peer into your bloodshot ones.

“Don’t worry about me tryin’ anything either. You’ve been through enough tonight. Just let me take care of you for the rest, ok?”

“Mmhm,” you agree. He sits up half way and you rise with him, your eyes ever looking westward until you see one of his handkerchiefs from his back pants pocket dangle in your line of sight. You stifle a laugh, utter a thanks, and begin to dry your face. Mattsukawa, when you were done, doesn’t hold your face anymore, even if it pains him to do so. Your free hand decides for both of you: your left reaches for his and you bring the calloused hand, opened palm, to your cheek. Your skin is soft and sticky from the tears, but if anyone were to ask Mattsukawa what it felt like to save a life, he would humbly point you out in a crowd and say ‘Ask ‘em yourself.’

“I lost sight of the things that brought me joy,” you say quietly. You’re breathing in his cologne and it smells like whiskey sours. The scent grounds you, as you recall your therapist giving you stress-relieving tricks such as naming five to ten things your senses pick up on. Your cheeks feel soft like mochi ice against Mattsukawa’s open palm; you see the neon lights hazily glow in the city below you; and finally, you hear his shirt ruffle against the shell of your ear when you finally calm down.

“Everyone does,” Mattsukawa agrees. “Can you do something for me?”

“Mattsukawa-san,” you said his name and he chuckles in surprise. You remembered his name? This was even better than before. He finds himself falling gently in like with you. The love between long lost friends is what keeps him afloat. Unwillingly, you find yourself amusedly smiling at his tanned skin glowing with a soft hues under his eyes. Was this man blushing?

“Call me Issei or Mattsun,” his voice says when his other hand loops around your waist. He buried his head on your right shoulder.

Tonight you learn that even strong and by your standards of “fine men” do in fact cry. You blink a couple more times and he just cries a mixture of tears he has no control over.

“Mattsun,” you say, voice soft like the breeze sending a boat to sail. “I’m sorry about all this.”

“You could have said you weren’t feeling well if you didn’t want to go out with me,” Mattsukawa jokes, turning his head to the side so you wouldn’t see his tear stricken face to the side. He asks you, if you felt comfortable enough, to just stay still for a moment.

The rooftop rendezvous was not what you had in mind when you came home from clocking out, but considering you were heavily contemplating ending your existence earlier, this one request was not too hard to fulfill. The belladonna in your bronchioles seemed to dislodge itself into your lungs. You stay as still as your companion had asked and you breathe in time together. His curls are soft to the touch and when he relaxes his shoulders when you run a hand through his hair, you feel him grin on the right of your shoulder blades.

Was this what it felt like to be you every hour before you both met at the cafe? This profound sadness doesn’t leave his heart nor does he quite shake the feeling of the leaves of the belladonna flowers taking root in his lungs. The flowers bloomed slowly since his twenty-third birthday were the same ones you dyed your hair for. You’ve been suffering with the hanahaki disease for quite some time, you confess back to him.

“Is that why you were here? Trying to jump?” Mattsukawa asks an innocent inquiry. He seemed like he was about to be scolded for the first time in seven years, yet you thought it was kind of adorable. And so you do something you haven’t done in a very long time: you scoff (although you were sure it was closer to a giggle.

“No,” you reply. “I was contemplating jumping because all my triggers hit at once, so I’ve been in a depressive episode for quite some time before we met.”

“Oh,” Mattsukawa acknowledges. “Do you want to stay the night?”

“…that’s awfully forward of you,” you say. Your pragmatic inner voice says to decline, but there is a mischievous side of his mannerisms, nonetheless you are curious. It is late into the evening already, so perhaps the offer is a better one. After all, you think the change of scenery would do you some good, so you humbly agree.

Roughly an hour later, you find yourself in Mattsukawa’s living room area. Offering his shower to you, you ask if there is something he can lend you. It is an old shirt with his high school cactus logo on it, but the shorts he tosses to you has a VBC and his old number stitched on the back pocket. Mattsukawa hands you a spare towel and tells you how to work the shower in his bathroom. Twenty minutes later, you sit close to the kotatsu even if it’s not too cold outside at the moment, you tend to sleep better underneath one.

Prior to your shower, Mattsukawa-san graciously gave you a small tour of his loft when you arrived. The walk wasn’t too far from the rooftop building and so you two walk side by side until the loft complex came into view. Mattsukawa says hi to the doorman who makes a joke or two about how he had almost pulled another overnight at the funeral home.

“Be careful with that one miss, he’d work himself to death! Ha! Work himself to death,” the doorman says, wiping a faux tear from his eye. You snickered covering your smile with the back of your hand. When you put it to the side of your body, Mattsukawa notices how dazzling your smile is. How would someone who smiles this much at a pun, hold so much carnage of self-doubt and depressive thoughts in their heart? Is that why your flowers and your scent are wrapped in poisonous belladonna? Mattsukawa shakes this thought to the furthest parts of his mind. You’re here now, in the next room, safe under the same roof.

The master bedroom door is opened just a crack once Mattsukawa is half-dressed in his pajama pants, parading around shirtless fetching a glass of water from the kitchen. You were already seated on the barstool peering out the sliding glass door of the patio outside. Jumping was not the way to die for you, you think. Perhaps if you died with love, perhaps you’d have a better chance of reincarnation than you thought. The ambient sounds of the refrigerator and the water spout being used brought you back to hold the gaze of your host for the evening. You made a conscientious decision to cash in on your PTO at your work location for the next two weeks via e-mail. You explain to the HR representative you were feeling burn out and your therapist was working with you to battle the depressive episodes you were going through. The automotive message came back saying someone from the office of internal affairs would look into the chain of command in your division. However, you could care less about work at the moment, since you were enjoying the company of the person who helped kept you tied to this world.

“You like what you see?” Mattsukawa says smoothly. The water glass is placed on the counter in front of you. After graduation from Aoba Josai, running and other kinesthetic stretches were included in his workout regiment. You froze, placing your phone face down to the extreme left of the counter space. The granite glowed in the soft lamp from behind you, casting shadows in the grooves of his muscular features.

“I don’t know how to answer that,” you tease. “But I do like the person who saved me from making a huge mistake.”

Mattsukawa nods as he leans forward to rest his chin in his hand.

“I’ll always come running to you Yin,” he gives you a nickname close to the currency your country uses. This causes you to roll your eyes, yet you reassure him it was filled with endearment.

“You sound like you’re going to love me until the day I properly die Mattsun.”

He wasn’t expecting you to climb halfway across the granite counter, stretching your back further parallel to the floor (your feet are balancing your lower half on the chair).

His hand finds its way to the small of your back and he says a quick, “pardon me.” The onyx eyes he owns close and crinkle upward like small crescent moons before you feel his pursed lips press against your forehead.

“You’re safe here,” you hear him say. His warmth is a welcomed blanket of comfort for you; his words are kinder than your own thoughts.

“Will you kiss me properly?” You ask.

“In the morning, first thing,” he answers. “But first, sleep.”

Mattsukawa walks around his counter to keep you from hanging in the balance thus lowering the risk of you falling knees first on the floor.

“Remember how you fell on top of me?” Mattsukawa’s voice is low. You swallow nervously; you affirm that you do. “Good. Now hold on to me sweetheart.”

He leans back against your left side of your suspended body and he wraps an arm around your mid-section and you push off with your elbows. The next thing you are aware of, you are being carried like a drowsy child to the living room where you sit on Mattsukawa’s lap like before. You raise a hand to his smooth face, your fingers tracing the highest points of his features; his eyes flutter close to the sensational spell you are casting; he is about to fall in the in-between of sleep and lucidity when he feels your lips press firmly against his. When you back down, he stops you with one word: “More. One more time.”

You turn your head at an angle the moment you feel his hands turn you around to straddle him more comfortably.

“Better,” you confirm. Your nose teases his own and he languidly looks at you before he pushes your back playfully and your lips meet his again.

You sigh against his lips when your knees come into contact with his cushion; his arms move away from your hips to your ribs. The callouses he earned over the years of playing volleyball in high school memorizes the map of your skin. Together, the aroma of belladonna almost dissipates the pain in your lungs the longer you are breathing in everything the young man in front of you is giving.

This was as brave as you wanted to be right now. You’d be more adventurous months into your new found relationship with your restaurant-cafe rendezvous man. Your hands trace his collar bones before they found their purchase on the sides of his neck.

“I like that,” you say when you are given a chance to catch your breath. Mattsukawa’s hands rest on your love handles again and he pushes you into a loose embrace. Your hair tickles his shoulder when you rest your head against his pectoral.

“I like this too,” he says, running his fingers lightly up and down your spine. “Close your eyes and rest for a while Yin. We can talk about this in the morning, ok?”

You stifle a yawn, agreeing.

A few minutes later, after you are truly asleep, Mattsukawa supports you in his arms and he carries you like a child, careful to support your neck as your legs rest limply above his hips, to his room. He lays you down first and then proceeds to tuck you in; staying above the duvet, he watches over you breathing in and out steadily, the last small petals escaping your lips when you cough softly in your sleep. Mattsukawa stares at the last shriveled one on the corner of your lips and swats it away.

“Pretty angel, don’t scare me like that. I don’t want to lose you,” Mattsukawa reaches over to hold your hand; fingers intertwining around your own and you squeeze his back. “You’ll be alright and I will help you keep nightmares away.”

“Why?” Your voice is laced with sleep. “Why do you want to love me?”

“Because our story is just beginning my love.”

Mattsukawa rubs his thumb over your knuckles and when he lies down further on his bed next to you, he rests a protective arm over your shoulders.

#sora scribbles #sora after hours #🌻— flying around collecting pollen—queue #🌻 txt #haikyuu x reader #cw: intrusive thoughts #cw: depressive episode for yn #cw: unsuccessful suicide attempt #cw: burn out form work and life in general #mattsukawa x you

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thepanicoffice · 4 years

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Brush with Death

[...]

Through plague, famine, financial crisis, and bourgeois summer music festival season, the Panic Office has always been there for its dedicated, maladjusted, slightly simple readership.

We have long prided ourselves on providing a faintly nourishing mental gruel of content – a sort of intellectual starvation rations – to keep your grey matter from wasting away entirely. This has never been more important than now, when you remain confined indoors reflecting on the senselessness of your own existence and the cruel accident of your birth.

But we also like to keep things light and cheerful.

So, let’s talk about DEATH.

I don’t regularly check the Office’s post-box but I would assume we have been inundated with glowing feedback on my semi-regular jaunts through art history. Having graduated primary education, I consider myself to meet all the criteria to be classed as a fine art scholar and well-equipped to take you on a brief tour of death in the visual imagination of the West.

It’s as well to remind ourselves that the darkness that dwells beyond the precipice of the mortal coil has occupied the thoughts of our ancestors since the first time some unwashed maniac picked up a wet clot of pigments and, for reasons best known only to them, decided to draw something they could only see in their head.

Let us go, and don’t fear the reaper. But don’t make eye contact with him either, for God’s sake. That’s just asking for trouble.

[...]

Unknown, Renaissance

Death has not always been a figure of fear – here we see his unmistakable skeletal form strutting and jiving along, barely clad in an entirely superfluous toga, like a slightly-less creepy John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever. Actually, it is probably that self-same fever that has claimed the life of this chubby-wristed infant. However, as I assume was probably the case for most people alive in the Middle Ages, he doesn’t look very sad to be going. If I’d have been born only to discover that I had no access to warm towels and was forced to empty my bowels out of a window like a common Welshman, I’d have embraced death as a friend too.

Death and Life, Gustav Klimt, 1915

This gaudily garbed grim cuts a sinister figure. He brandishes, with menace, the distinct gnarly form of a Nice ’n’ Spicy Nik Nak – its seemingly harmless, even comical, appearance at odds with the often-lethal sodium content contained within. The spectre leers at this writhing tissue of existence, threatening it with, presumably, heart disease and morbid obes– Ooh , is that a nipple? It is! Great painting. Though it is distractingly close to that child. That sort of spoils my enjoyment.

What were we talking about? Oh yes, Death. In summary, it’s hard to be too fearful when it’s stalking around in vibrant patchwork robes that Elton John would consider unforgivably tasteless and showy.

Death and the miser, Hieronymus Bosch, 1490

This irritatingly long and hard-to-crop image (it’s clear little if any thought was given to future generations of facetious technophobe bloggers by Mr Bosch) requires quite a lot of unpacking. Its dense and layered symbolism is obscure but, when one has assumed one can easily decipher art for as long as I have, its meaning becomes clear: bribe the ugly devils that crowd your life with a bulging sack of jealously-hoarded gold and perhaps Death will overlook you when your time comes. Most importantly, shun Christ and his shiny promises even when your demise looks inevitable – that’s exactly what he wants you to do, clever bastard.

Bosch, never one to know when to just put the brush down and step away from a canvas, has included all manner of largely meaningless additional detail. One feature, though, stands out: the hideous, stunted rat-gremlin carries a letter, waving it aloft, unnoticed by all. We will never know what it says. It’s almost a perfect metaphor for the Panic Office itself.

Unknown, 17th Century

Ye Gods! I don’t even know where to look. Someone get this man some damned trousers! And who thought it would be a good idea to equip a blindfolded man with a scythe? Absurd.

Der beste Arzt (The Best Doctor), Alfred Kubin, 1901

I can relate to this one. Death, mysterious and even slightly sexy, carelessly smothers this excessively long man with one hand. This is basically what my hangovers feel like when I’ve been trying to match Ann Widdecombe drink for drink at our monthly cribbage night. Like me, the slender victim clasps his hands in supplication, praying to the mercy of his nameless tormentor that his suffering might end. However, unlike me, this man doesn’t seem inclined drink a vial of baboon’s tears which I have found, after years of trial and error, is really the only effective remedy.

Unknown, Medieval

This is a fascinating depiction of Death as a sort of recognisable breed of pub bore, droning on, hectoring, sharing his conspiracy theories about how the dinosaurs really went extinct, deathsplaining to the living. Look at it, wagging its skeletal figure at this clearly disinterested person. It’s like, we get it: death comes for us all. But there’s no need to be such a dullard about it.

Danse Macabre, Thomas Rowlandson, 1815-6

This is the first work that makes me empathise with Death. All that power and yet every day the same tedium: more double pneumonias, more malarial fevers, more shower slippages. Yawn. Many of the best deaths – bubonic plague, the bloody flux, leprosy – have been all but eradicated (thanks a lot, modern medicine!) So what is left to look forward to? The odd atrocity or elephant goring, sadly few and far between. You think you’re having a boring lockdown? Take a moment to put yourself in Death’s shoes (black crocs I reckon; practical but essentially evil).

Graphic illustration of Lubeck mural, after 1463

We’ve all been to parties like this, cajoled into dancing by others regardless of whether your outfit really allows for it. Now imagine those other partygoers are the dead themselves. Terrible evening.

The Hypochondriac, Richard Dagley, 1827

Speaking as someone who’s died of hypochondria twice before, I know this scene only too well. One sits at home, trying to quietly contemplates one’s… eery painting of a prancing clown… only to spy, from the corner of your eye, Death’s chittering mandibles lurch from the gloom. Meanwhile, your pet cat (or monkey; the quality here is rather poor) offers you no comfort as you descend into a clammy-browed panic. Jesus, I need to get my blood pressure checked. Some days I can’t sleep for the hammering arrhythmia of my backfiring heart, I can feel it behind my eyes, and my sight fades until I am left to face…

La Jeune Fille et la Mort, Marianne Stokes, 1900

…Oh Christ, this guy. This morose tosser. This gloomy dullard. This Sisters of Mercy album cover reject, come to bore you with his self-indulgent monologues about the ‘black lips of encroaching night’ or whatever GCSE poetry he’s most recently written after his parents have sent him to bed for failing to use a drinks coaster on the good table. I don’t know where he got that robe from but the big lads in his form are going to give him hell for that come Monday. But that’s fine, he doesn’t care, he’s used to being misunderstood, as he thinks no one apart from him has ever worn pale makeup and been really into the ‘complex, violence artistry’ of 80s slasher films. Tedious prick. Just get over yourself and end me! No, I’m not impressed by your lamp. Arse.

#Maslin #Editor #Death #Art

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annakie · 5 years

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An Annotated Mass Effect Playthrough, Part Five

Will we make it off the Citadel in this update??

List of Posts: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Flux is my favorite bar in all of the first game, I know there’s not many to choose from, but I like the music best, everybody’s clothed, everyone’s having a good time, there’s slots upstairs for entertainment, there’s dancing, and plenty of space to chill out in. Also the color scheme is great. It looks particularly great now with the graphics mod improvements.

Doran gets a nice glamour shot here.

I’m a tattle tale who always turns this guy in. I agree with Kaidan...

Also I really love Rita’s quest with her sister. She loves her sister, Jenna wants to be helpful, even Doran’s like “Hey I’d love to give her her job back.” Everyone here is pretty wholesome. And Jenna gets one of the best surprise appearances in ME3 if you do things right. ME1Recalibrated fixes the bugs with her quest, too!

Speaking of bugged quests, Hello Conrad! ME1Recalibrated fixes Conrad’s bug, and even if it doesn’t, ME2Re does. The only bad thing about that is it makes his apology for accusing you of something you maybe didn’t do make no sense.

Everyone else was sure Conrad would turn out to be evil, too, right? Instead making him into just a big lying dummy with an advanced degree was a great move. I was kinda hoping he’d show up in the Citadel DLC.

Harkin is JUST the FUCKING WORST. I’m always tempted to let Garrus cap him in ME2 because what a waste of air he is and doesn’t learn his lesson.

This is also maybe the most overt place where FemShep experiences sexism. I mean, don’t get me wrong, there’s some pretty shitty sexism sprinkled throughout the games (as discussed a bit last post) but ugh this guy, if I could shoot him this game, I might. At least on renegade playthroughs.

Speaking of Garrus...

Finally, an alien who wants to hang out with us.

As primarily a Kaidan-romancing gal, who tends to keep up with the Kaidan Alenko tag, especially back in the heyday of tumblr, for a while, loving Garrus was... difficult.

In October, when I was finishing up my latest ME3 playthrough and also cleaning up my blog, and also rewatching Doctor Who and thinking a lot about Rose Tyler and Martha Jones, I posted a long thing in a post about Kaidan and Garrus and badly behaving fanbases, which I don’t feel like typing again. Here’s the whole thing, but I’m going to pull a part of it into here.

I love Garrus, so much. And I was thinking with this whole parallel DW rewatch / Mass Effect replay think I’m doing right now how both Rose Tyler and Garrus Vakaraian are characters that were ruined for me for awhile due to their respective… overly enthusiastic fanbases who a small percentage of were dicks to people who loved other characters. The Kaidan tag (and from what I understand Thane got some of this too, but not nearly as bad) was a pretty hostile place for awhile (and yeah I used to regularly check the Garrus tag too and there was a small amount of tag-invasion there but uh, like 5% of what the Kaidan tag got) which made loving the character of Garrus a lot harder for awhile. But when actually watching seasons 1 & 2 / the end of 4 of Doctor Who, or actually playing the ME games, those characters are awesome.

Fanbases can be amazing or terrible, and time and time again I think you start to realize that no matter how great a fandom is, there are going to be a few people who can only enjoy themselves by feeding on drama, or on lifting up what they love by stomping on other people/characters/plotlines.

It’s not fair to characterize everyone who loves a popular thing as someone who does this. It’s also hard to avoid completely because there will always be jerks, or young/new people who don’t realize what bad form they’re showing. I did learn by trying to fight it for a year or two, that responding might help that one person not do it again, but it’s not going to stop overall.

Anyway, don’t be a dick about the things you don’t like.

It’s sad that even thirteen years past the release of ME1 and eight years past ME3 some people still need to have this fight online. It’s basically impossible to enjoy like, any non-curated Mass Effect space online because of pissing contests or people spouting the same boring opinions. Which they’re entitled to. I’m just real tired of “Kaidan is boring!” “Ashley is a racist!” etc with no further depth of thought being given.

The ability to mute / block people and get away from the worst of it is one of the reasons I’m still on tumblr. Especially always mute/block “confessions” blogs. Yeesh.

---------

I’m glad Garrus is here, and I’m glad he’s on the team. What’s funny though, is that people tend to forget that Garrus like, wasn’t really all THAT popular of a character before ME2. I know I was only in the fandom for a year before ME2 but I dug in pretty deep in that time.

It wasn’t until he gets his face blown off and starts talking about Old Times that a lot of people started to REALLY like him. He’s still great in ME1, but not like, elevated to god-tier that so many people did post ME2 release. But in ME1 he IS neat because he’s really malleable. Probably the companion who can have the biggest personality shift depending on your choices.

Also, I remember a time when the people who wanted to romance Garrus were like... outliers? I remember thinking “GARRUS? As a romance? That’s... weird. Who would do that!?”

OH HOW I WAS WRONG. But that was before reach and flexibility.

Hey I even have a Shep that romanced Garrus in ME2 and ME3. And I loved it!

Were I to replay a different Shep, she’d be my first choice.

So yeah, I love Garrus, I keep Kaidan in the squad all the time in ME1 and the other spot I try to rotate everyone else somewhat evenly, but you’ll see plenty of him. Then ME2 he’s by my side most of the way. And an awful lot in ME3, too. But I’m happy for him to get crushed on by Dr. Michele and glad to see him and Tali find happiness in ME3. SO that’s the path we’ll be going down if we get that far here.

I love the Destiny Ascension flyby moment on the Citadel, and it’s so easy to miss. Also really hard to get good screenshots of. Thanks Flycam. Don’t pay attention to the untextured wall in the first pic, just look at the pretty lights!

Let’s go get another squadmate! This time, a not-as-initially-friendly alien!

What an amazing entrance for Urdnot Wrex.

“Do you want me to arrest you?”

“I want you to try!”

Hell. Yeah.

Here’s where the somewhat in somewhat evenly comes in. I probably do favor Wrex and Ashely in the squad in ME1 a little because... well you know what’s coming for Ash and Wrex you get the least amount of time with by far of the other companions. Also, he’s just... great? A tank, with some biotics and a shotgun... okay well so am I as a vanguard, but Kaidan has just enough tech powers for us to muddle through where we need to when Wrex is in the squad and he’s so much fun to have around. His “Fuck you, I don’t care” attitude is great, and his growth story throughout the trilogy is one of the best arcs a character gets, imho. I just really love Urdnot Wrex.

This is a real nice flight control office you’ve got here, C-Sec. It would be a shame if someone planted a bug in it later, since literally anyone can just walk on up here uncontested.

This entire area really is so pretty though.

I always pump points into Paragon as much as possible from as early on as possible, and saving these poor guys’ lives is one of the big reasons. They don’t need to die.

Ash usually still stays in the party up to this point, though sometimes it’s Garrus. Fist is still a dick in ME2 but he doesn’t need to die here, sorry Wrex.

...raise your hand if you still occasionally forget to pick up Emily Wong’s evidence and have to reload. I remembered! ...once I was almost out of Chora’s Den and had to turn around this time.

Kaidan? Kaidan my love? My darling... perhaps YOU shouldn’t be the one standing in the middle of the corridor with no barrier or protection? (I suppose I could scooch over but then I’d look less badass for these screenshots. Naaah.)

It’d be a shame if someone properly lit the corridor so we could see what’s going on.

But hey... TALI! Tali Tali Tali! The first quarian we see, and only one for... awhile? Is there another quarian in this entire game? I’m trying to remember and seriously can’t think of one.

Anyway, I love Tali, but another character you really need to ignore their most rabid fanbase portions of. Yikes, Talimancers were really something back in the day. The biggest problem I have with Tali being in the squad is that normally she’s REALLY useful against Geth and... not so much against just about anything else. She gets sidelined on my team more than I wish she would. Especially since she doesn’t show up until very late in ME2 and late-midway through ME3.

Finally, the proof we need. And the game continues to introduce new concepts to us with the Conduit and we hear the word Reapers for the first time. We also get a loredump on the quarians and the geth.

Tali’s voice doesn’t have quite as heavy of an accent in ME1 as it does in 2 and 3. I guess we can assume she’s lost part of it while on her pilgrimage? Picking up the local dialects a bit? The next two times we see her she’s just spent a lot of time with her own people.

Tali’s suit and omnitool look SO GOOD with the updated textures.

I swap Ash out and Tali in at this point, and usually finish up a few more quests along the way.

Ah, Septimus. You lovesick fool.

Honestly, the very best thing with Septimus is to bring Garrus here if you’re gonna romance him, have Garrus laugh at him for coming undone for love and then... well, ME2 and especially ME3 happen. But still. Septimus... always needs a kick in the pants but will get around to doing the right thing.

Hey here’s a cool thing ME1Recalibated does -- Morlan carries a Squad Iconic Armors stock, so you can always find tier-appropriate default look armor for you and all the squad. Very cool of you, Morlan. You are currently my favorite store on the Citadel. Now stop sending me spam, I didn’t sign up for your mailing list.

Look, I have questions about what exactly Xeltan told the consort and how... all that... works... but... I don’t think I actually want to ask them. Just.. let’s all shut up about all of it, it’s over now.

BTW, according to one of the novels, Councilor Anderson finds Ambassador Cayln super annoying. I need to re-read that book.

OK fine... I’ll go talk to the Council.

Coming at ya with Actual Proof and a quarian tagging along to back up the claims, the Council is ready to listen. And while not surprising that it’s finally time to become a Spectre, the actual ceremony is really well done. With the swelling theme music blaring, and all three councilors stressing what a big deal this is and what will be expected of you, you really feel the weight of this moment. People take notice. Although apparently later, Kaidan or Ash get an entire televised event around becoming a Spectre, I guess there’s no time for that right now.

It definitely feels like the game so far has been building towards this moment, not only with POUNDING it into your brain about who Spectres are and why they’re so important and letting you know you’re being evaluated... but it feels like there’s been a shift in the game after this moment. It’s A Big Deal.

I didn’t finish all the sidequests on the Citadel yet, they can wait, I’ve been here long enough. Let’s go check out the new cool stuff we can buy.

ME1Recalibrated adds in this Spectre Armor. Eeehhhhh... no thanks. We’ll stick with Onyx.

I did cheat myself in a bunch of credits and picked up Spectre weapons though. This ain’t no tryhard playthrough.

Well OK, we can finish ONE more quest. Thanks, startlingly loud and triumphant music queue that’s never used again!

Man, this would be SUCH a good pic of the Normandy if... the airlock didn’t go straight through the ship.

We’ve got a ship of our own! And most of our squadmates to put on it!

Sucks for Anderson to be sidelined, though. We already love you, Anderson!

It’s cool to get a bit more of the Saren & Anderson backstory here for real. Still, I enjoyed the book more. Maybe I’ll do a re-read of all the ME books here soon.

Udina... just keep being you, I guess.

WE HAVE A SHIP!!!

Okay, whew... we made it off the Citadel. Now I gotta actually play some more to have more updates to post. Might be a few days. Have to actually go back to work tomorrow. :p

Let’s probably do like one sidequest then go get us an Asari!!

#mass effect #bioware #kaidan alenko #garrus vakarian #urdnot wrex #tali'zorah #annakie's mass effect stuff

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drsilverfish · 6 years

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Old Timey SPN - A Fresh (Queer) Look at 4x06 Yellow Fever

Dean in Yellow Fever (comedic terror overlays heart-stopping anxiety).

Whilst we’re on S14 mid-season hiatus, I wanted to write this meta, because sometimes, when writing or reading about the queer subtext in 2018/19 SPN it’s perhaps too easy to forget why queer subtext came into being in the first place, not just as codes in literature, film and television, but as codes in the everyday lives of LGBTQ people. Such codes were (and still are in many places) built around being able to safely signal to, and identify, one another, without being outed more generally, therefore being at risk of often life-threatening violence, backlash, repression etc.

The world Sam and Dean grew up in, on the road in dive motels and truck-stops, working cases in the “boondocks”, on the fringes of a seriously macho hunter culture, with an ex-marine and Vietnam Vet for a father? A father who sometimes drank too much, and who (in subtext) was, most likely, sometimes physically violent towards his eldest son? A world where Dean got him and Sam fed by stealing food when their Dad forgot to leave them enough? A world where, when they were a bit older, they got by on hustling pool and credit card fraud and (Jensen’s headcanon, but also see below) Dean probably turned tricks on occasion too? That was not a world where you could be “out” safely, by any stretch of the imagination. Of course that doesn’t mean it was a world where sex between men didn’t exist. But it was far, far more likely to be a world populated by MSM (men who have sex with men, but who do not identify as gay or bisexual) than by anyone sporting an “out” LGBTQ identity of any kind.

It’s not until ten years later, in 2016, in 11x19 The Chitters, that we meet any clearly identified LGBTQ male hunters, and when we do (Jesse and Cesar) we learn that Jesse’s childhood, in small-town Colorado, was full of fear and the need (which his older brother warned him about) to stay in the closet for his own safety.

SPN really hints at all that, early on, in the scene from 1x08 Bugs when Dean comes out of a pool hall with a wad of cash in his hand, and Sam ribs him about hustling pool and Dean says it’s “fun and easy” and there’s a “Billiards” sign flashing behind him which is partially broken, so instead it reads “Billiar” (Bi-liar = bisexual liar) hinting (in subtext) that maybe, what Dean was hustling wasn’t just pool, but dudes:

Original gif-set here: http://canonspngifs.tumblr.com/post/182845022861

So, content warning for this piece of meta - under the cut I discuss “queer-bashing” and link to an upsetting (but important) real-world piece of reporting in Vanity Fair from the 1990s on a series of brutal homophobic and often ultimately murderous incidents in Texas, as an example of the kind of climate Dean and Sam would have been aware of, growing up.

If you’re feeling OK to follow this thread through, the first thing you should do, is read this earlier, great piece of collaborative meta on Yellow Fever and its Dean/ Ash subtext by @f-ckyeahfutbol and @sandraugiga and @aslightsgoflashing (the last blog now deleted):

https://f-ckyeahfutbol.tumblr.com/post/147912926731/aslightsgoflashing-f-ckyeahfutbol

I want to write something adjacent to that meta, by talking about how both Dean’s heightened anxiety (brought on, ostensibly, by the “ghost sickness” in the episode) and the form of violence meted out to Luther/ the ghost in Yellow Fever, can be read as, subtextually, signalling towards Dean’s “gay panic” and (the extremely understandable cause of said panic) - homophobic violence.

More under the cut...

Firstly, let’s understand something of the history of violence towards gay/ bisexual men, particularly in the small town and rural United States where SPN is set. SPN began screening in 2005. Just a decade earlier, Vanity Fair ran this important piece of investigative journalism on a series of deadly and violent “queer-bashing” incidents in Texas carried out mostly by teenage boys, who felt supported by their churches and communities in carrying out these attacks (many of them resulting in murder):

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/1995/02/texas-murder-199502

Sam and Dean are aware, in the SPN story-world, of this kind of community-supported homophobic violence. Remember the out gay teacher who was murdered by a homophobic preacher’s wife controlling a Reaper in 1x12 Faith? Meta on that here:

http://drsilverfish.tumblr.com/post/115161057824/bisexual-in-the-subtext-since-s1

The SPN story-world also established, early on (see below 2x11 Playthings) that Dean is anxious about being perceived as queer, in a way that Sam is not:

SAM: “They probably think you’re over-compensating”

DEAN: .................................

Original gif here: http://nimbus2ooo.tumblr.com/post/5585782984

Dean has been queer-coded as bisexual since S1, and, as this Dean/ Ash meta master-post makes clear, specifically, in the early seasons, in relation to Jo Harvelle and Ash, whom he meets at the same time:

https://sandraugiga.tumblr.com/post/124850209617/a-detailed-look-into-dean-and-ash-masterpost

Ash, of course, dies in 2x21 All Hell Breaks Loose, which is why the Yellow Fever @f-ckyeahfutbol and @sandraugiga meta linked to, above the cut, discusses mourning and the Dean/Ash subtext as one of the threads running through the episode. As “ghost-sickness” in some Native American cultures, is a form of mourning, that reading is definitely relevant:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ghost_sickness .

Bearing that in mind, I’m going to leave Dean/ Ash to one side, and talk specifically about reading the “ghost-sickness” in Yellow Fever as closted “gay panic”.

The episode opens with Dean, terrified, running down a dark street at night.

On one level, we later understand, his terror is all about what he experienced in Hell and his fear of returning there. He is being chased by a little dog, which, it is eventually revealed, he is hallucinating is a Hell-hound.

However, on another level, we can also read this as Dean being chased by his “Gay Thoughts TM”. The little dog is wearing a pink bow. Pink is often used in symbolic visual TV/ cinema code for “gay” a) because it is understood as a “feminine” colour (and there is that old stereotypical association of gayness with femininity) and b) because the colour was reclaimed and used with pride by the LGBT community itself, particularly in the 1970s and ‘80s, from the pink triangle that homosexuals were forced to wear as an identifying mark in the Nazi concentration camps.

After this opener (also strongly played for comedic effect, so the queer reading is definitely in the closet) we flash to 43 hours earlier, and the first vic, Frank O’Brien, on the autopsy table. Posing as FBI agents, the Winchesters show up to investigate. They have taken the aliases Joe Perry and Steve Tyler (from Aerosmith). Tyler has been quite open about having had sex with men as well as women.

Dean notices (and we should note it’s Dean, not Sam) that there is a mark on Frank’s ring finger where a wedding ring should be, but it’s missing. Then the coroner hands Dean Frank’s heart.

A dude with a wedding ring missing and then his heart is passed to Dean? That looks like symbolism for queer-on-the-side infidelity to me.

We learn all the other vics were also men, and they all died of heart failure (aka, in subtext, we are talking about queer closeted men).

We also learn that Frank’s wife Jessie committed suicide many years ago, and that Frank was a bully in school, but he “got better” after his wife died. Both of these factoids can be read as subtextual signals pointing towards Frank’s queerness (possibly his self-loathing turned outwards and his unhappiness in his marriage).

Then we meet the germaphobe (a mirror for Dean) Sheriff in town. The Sheriff is really cut up about Frank’s death, and seems to be hiding something.

SHERIFF BRITTON: "Me and Frank, we were friends. Hell, we were Game-cocks.”

(Dean snickers)

SHERIFF BRITTON: “That's our softball team's name. They're majestic animals.”

In other words, Dean heard the word “Game-cocks” and his mind immediately went to “fuck buddies,” which says a lot about Dean, but also Dean’s gaydar may have been on-point.

Were the Sheriff and Frank, in fact, (closeted) lovers?

Textually, we find out the Sheriff knew Frank had murdered someone, and covered for him. Subtextually....?

The Sheriff, we realise later, like Dean, has also been “infected” and is beginning to suffer from the ghost sickness. This “infection” as a metaphor for queerness might seem as if it is alluding to HIV/AIDS, but, if we read the queer subtext of the ghost sickness in Yellow Fever as about closeted “gay panic” in the kind of environment where it’s not safe to be out, then this isn’t a “gay/ bi men are infectious” homophobic metaphor, it’s more about closeted men’s fear, in a homophobic environment, that they are somehow “infected” by queerness and will not be able to keep it secret.

And how are the men who have died, “infected”? It seems to be (metaphorically) “through the heart”, as Dean was shown literally holding Frank’s heart, and the Sheriff was suffering from grief-of-the-heart at Frank’s death.

As soon as Dean is drunk, and therefore disinhibited, the element he is is repressing emerges, and Dean flirts with the Sheriff’s cute young assistant. And let’s side-eye the Dean-mirror Sheriff’s choice of deputy eye-candy here. The deputy is framed by a painting of stallions in the Sheriff’s office. Stallions, like game-cocks, being a symbol of hyper-masculine virility - the Sheriff’s choices being both a cover for, and a coded signal of, homoeroticism.

And here’s that much giffed flirting scene:

(Couldn’t find the gif credit for this one)

At Frank’s neighbour’s house, Dean (not Sam) gets crawled over by a huge yellow-white python (read - penis metaphor) and Dean (infected by the ghost-sickness, aka “gay panic”) freaks out. As frequently throughout the episode, this subtextual meaning is covered by comedic effect.

(Couldn’t find the gif credit for this one either - sorry - older gifs tend to appear on platforms like “giphy” that strips out the OP)

Finally, the boys find out that a dude named Luther is the ghostly source of the “ghost-sickness”. Luther, who had learning disabilities, was murdered by Frank, who ostensibly (and wrongly) believed Luther murdered Frank’s wife, Jessie (who had been kind to Luther, and who, Luther’s brother tells the Winchesters, he had a “crush” on).

Is that the actual story, however? That’s the heterosexual, surface-available textual story.

But subtextually? The Winchesters find Frank’s wedding ring in the lumber yard which the ghost of Luther is haunting. What if that disused “lumber yard” was a known cruising ground, and Frank had had sex with men there (symbolised by the loss of his wedding ring) perhaps with Luther himself, or with the Sheriff (and Luther witnessed it) then he felt guilty about it (maybe because Jessie found out about his habit of having closeted sex with men on the side and that contributed to her suicide)? And so, Frank went after Luther.

Why this subtextual reading?

Let’s look at the way Frank killed Luther. He wrapped a chain around his neck and “road-hauled” him to death behind his truck.

Have you heard of a “fag-drag”? Unfortunately, I don’t mean drag performance, but the “queer-bashing” version. You may have heard of a “fag-drag” used in this sense because of this Southpark clip (typically faux-ironic in tone) in which Mr. Garrison yells, “Come on everybody, let’s get us some queers, and some trucks, and have us a good old fashioned fag drag.” Mr. Garrison was depicted as a closted gay man who hid his homosexuality by making homophobic statements in the first three seasons of Southpark (he eventually came out as trans).

youtube

Or, you may have heard of the “fag-drag” (a particular form of homophobic violence) thanks to Brokeback Mountain. It was such a (murderous) “queer bashing” that young Ennis was forced to witness (the aftermath of) by his father - in which an old gay rancher had been roped to the back of a truck and dragged, “...until his dick came off,” and he died.

Sorry for the graphic imagery - none of this is OK and I am using “fag-drag” in quote marks throughout, because it’s obviously a violently homophobic term in and of itself.

So, in subtext, we can read Luther as having been “fag-dragged” to death by a, self-hating, closeted Frank.

As Dean gets pulled further and further into the hallucinations that accompany the ghost sickness, Sam calls Bobby for help.

Bobby realises that the ghost responsible for the “ghost-sickness” is a Buruburu, a ghost born of a person’s fear after dying in a terrifying way. Bobby tells Sam a salt-and-burn won’t work - they have to scare the ghost to death. I mean, logically, that makes no sense, right? A ghost born of terror would surely feed on terror?

But, subtextually, it does make sense, because Sam and Bobby love Dean dearly, but they both, at this stage in the SPN narrative, do not fully understand just how much Dean’s surface macho bravado is a performance, covering much that he hides from them (including his queerness).

So, although they both express distress about it, Bobby and Sam recreate Luther’s original death (in subtext, his homophobic “fag drag”) by wrapping an iron chain round ghost-Luther’s neck and hauling him over the ground, attached to Baby.

Shots of ghost-Luther’s death - Sam calls it a “truck haul” (in subtext, a ”fag-drag”):

are intercut with shots of Dean, in the motel room hallucinating the creepy little girl version of Lilith. He asks her, “Why me? Why’d I get infected?” She tells him, “Silly goose, you know why - listen to your heart.” In subtext - that’s Dean’s queer heart (and see my meta linked above on Dean’s queer heart in 1x12 Faith).

As Luther’s ghost gets “fag-dragged” by Dean’s soul (Baby) Dean’s heart starts to give out (again, the shots of the two events are intercut). In our queer subtext reading, we can understand this as a metaphor for the trauma Dean’s own closeted self (his “gay panic”) is inflicting on his queer heart:

Once Luther’s ghost has been destroyed, the ghost sickness leaves Dean.

Or (metaphorically speaking) does it?

The final scene between Dean, Sam and Bobby is really heartbreaking, in a subtextual sense. Because Bobby and Sam tease Dean about how anxious he was under the spell of the ghost sickness, and he pushes back, full once again of his performance bravado:

BOBBY: “You sure, Dean? 'Cause this line of work can get awful scary.”

DEAN: “I'm fine. You want to go hunting? I'll hunt. I'll kill anything.”

BOBBY: “Awwww, he's adorable. I got to get out of here. You boys drive safe.”

So, yes, the more textual layers of the narrative tell us that Dean got infected by the ghost sickness not because, as Sam says in the episode, Dean is a “dick” but because Dean’s terror of being dragged back to Hell (and to the things we eventually find out he did there) made him susceptible to fear-infection.

The more textual layers tell us, that the things Dean keeps from Sam in their talk at the hood of the Impala at the end of the episode, are his hallucinations of Hell-hounds, of Lilith, and of Sam himself with yellow eyes.

But in the queer subtext (should we choose to adopt this reading)?

Dean’s “gay panic”, Dean’s fear of homophobic, or homophobic but homo-erotically charged, violence (like that which was visited on Luther by Frank) was what attracted the ghost-sickness to him (and not to Sam) just as it was attracted to the town’s other (closeted) men, like the Sheriff, who, guiltily (and in fear) nevertheless cruised for sex in the abandoned lumber yard, or took part in nights away with their fellow “Game-cocks”.

And so, in this subtextual reading, one of the things Dean is choosing to hide from Sam, is his queerness.

This particular reading of Yellow Fever makes additional sense once we get to 4x16 On the Head of a Pin and discover that Dean’s time in Hell included a, hideous and twisted, but nevertheless homoerotic, charge between himself and his torturer and “mentor” in Hell, the demon Alastair. That’s an additional trauma, an additional psychic wound, for Dean’s queer heart to bear.

Finally, we should also note, that an element that significantly supports this queer reading is the fact that Yellow Fever is set in the fictional town of Rock Ridge, Colorado. That is also the setting for the spoof Western Blazing Saddles (1974). That movie contains the famous “French mistake” sequence (which later gave Edlund the title and concept for 6x15 The French Mistake).

This sequence is where the movie finally breaks the fourth wall (revealing itself to be artifice) and the Western set of Blazing Saddles breaks through into a cabaret chorus show, where an all male troupe are performing a top and tails number called “The French Mistake” (an allusion to men having sex with men). They are called “faggots” and “sissy marys” by the cowboys, but they also “queer” themselves by using feminine pronouns; “Come on girls!” The cowboys and the chorus dancers get involved in a free-for-all punch-up, but we also see some of them making friends with one another, emerging from the melee with their arms around each other.

This is, of course, a meta-commentary on the queer subtext of the Western genre (and the closeted queerness of classic Hollywood itself). So, it’s a pretty interesting setting to have chosen for Yellow Fever (as it points, by allusion, to the queer subtext of Supernatural i.e. it’s a big sign, for those chosing to follow the trail, that looking out for queer subtext in Yellow Fever might bear narrative fruit). Here is the “French Mistake” clip from Blazing Saddles:

youtube

The book Intersecting Film, Music and Queerness by Jack Curtis Dubowsky (Palgrave, 2016) contains a chapter specifically devoted to reading the queerness in Blazing Saddles.

My own reading of Yellow Fever has been brought to you by me, courtesy of Andrew Dabb and Daniel Loflin, who wrote the episode, inspired by some of the questions left hanging in @f-ckyeahfutbol. and @sandraugiga ‘s meta on the episode.

As ever, here is my usual disclaimer - Dean’s bisexuality and his attraction to men continue to be told in the SPN subtext (14 years and counting now). My queer readings of Supernatural do not “promise” that this element of the narrative will emerge into undeniable main-text for the general audience.

However, subtext IS a part of narrative.

#Supernatural #SPN meta #Meta #4x06 #Yellow Fever #Dean is bisexual #Still subtext #But subtext IS part of narrative #CW: suicide #CW: violence #CW: homophobic violence

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elizabethrobertajones · 7 years

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13x05 watching notes

I’m not used to getting what I want.

Expectations: holy crap am I excited to see Billie again. Yeah yeah Cas or whatever, we know he's back and would be coming back from the moment he died, and all the rest is just flavour text... BILLIE is an utter treat and given A: how she died (not just dead reaper killed off for man pain as a minor thematic antagonist, but also woman of colour on the show which was a bummer and at least she alters their post-death appearances dismal stats even if she isn't back-back as her full and healthy self a la Cas as a worst case scenario >.>) and B: the themes she embodied, and C: that Cas just got punted back OUT of the Empty, well, I am ridiculously pumped to have her (or the image of her >.>) around again, because of the utterly fascinating thematic conundrum she'll represent and because Billie was the most freakin awesome character ever, and Lisa Berry just exudes this raw calm power, and I went and watched Shadowhunters over hiatus 90% because she was on it in like 3 episodes and lo and behold she was a powerhouse in her scenes there too :P

Of course I have a personal stake too and as a meta writer it's not quite so obvious, as a shitposter you might have caught me endlessly referring to it, and as me personally inside my head, I know that I introduced Billie to Terrible Coffee AU to be a side character to the drama, meaning to embroil her in it as a voice of amused-warning-to-later-friend for Cas, and began constructing an entire narrative to explore cosmic consequences in as if post-death the show's Billie had wandered over to my silly AU and was using her extreme disappointment in them all to add another level of irony to the characterisation (listen: imagining what face the canon character would make at their role in your AU is a great way to characterise and people think I'm good at it, so free writing tip :P) and I had to make Billie proud about what I wrought.

I failed to actually write that section in time for this episode, had no idea there WAS an expiry date and that Billie would come back, but here we are and I've accidentally over-thought Billie to an absolutely astronomically disproportionate degree to probably most people around these parts for the sake of having her tease Cas about Dean from the deck of a boat while they were sipping cocktails together. :P

I can and will mentally insert a cocktail into Billie's hand in her scene(s).

OH AND THEN THROW IN THAT THIS IS A YOCKEY EPISODE. Of all the current writers, he's the one who makes me lose my chill completely. He's got an incredible way with character and emotion which I absolutely adore, so I find it pretty hard to worry about all the nervous little things I worry about aside from how much the grand scheme of things will let Billie back. And season 13 seems to be going pretty in my favour as a viewer and meta writer so. Super sublime chill.

Oh boy the recap people are trying to put us out of a job.

Superimposing Dean's speech to Patience over Sam crying over Dean nearly dying in 2x01 and ghost!Dean lurking behind him, which of all the reminders that they die a lot is a... lot of a thing. Because John etc. Season 2 theeemes everywhere. And then of course them getting shot as ghosts in 4x15 aka time to save Tessa. And Dean wasn't having an easier time in that episode, hell-damaged and talking to Tessa about how he wished he'd gone with her. Could just be subtle reaper reminders because the next shot is Sam detoxing demon blood in 4x21, nudging us into new territory for Jack theeemes. But that's part of the "pain" in his speech, "horror" is Dean hilariously dying in 3x11 when hit by a car, which, well, wasn't hilarious at all for Sam or the rest of that episode for us once the dying montage was over, and just reminds us how much they're dicked around with by the universe... And then "Death." Over. Death's hand.

Look, I am a simple person with simple wants. I would have been satisfied to just have this about Billie but now you're making me want to see DEATH again and see what the heck happened with him. I mean I've always sort of wanted to see him back again because if Billie would be pissed at them... :P But I could accept she was his stand in from now on. That she WAS the new Death all along, even, for our wild spec. Now I am MADLY excited about how they're going to utilise all this stuff because oh hi have you met me the reapers and death stuff is my absolute favourite stuff on the show. I was always hoping this wasn't going to be a cop out with the tasty sounding title, and it seems like they want us to really be on the ball about the themes here, to whatever end.

(Just having paused it to squeal here, it could be a fake out about Death because the first shot of him in his killer intro montage was his hand with his ring because in season 5 that was the cue we needed to know that was the ring we needed and that Death was who he was supposed to be... Logic dictates the ring crumbled in 10x23 but if they wanted to invoke Death without bringing Julian back...)

Weeeeeeeehheeheheheheeee Death's "affront to the balance of the universe" speech in 6x11 where he was resentfully giving Sam's soul back on one condition... The same thing Billie was pissed about in 11x02 onwards. Is he here to cover for her reappearance and make this seem like it's all just a big cosmic theme? Because something tells me this episode is about their deaths somehow or another, either temporary, threatened, or big picture :P

Or it's confirming that Billie is Death, there's always that because the next transition is Dean killing Death to Billie LITERALLY CONTINUING DEATH'S SENTENCE FROM 6x11 - "you cause disruption on a global scale -- so next time you die and your brother bite it, we're going to toss you out into the Empty."

"And *nothing* comes back from that" *stab*

Leaving it there with Cas - no cutting to him back alive in the bramble patch. Instead the last note, the only one ABOUT the Winchesters in season 13 aside from Dean's 13x03 speech being used - is Dean saying Sam needs to keep the faith for him, which was the comment only answered in dramatic irony by Cas's return. No comment on the dominoes of Cas stabbing Billie, getting stabbed himself, going to the Empty, and coming back from that. No comment on the deal. This is all stuff we're either meant to know already or isn't strictly relevant right now... But we'll see :P

Sort of scared to play the cold open because eye horror in the promo pics and I don't wanna see the doctor drill some random person of the week through the eyeball :P

Oh no, it's kids. I think they're still alive because of the promo where they refer to talking to some kids. Or one of them with the implication both made it out the house although I assume their time is numbered regardless.

They're visiting a house which used to be a mental health clinic, which has weird overlap to last episode and the fact the guys went to a fully functioning house with a modern day therapist in it. Mel pointed out the Asylum direct visual reference in one of the props we see in the fast promo so I suppose that's a good season 1 reference to keep in the back of your head.

The floppy haired kid with the backpack (aka the Jack mirror?) is more uncertain about doing this but encouraged by his friend to go along with it. His friend is a dick.

I hope someone's had a good look at the stained glass window because I can't tell if we've seen it before or not. This may or may not be set re-use >.>

You can tell the boys apart because one is half battery (the dick) and one has full battery still (our sympathetic guy)

Don't touch the plague masks!!!!

Literally that was your entire fault and at least the one we were rooting for legged it with a minor wound. I think even some other ghosts were yelling at them for waking up the doctor (I HOPE that's not a parallel to The Empty and Cas waking him up)

But yet... sam and dean seem to have visited both? Was it only "minor" brain drilling and the other kid comes back home slightly altered? Mel also made promo shot comparisons to Naomi and her drilling... Brrrr.

Anyway Dean is making himself PB&J so I don't have time for you all. Ouch.

Did Sam literally just compliment Dean for making himself a sandwich?

is it a recovery sandwich?

I get the feeling if we're seeing this and the promo was a lil later on and some investigating further into the episode then maybe we're basically seeing Dean's breaking point for being babied through his grief by Sam's attempts to cheer him up.

Makes you wonder why they picked that instead of this, but this could be a relatively dull opener and Sam trying to talk Dean into going to a strip club was too funny to resist, because it kind of was :P

Sam has been on screen 6 seconds and he's annoyingly peppy

I love Sam btw, like, you are not allowed to judge me for how I may talk about Sam in the coming stretch of episode because I get the sense he's in full on cheer up mode, which turns anyone into the most irritating person on the planet and then you throw in Sam's eyebrows and basically I can't with him :P It's not a judgement on his character, I know he's trying to help Dean because of what Dean told him, but Dean just wants to operate a shell of himself for a while and Sam's trying to dig him out of it because it's painful to see him like that and he doesn't know that Cas is reconnecting with them soon, and if not today then next week and also probably by the second half of the season Mary will be back with them.

Anyway Dean just carries on stoically making his sandwich and we all talk a lot about the symbolism... I think in this context perhaps it's loosely linked to Kevin operating as a ghost out of this kitchen after dying halfway through his PB&J and coming back for the crusts as unfinished business. He was mourning his mom while he was alive but then it turned out she was alive but too late he was dead.

The PB&J is also symbolic of humanity so idk. He could just be making it because it's sweet and he has a sweet tooth, it's vaguely reminiscent of pie filling but not enough to be traumatic and it's Dean's "I'm doing 1 good thing for myself today" personal quiet method of getting better in the long slow aftermath that Sam wants to rush.

"GET THIS" Sam is on full on Sam-ing

Awww Jack's watching DVDs. I assume Sam HAVING a stash of DVDs is stuff he's collected as an adult with a Bunker to go on a nostalgia kick. I assume they have a PO Box pretty much for Sam's Amazon deliveries. Like, he hasn't been lugging DVDs around with him since the start of the show and before that they had a bunch of VHS tapes in the back of the car or something :P They grew up dependant on what was on motel TVs and picked what they liked to come back to as adults with a settled address.

Also: the clouds part and bestow on us: a thing Sam likes!!!! That's like at least 4 songs, a couple of movies including Star Wars stuff, HP Lovecraft, and now liking old bad fantasy movies that even Dean judges him for.

Or, I assume, Dean has watched and may or may not reference if the opportunity came up but he needs to box something off as Sam's weird nerd shit that makes him unappealing to the ladies, while Dean, obviously, has never liked anything nerdy, and has had lots of straight edge manly sex with women and all comments about Zorro masks are stricken from the record.

Sam, being in a magnanimous, my brother is grieving, mood, just literally takes the hit and keeps going. Jesus Christ Sammy.

I would swear he's worn his worst plaid today just to give Dean something else to judge him for :P

Oh uh anyway point is Jack is being stashed in the Bunker just like Sam once stashed Cas with his netflix. Sam's being responsible for the pop culture education of 2 generations. At least Netflix lets you pick whatever you want once Sam's not trying to be helpful, and in 11x06 Dean related to Cas to switching to bad TV, rather than watching Sam's picks of the good stuff you're meant to watch.

Less chance of Jack going on a complete rampage through trash TV, but still if nothing else Dean's hands-off approach to the kid means that Sam is being allowed to mould him however he likes :P

I just went back and watched again just because I realised the credits were ALREADY over after 5 names. It was like, J2, Misha (yay!) and 2 people I hadn't heard of who I assume are too important named characters in this episode to skip but also not reoccurring characters. I wonder what the slippery slope is when you don't put Lisa Berry's name in the credits of an episode you've advertised she's in. Even people who've checked on TV guides will know... But I guess you treat the episode as internally self-spoiling and ignore what everyone knows for the sake of the person who buys the DVDs and watches through without even reading the descriptions in the sleeve or whatever. Anyway glad she wasn't spoiled but it does make me like *itchy teeth* about Death being in the recap, because naaah. Naaaaaaah. NAAAAAAAH. they wouldn't. they're not. it isn't. She's making like, a hallucinatory cameo for theeeemes and I got to stick with that until the episode proves me wrong, never mind bringing Death back :P

As a fan of Death and the reapers (probably already a band name) I'm like... so on edge right now :P

Oh wait also Dean said "what about Jack" - he's using his name even to Sam now. Not teasing him about the anti-christ

Ya know, based on how beer for breakfast (name of my band) went over and letting Dean be Agent Page (oh the promo is so the breaking point - Dean already is calling him out on all this IN THE TEXT, using his words to point out the weirdness) I am actually thinking that Dean would have actually quite liked to go on another job with Jack. That he was starting to see the use of him and to warm up to him ever so slightly as a person since he showed effort and did a good job and saved Sam and dug the graves for them. I don't think Dean would ASK out loud but if Sam had said, "Jack comes and that's final" Dean would have done that face shrug expression and let it happen without much complaint.

Sam is bending to Dean's apparent desires and being like, well Dean doesn't like Jack, this could be a chance to get Dean out of the bunker without Jack and let him forget all his troubles for a bit...

Like, I don't wanna worry you Sam, but last time you decided you needed to cheer Dean up from his extra super special worries about Cas, you took him out into the woods for a fun werewolf hunt, got shot and strangled and had to kill literally every single werewolf in the episode with your bare hands while bleeding profusely from your stomach, while Dean had a random encounter with Billie in the depths of utter despair that he'd lost everyone he ever loved and the world was now going to end without you all.

Dean's a drama queen about a lot of stuff but when he tells Jack your plans don't usually work out, this is the sort of shit he's referring to :P

*Sam looks so freakin smug with himself walking off after the badge exchange and Dean's like... what. What?*

Poor kid with his great big bandage on his forehead.

He "can't even talk" because the trauma was so bad and we cut to him apparently drawing in his room, which makes me think right back to 1x03.

Omg lol of course Dean walks in the door alone to chat to him. And sees him drawing repeatedly the MotW. We bonding over trauma so bad we can't even talk about it again?

OH there's 3 boys. Shaun/Sean (I'm gonna pick Shaun because this is America and I assume you all don't spell stuff proper - FYI to Americans reading this, please remember to read this all in a shrill British accent, what what) and Evan who was presumably the one who died in the cold open, and Mike is the third, who they're inseparable from but was NOT there in the house with them that night, and by nightfall at the promo scene they had not spoke to him yet.

What a frikkin rug pull though, to have 2 boys in the open, so you think they're a duo of best friends, and it's like NO WAIT THEY COME IN THREES... Bahahahaha

Dean back upstairs with Shaun, and he's sat down to talk to him with a "you know" and at this point I am pausing and getting a stuffed toy because he's either gonna open up to a kid who won't squeal about it because he can’t talk, or say something completely awful because he's in an awful place and either way I don't need Emotional Honesty Hour from Dean Winchester at 9:30 in the morning without a friend :P

On no, Dean talking about knowing what it's like to be scared of monsters, but then trying to reassure the kid that he can at least make it go away PHYSICALLY even if the horrific psychological trauma can't be erased. Comforting!!

Promo sceeene!

Which we already picked over but aw yeah so Shaun didn't tell Dean anything after all, except for the plague doctor drawings (and he didn't show he had the mask with him? Really?? Did he drop it earlier?) so Dean really did just open up to the kid about understanding his pain but being the thing monsters are scared of... A better Dean pep talk than Patience got at least, since Shaun was a regular victim and Patience might have been angling to join the life... and it mostly just served to make him say that :P

Since I've been barrelling through all the Wayward Sisters old episodes this month, I am reminded that I spent a good long while wallowing in Yockey vs Sam knowing Dean's porn habits and outing them to Jody in 12x06...

I think Sam trying to make the sacrifice to go to a strip club with Dean (and I can't believe this is the third time I'm putting myself through watching this exchange because omg second hand awfulness and yet I went back and watched it twice it was so good) probably fits under this characterisation umbrella.

Of Sam vs performing Dean, as much as the callbacks to season 1 and Dean vs Sam's Jess grief that I was talking about last night thanks to an anon nudge. And parallels to 12x16 and their chat about the swimming pool outside a similar hotel set (although this one is infinitely lower rate :P) - the writers playing with the knowledge that Sam and Dean have grown up completely latched onto each other like this and Sam's been dragged to strip clubs by Dean almost certainly and they just kinda know more than they want to about the other's personal habits, and they have low, bad boundaries. 12x16 was asserting some back, letting them have separate rooms, and showing Sam grossed out by the thought of Dean skinny dipping which, I mean, fair (if you're Sam anyway :P) but they don't really GET those boundaries.

So there's some re-poking season 12 specific themes here as well, just in that Sam, who has historically had his own walls up about Dean's porn and interest in strip clubs (because they're extremely not his thing) is willing to cross a line for Dean and just go with Dean to a strip club and buy him a lap dance from a place with a decent online review. Which also shows low bad boundaries that he would try and manipulate Dean back to happiness this way, just like in 1x19 especially, Sam had to angrily re-assert his boundaries about Dean constantly trying to set him up with Sarah, and Dean had to point out he has a stake in Sam's sex life too, even if it's just having to put up with Sam being cranky and miserable. Historically, Sam having to put up with Dean's sex life is considerably more on the "ugh, TMI" range for him :P

... sorry, yelling "promo scene!!" usually means I stop analysing for a moment and just watch, because I already went over this ground last night, but I guess there's more untapped depths :P

Holy shit, though in the reaction shots for Dean after talking about the Clam Diver, he's standing with his back to some stuff that on my screen makes a beautiful bi flag. What the hell. I was thinking how colourful the backdrop was last night but...

I mean that's the blurry background to his close ups on this.

I THINK it's just the road lit up behind him but oh gosh getting it in the background of the shot for THIS conversation about the Clam Diver? GUYS what are you DOING.

Who directed this??

I overshot and landed on "how you ever got laid" "heh, tell me about it" I can't BELIEVE, STILL that Sam just gave him that win. For some reason it reminds me of Swap Meat where he judges Gary for being a virgin based on the Star Wars stuff, even though Sam is an established Star Wars nerd of more than the general audience variety, and mostly likely read the old tie in novels :P Sam owning that his nerdy interests as a teen didn't exactly make him very sexy is probably the most frank thing he's ever admitted to Dean and he's just trying to help Dean.

(Tbh, again, it may have helped Dean more if Sam just reacted all prickly and got wound up, which is generally what someone teasing wants - a reaction, not rolling over and showing your tummy. Anyway more on the pile of Yockey probing their sex lives in relation to how they see each other, with Sam letting Dean be the one with the more manly sexy interests and letting the performing Dean layer that all comes from win, and then trying to pander to it some more by looking up places to make Dean feel even more manly and in control)

And holy crap I'm glad I have no yoga today because Yockey's got me talking in loops and I've been back to this conversation in the kitchen 3 times and it's nearly 10am and I've made such bad progress. Mental contortions instead :P

Ooooh directed by John Showalter. I'm pretty sure he's been around for aaaages and contributed more than his fair share of nonsense... :P

I just looked him up on the superwiki, saw he directed the episode with HP Lovecraft (and that ridiculous "I was busy having sex with women" or whatever line about Dean not reading the novels) and basically I am gonna hit the brakes on this thought and just watch the episode or I'm going down a rabbit hole I don't come back from until 11am :P

Oh but the thing I was trying to confirm was... Not that I knew I was looking for it except in the most abstract sense that I was thinking of it in one hand and thinking maybe there was something by this director in the other without realising it was the same hand... the blue & red light falling on Dean in 10x16 which looks an awful lot like the bi flag and shortly preceded Dean confessing all that delicious confessional stuff?

Yeah guess which director according to Superwiki.

Now i'm done.

I want to know what metric The Clam Diver got "four and a half" of on whatever site Sam was reading about it.

That's in Sam's browser history.

"Is it my birthday? Did I win a bet that I don't know about??"

"I'm just trying to be nice."

"W h y."

"Because..... you know why."

"I'm f i n e."

Sam, back off, he's gonna stab you :P

I got to ask... is the automatic door not working an improv because the door broke, or thematically relevant, because that's the sort of random thematically relevant detail I could have a nerdgasm about for absolutely hours of typing while Sam is harassing Dean into the building talking about him not believing in anything. The higher powers aren't doing shit for Dean even when he waves at where he thinks the sensor should be, so he gives up and just opens the damn door himself.

The door has a sticker that says, quite clearly, "warning automatic door" and at the very least for the shortsighted is a great big yellow warning sticker on it, so I'm gonna have to go that they're signposting that it's supposed to open, so this is something either scripted or added with full intent to metaphor and my brain hurts.

Sam is trying to understand this massive great big VOID of misunderstanding and it's... frankly awful. He's babbling about his understanding about Dean and his confusion

"You're not, Dean. you said you don't believe in anything, and that's not true! you-you-you do believe in things, you believe in people, that's who you *are*, that's what you DO. I know you're in a dark place and I just want to *help*"

This is telling us a lot more about how Sam sees Dean than Dean's faith arc. Of course Dean believes in people and saving people and that the planet is worth saving. That's a baseline assumption around here. Dean and *faith* though, in believing in things, in how the universe treats them... it doesn't even open automatic doors for them. Cas is DEAD. Cas is where Dean's belief arc centred in the last minute of 4x01 and Cas is where it has freakin' remained for the next 9 years. Cas lost faith in God and Dean chucked away the amulet because he lost faith in everything - Cas and Sam and himself and their ability to save the world that didn’t want to be saved. Cas became God and Dean lost all hope he may have had left. Cas came BACK to Dean and his faith was restored but in THEM. GOD came back and Dean and Cas had similar and unchanging positions on it right down to Chuck basically telling Dean not to confuse him with his own father, but the ridiculous superimposing over John over Chuck and Chuck as Cas's failed father who Cas now just ignores outright and Dean lashes out on his behalf because he knows Cas doesn't believe. That Chuck broke Cas back in 5x16 and... Yeah. Cas is gone now and what does Dean even have left in his personal faith? Chuck didn't answer, the automatic door won't open even when he waves at it...

Sam sees Dean as having no faith in God (while Sam has had the much more complicated journey there with his personal faith, and feeling it in a religious way) but instead he tries to get a read on Dean's personal compass, and god dammit Yockey *takes a shot* in Wendigo of course Dean sits down with Sam and tells him HIS personal philosophy on why he does what he does: saving people, hunting things, the family business. The thing is, Dean has already in this episode reached out to Shaun and described himself and Sam as the people who know about the monsters, the ones who can't erase the trauma but they can erase the monster, and help what little they can there... Save *other people* from it - yeah it's a message full of regret and defeat that Shaun already got hurt and that's probably why Dean couldn't get him to open up because he didn't come in bubbling with wide-eyed optimism about saving the day, but heavy eyes that had seen this too much. But oh does he still care about the people, and saving them. He just doesn’t trust what HE can do, what they can do against the tide of awful. It's not in his speech to Patience, because it's not the motivation to be a superhero any more - he is just a guy doing a job. And he's lost his heart in many ways. But he will still fight to protect and help people because baseline, Sam is right, that IS Dean and even damaged like this he'll go on hunts and protect people. Take Jack into the Bunker with them in 13x01 expecting it to be a self-destruct thing where base case scenario they can take Jack out with them or something and contain the blast...

But yeah. 13x04 expressly ended linking Dean's lack of faith, via dramatic cast-iron irony, to Cas coming back as Dean voices what losing Cas has done to him.

And then Dean gets to say his bit -

"We've been down this road before, and I've fought my way back and I'll fight my way back again" which HONESTLY echoes Cas in the Empty telling his depression to stuff it and that he'll fight and fight for eternity if he has to.

Dean is trying to get better, he made himself a PB&J, he's just taking this all at his own pace, and Sam's starting to smother him.

"How?"

"Same way I always do: bullets, bacon and booze." Dean regrets his no bumper sticker policy because that and the "whole bottle of Jack" comment from last episode are both iconic Dean talking about his coping methods out loud way.

Also throws back to 10x11 and how Dean did that list of 3 things which he was getting back to when he lost the Mark and left a blank space which should have been "babes" or something and just put more booze into it. The swap of sex for food happens a LOT with Dean. For some reason the Dean vs cake explanation I wrote recently was floating around tumblr again last night, in which the middle of season 10 conveyed clearly that cake was stuff Dean hadn't tried yet (and 10x16's confession tied it all together - we're really delving deep into the stuff that was explored back then and I've thankfully been in fandom for so have the language down really well but I hope I don't have to explain this entire complicated web over and over later :P) and pie was coping methods heterosexual sex with women - tying what Dean wanted in 10x07 in the hook up he didn't get, to pie in 10x13 via that gross dating app... All this with the cake, croissookies, and that comment in 10x11 where Dean was trying to detox and eating egg white omlettes (hi 12x18) and cutting out booze.

And, of course, there's the whole bacon = bisexual experimentation thing from 8x13, 9x13, 11x21, and I guess now :P Cass had a much more thorough bacon masterpost somewhere out there which I may have to dig out and reblog with a knowing look...

And Dean slams his hand down on the bell to punctuate this statement and hopefully bring an end to the conversation by summoning a hotel receptionist.

Cue screaming kid having nightmares about what he's seen.

His mom kisses him on his forehead where the doctor drilled him, and leaves the door open so she can be concerned about him.

Oh no, his backpack DOES have the mask in it. Dr Monsterface used it to get to him :<

(Oh wait hi yes that thing Jody said about the Dr Sexy leviathan in 7x02 is still fresh in my mind. Leviathans as a depression metaphor in a way The Empty rapidly escalated.)

I saw/maybe reblogged a post about how Jack might have Kelly used against him and 13x04 was the nice version, but he's going around carrying his grief about her in a backpack. We have to hope like hell Mia gave him catharsis enough or he might carry that grief with him and things can use her image to get into his head.

(That and the 2x "shoot him!" order about Dean from Miriam and Buddy to the sheriff and Mia, 2 people who wanted to help, are causing foreshadowing concerns)

I love the cuts between the doctor coming for Shaun, though - the bell ending one conversation to Shaun waking up screaming, and then he gets up and pretty much goes to confront the doctor head on rather than cower - but cut to an empty bed.

Dean's empty bed, but he seems to have left the keys?

Ah, he went and had some, uh, catharsis somewhere. I swear to god those are probably the sunglasses from 1x19 dug up again and stuck on his head just to haunt Sam.

The fact his tie is tied around his head makes me feel like he was probably blindfolded at some point in all that... Hehehe. I doubt his tie is tied so nicely around his head with a pretty bow because he did it to look cool :P It would just be the same knot but on his head in that way.

Sam's like "oh great" but doesn't kick Dean awake? Like on a normal day when dumping a glass of water on his face and telling him to suck it up would be the correct thing, Sam's like, "Sam's got this!" goes and gets dressed, takes the keys, and leaves Dean passed out on the floor. In 1x19 he hit the horn to wake Dean up because serves you right.

(if he only went to a strip club he may have just made off with someone's underwear thrown on him for being a good tipper rather than actually having sex with anyone... I kinda doubt if he was THAT drunk he'd be more than a very generous customer they don't mind kicking him out at closing with a bra still on his head :P)

(I'm gonna assume Dean did not actually have sex but just went out and had some very drunk miserable fun and made a friend last night and now he's gonna be dependant on Sam for cash for a while until he can scrounge some back up :P)

Also, um, what is he holding when he rolls over? Is that a fun kinky times toy whip? Exactly what sort of place did he find last night, and please, for the love of god, tell me it was not the place Sam was diligently reading the reviews for between his fingers yesterday, apparently.

Listen say whatever you want about the fact he walked home holding it, if that boy had his tie tied around his eyes he was not the one holding it while he was having fun :P

I like Mike. He's a burly farm worker hefting hay outdoors in the sun, which makes him like 3 different directions of Cas parallel (the strong one in the dynamic, sun, hay), and also he was sensible enough not to be running around in a haunted house for youtube hits.

...

Look, at some point Cas hefted a bunch of hay out of the back of his truck and onto the side of the road and that happened in canon and no one ever mentioned it

thank you Yockey for acknowledging off-screen hay hefting.

Aw no he's lying because he's scared and Sam makes him tell the truth and it's that he WAS scared and he thinks not going to the house was cowardly, but now his friends are missing and hurt (so far as they know because Shaun getting killed overnight might not have made it to them yet)... He does tell the truth in the end. He's also in DEEP denial about their deaths.

Is that enough bacon, Dean.

No, no it is not.

Sam, you're gonna kill him if you give him more beer right now. Is he smuggling local ales to Dean?

I don't think I can actually watch Dean eat this entire pile of bacon with Dean's bad mood eating habits. This pause is just to procrastinate dealing with that.

Wait also the friend is called "Mike" which, uh... Michael? is a thing we should be more worried about? What happened to that guy anyway?

Man, we're 16 minutes in and where's Billie?

I feel like Dean being hung over for the rest of this case is probably not going to help with him getting caught and threatened with a drill by a regular old ghostie.

I'm snooping Sam's tablet before he delivers the cliff notes exposition, and aside from the creepy images at the top, including an old school newspaper article in the top image results that is illegibly small, but seems to have photos of the doc alive, the first and only legible article mentions a woman with depression who goes to the doc because she had depression because her son drowned... Which makes 2 son drowning deaths in 2 episodes, with the kid in 13x04 who killed his mom in the car. Also reminds me of 7x14 where when Dean confronts the guy behind all the nightmares, it's because his little brother drowned in the sea and he could never let go of that guilt.

I think drowning is the metaphor for depression here - people losing a part of themselves metaphoric to small son, who is overwhelmed in the water... Dean related to that loss and used it against the Plucky's guy, and that was in the slight turn around section of season 7 - the part where he began confronting the loss of Cas through mirrors because of course Cas was coming back. In season 13 the plan has been set in stone and can be done briefly and with HEAVY dramatic irony that we're all aware of because we only actually have 1 episode without Cas so far, even if 1 was his death and one was his waking up, he's surrounding Dean's grief in a layer of dramatic irony. Dean may be overwhelmed and drowning. We may have SEEN the memory of Cas drowning in the Empty, but it's all done with dramatic irony, that Cas is not lost to Dean but presumably finding his way back.

Dean had better not puke at the grieving mother's house after all that bacon and beer for breakfast after a hard night out.

I love the cut between Sam asking what happened in one scene and the woman saying "I don't know" in the next - there's some good thematic transitions I've noticed already, especially this way of skipping exposition here, but I liked Dean ringing the bell for the hotel and Shaun waking up screaming, because Dean was about to go out on his grief metaphor night out and for all I know get the sexy kind of drilled while Shaun was getting the unsexy kind... and then the cut to Dean's empty bed, because this is how bad his grief was hurting him.

(Also after Sam tried to control and placate Dean's grief, he resisted Sam's attempts to smother him but he still has been accepting the offers, and did eventually go out and get wasted and Sam had encouraged it - just Dean did it on his terms and without Sam, just his tacit approval that Sam wouldn't bitch about it.)

ALSO WOW AFTER 13 YEARS YOCKEY FINDS A WAY TO SUBTLY WORK IN THE COLD SPOTS FOR GHOSTS.

LOOK HOW INTELLIGENT THAT MAKES OUR BOYS LOOK WHEN THEY READ THE SUBTEXT OF A SCENE FROM A SURFACE READ OF SOMEONE WHO DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT GHOSTS BUT IDENTIFIED THE SIGNS AND THE PEOPLE WHO KNEW WHAT TO LOOK FOR COULD UNDERSTAND WHAT WAS HAPPENING WITHOUT HER SAYING IT AND NOW THEY KNOW EVERYTHING JUST FROM INFERRING IT

WOW

Night time and they go to the house and we're at 18 minutes in. I mean we have time for a jump scare, some bad shit to happen, and then the ad break before pt.2 of the episode.

Buzz buzz

"What's up, doc?"

*ad break*

*back to Dean getting drilled*

Sam saves him and on with pt.2 of the episode.

All the masks are back in place.

Oops, don't touch the masks. *horrible screaming from elsewhere in the house*

Well, except to burn them. Sensible to stay in the room, defend their turf, and get to the burning asap instead of poking around or investigating the screaming any more. 13 years and they have learned a fair amount about ghosts and I am admiring how competent they are. Sam especially has the lead here, probs because Dean is off his game by an enormous degree to him.

Ahahah and Sam did a round circle at the door so we see the doc get partway through the door, realise there's salt, and have to awkwardly back out of it to have a second go and honestly that is the funniest shit a ghost has ever done on this show even though it's also terrifying :P

*burn burn burn*

So rescue Shaun?

What can possibly happen next with nearly 20 minutes left

LIGHTS BLOWING DOWN A HALLL

Now they dealt with the advertised ghost I'm just waiting for Billie to show up, because they're about to be mobbed by a ton of ghosts and she can save their asses, or else... well idk I have to watch, but I'm just laughing because of lights blowing down a hall - 3 times already this season, for Jack, for Patience at least with them flickering rather than exploding like this...

These are all the whispers about the doctor which we heard in the cold open

I love the Winchesters running around shouting sensible ideas about what the ghosts are doing though.

Is this going to be Dean's torch everything solution?

YIKES, no, it's 4x15/11x17. BAD IDEA, DEAN. i can't believe he even carries a pre-prepared take me to the veil kit. Like, that's the reckless nothing to live for might as well die trying to do something dramatic toolkit. We also get shades of 11x16 with him doing that in a super haunted house.

You can NOT pass into the veil in a super haunted house with just your brother to watch over you and stop these 1000s of ghosts killing you.

Jesus Christ Dean.

Wait is he literally doing this

Sam is like FFUCKING HELL RIGHT HERE WITHOUT EVEN A SALT RING? ON THE FUCKING STAIRS UNDER THIS SYMBOLIC STAINED GLASS WINDOW THAT LIZZY DIDN'T ANALYSE EARLIER?

DEAAAAN

And yeah this is 2x01 all over again with Dean walking down the stairs trying to get the attention of a ghost.

Wait back up new reaper with a customer service calm grief counsellor voice, but what did she say her name was? :P

"Hello, my name is JESSICA and I'm here to lead you to your next life"

... well I hope she survives the episode just because I always root for the reapers and she's clearly just a random obstacle to Dean who is doing her job, a regular old part of the natural order, but that is not a name you use at random :P

I'm just sitting here running my hands through my hair trying to deal with this right now. Gonna play a few rounds of Pokemon shuffle because I sort of knew this was coming since they showed 5x15 and 2x01 in the opening recap, but the way Dean did it and then walking immediately into a Jessica? Yeah I need a mo.

Dean maybe never told Sam what he did in 11x17 because he didn't at the end of the episode and idk if that's one of those things you don't just bring up at the breakfast table.

JESSICA.

"Hi, I'm the spectre of the loss of the most important romantically loved loved one in your life, do you feel like moving on from them to the next thing"

"sorry I can't come to the phone"

YOCKEY I AM DISTRESSED.

Accidents don't happen accidentally.

"Oh god."

She knows what she's got herself into.

Sam takes 20 seconds to set his waych and sdakdfjgkl hang on who cares about Sam

WE'RE IN REAPER HQ

"Dean Winchester is the the veil!"

Please say this whole thing goes to red alert.

Where's his file. It it like 5000 times the size of all these little ones?

Sam put down enough salt for Dean but not himself.

I don't think that's ghosts blowing lights any more, I think that's emergency lightning from the cosmos.

SHAUN! Oh no, you're dead :(

At least he's talking again.

Generally the freshest ghosts are the more talkative ones, and as Bobby showed us back in 7x19 which I generally try not to remember or rely on for ghost lore, because the older ones are fading and falling into patterns and the fresher ones still have a stronger sense of self and their old life.

OH NO Shaun got possessed because of course that's how he got back here with the mask. I think we saw a smaller ghost in a t-shirt in some of the promo stuff, but I thought it was a kid, not a teenager.

"I miss my mom" he's on the other side of the grief from Jack, who misses his mom because he's alive and she's dead. The doc said he'd feel better and he froze and let him kill him. Also Kevin parallels just of a kid whose most important relationship is his mom and now he's dead.

Dean's thinking clearly for the first time in a while because he's not in his body. All soaked in alcohol and grief. He realises he let Shaun down by not being there to protect him. Which may have all happened this way in another episode, but that PB&J, man. It was a Kevin thing all along. (I SAID it was a Kevin thing and you all were like blah blah Cas blah blah Jack, look, don't doubt me on my Kevin knowledge, guys, I am still RAW about his death and it was 4 years ago :P) Dean's remembering in the middle of grief that it's "saving people hunting things" after he let Patience down with that speech. Or so I hope. They used Dean's speech over the open of the episode like in a season 1 episode they'd usually layer the more optimistic and simplistic "saving people hunting things" from Dean's like, second day on the job, not where he's all messed up and old.

Anyway Shaun is an emergency Kevin patched into his life to make him feel bad about failing people, and I guess that puts Dean at similar crossroads to the middle of season 9. Hopefully to a different end, just like this should be subverting 11x17 for why he just abruptly decided to cross into the veil, because Jessica is not having a good day :P

DEAN GOING INTO THE VEIL TO HELP LOST PEOPLE is doubling up the job of a reaper. Reapers CAN'T COMMUNICATE across the veil to the living, and don't wanna solve the cases. They come to move on the one person with a ticket upstairs in a house full of hundreds of ghosts and just ignore them... Dean actively dives into their turf to solve the case and find out how to move the souls on. He SAYS he wants to help move the souls on.

I have such a huge love of Dean blurring the lines with being Death, and being a reaper. It's just such a symbolic thing. Their job is moving people on, basically handing souls to the reapers to carry on the job, when it's ghost cases. They're the human agents of the reapers breaking the ties that hold ghosts to the earth so that the whole process can carry on and the world doesn't fill up with ghosts - like it did when the veil was broken. (or is it still? Again, the whole Kevin thing not quiiiite answered, although maybe/maybe not that was a sign Chuck was fixing the thing... But then there were a whole bunch of souls Billie for for them out of the veil like 2 episodes later...)

Reaper lore is fucked up on this show :P But Reaper HQ just in the first glimpse looked aaaawfuully empty adjacent...

I'm guessing even though Dean's got back with the info he needs, and Sam's about to wake him up because the clock ran out, the reapers are going to intervene...

WAKEY WAKEY DEAN

Oh look Billie's back.

"Hey Dean"

I haven't been this happy in about 1000 years. Like seriously Cas getting back was great and all but HOLY SHIT have you seen Billie? I would set this as my desktop immediately but my mum and Cat are both gonna have to watch this episode with me and probably see my desktop in the process, so... Saving a screencap for later ;)

This is literally the best thing.

LOOK AT HER.

LOOK AT THAT SCYTHE. HOLY SHIIIT THAT SCYTHE.

Billie's understated attitude is just *clenches fist*

She just shows up!! LOoking LIKE THIS!!!!

I don't even wanna hit play, I don't wanna move past this point, I just want to bask in this one image forever.

THE COAT. NO one has shown up in a floor length leather coat in the entire show so far, because no one has been good enough for it.

"We need to talk" Yeah no shit babe.

LOL getting right to it - Dean like, Cas killed you. Billie like, "how's that working out for him?" - does she know? Either way, she's rubbing it in. Because of course she has eeeevery right to be pissed. :P

UTTER GLEE.

I have a sudden feeling... Billie says, "certain rules - after you kill one "incarnation" of Death" (Hey 1000 points to trisscar) "another one takes its place" and dude.

Death died and within 10 seconds Billie was singing "o Death" and following the Winchesters around, annoying them, making deals with them, making ultimatums with them... Like, the reapers aren't exactly itching to kill EACH OTHER and promote someone, and I guess just one biting the bullet and taking one for the team doesn't work... But this suddenly explains EVERYTHING about Billie getting all up in the business of the people who basically fuck up every deal and ally they make and hanging out with them... doesn't give you much of a life span.

Back in 12x06, Billie taunted Dean, made fun of him for not getting what he wants, and said she wanted something from him. Came to Mary and said she was there to reap her when she was ready. She LET Dean make another deal, a deal where one of his family would have to die, or he himself do it. In a car full of Winchesters, one of them is gonna take one for the team, or ruin everything and kill the reaper who's been bothering them, holds so much over them...

I'm thinking very hard about changes of state right now - that Billie and Cas had mirrored deaths, and Billie came back improved, and Cas... Well, we don't know how he came back except he's been put on a better path, for his character narrative, in confronting and overcoming the symbolic depression, and he has a better coat. Not much to go on yet, and I haven't been participating in the wild flailing about all the ways he MAY have come back different, but this makes a veeery interesting mirror about returns and changes of state, upgrades after death. Now I'm interested in what may have happened to Cas.

But, like, to a magnitude of difference to how utterly delighted I am that Billie won the game :P

But yeah this is a bit of a lore fudge but who caaaares because it brings Billie back and powers her up and makes her into THE BEST CHARACTER ON THE SHOW IN A TOTALLY INARGUABLE WAY.

I love her new ring :P

"This universe can be so many things, and sometimes it is poetic."

Hell yeah it is Billie. I've been saying so for ages, but this really puts it in such a beautiful way. This is Dabb's entire job. He makes this universe *rhyme* with itself. This is what his mirrors and parallels and character repeats have been doing. I even compared scene transitions in 13x03 to the way poetry ends each line in a verse. It's something all the writers have been doing - making the story rhyme.

Gaaaaah. THIS is Dabb's writer meta commentary, perhaps. I think I can trust Yockey to spell it out this way :D

She took him to Reaper HQ!!! Like Cas he's passing through states - I assume he'll be back in time to finish the hunt, but in the mean time... He's got to work through some shit, just like Cas did last episode. Rhyming with each other.

Dean is wearing a black and grey plaid with thin red lines, and a black jacket. He's bringing like the only colour here to all the blackness.

yeah, Billie, keep the scythe away from him.

I love she set her desk up in the W section because even though it's not the middle of the alphabet, she's keeping a CLOSE FREAKING EYE on the Winchesters.

Ooh she knows Dean went to the AU... She's interested in Jack. Dean's chance to protect him!!!???

Billie looks INCREDIBLE how did I ever let myself talk myself into doubting she was here to run the game?

wait shit Dean's doing epic character stuff. Not bargaining with his life, or asking for Mary or Cas back. He just wants to complete the job and free the ghosts because freakin sshdfkjsjlks PB&J brought him back to his senses and he needs to save Kevin-stand-in rather than let him wallow in the veil for 3 seasons again

THAT is one heck of a thing, Dean. I love you so much

not as much as billie but it was a beautiful character moment

Billie is STUNNED.

Jessica gets to take all the ghosts back. She thought this was going to be a terrible day and it actually worked out.

Again, with like 10 minutes left of the episode so this isn't how it ends.

Now Dean's talking about trust, and Billie brings up how they keep breaking cosmic bargains. I think he may be stalling - even planning to NOT give up Jack even though Billie went first... Or he's gonna tell her but... Natural order? She can't just go... kill him...

If Dean's still uncertain about Jack he could always make a query about IF she could kill him, but not give away enough, or have her as the weapon in his back pocket should Jack be a problem... something for him to regret later, maybe?

This is stressful

Dean spills. "Lucifer's son. Jack. When he was born it created a little rip."

What does Billie know about the AU?

Well she knows how the multiverse works, and she knows a "big dumb Winchester" is fairly statistically likely to be the one to knock it all down.

The warning not to try and get Mary back? Now Cas is back? The consequences may still be on Mary, however she's returned to them, intentionally or not, she could topple it?

Ugh I hate spec but all these lines are so leading :P The comment that Sam's plans don't work out, in this light, for example, is realllly nerve-wracking. And we know from spoilers the AU is going to become a more immediate problem at some point...

"That does sound like us."

"You've changed." Billie reading Dean deeply and now we get to the character part of this where she's just... analysing him.

"The Dean I know and love" look I'm die hard Destiel to the bone but Dean x Death is something I've always thought the dynamic for was absolutely stunning since their first meeting, and I hate to say it but making Death into Billie is making it aaawfully tempting to ship :P

Please show him his massive folders.

She's currently just calling him out on how bad he feels. Pure awful character exposition.

"I don't matter." OH DEAN NO.

He and Cas totally rhyming with each other about their passing through these dark other worlds...

Dean couldn't save mom, he couldn't save Cas, he can't even save this kid... But he already saved the kid with that bargain with Billie, and Cas is... out there somewhere. And Mary is a whole other problem and the one he can't solve right now. If she's alive, she's on the other side of a wobbling house of cards he can't touch. But the difference in the way he gets finality on Mary vs the finality on Cas? 13x01 vs this episode as Dean slides from dealing with Cas to dealing with Mary? Getting this blunt exposition from Billie about it...

I think Billie would have thought it was funny to show Dean his file, but then realised because he's changed she needs a different approach to intimidate and interrogate him. She sees that he doesn't feel like a hero any more, not the guy who saves the world. All his crushing losses have made him feel like he's still utterly helpless to make anything good happen in his own life.

And Dean can't work through it, won't work through it, and he knows it - this is the thing that has broken him hardest... That at this point there will be NO recovery except the story handing back Cas to him, and even then that's one hell of a shake to what he believes he can accomplish... If they wanted to scare him back down from "i kill gods" Dean who then went and killed Death too, to show him the universe his huge, and keeps on ticking and his actions have put Billie in charge and the natural order keeps on ticking... But he still can't get mom and Cas back...

I am literally sitting in that room in Alice in Wonderland where she's floating around on her tears.

I mean in my head, anyway :P

My heart is broken.

Billie's "don't you?" though when Dean says he doesn't matter... I wonder what she knows that Dean doesn't :P

But Dean starts ranting to her about how Sam's been trying to help and he's useless... :(

"You really believe that. You want to die." Well, yeah the universe has become a crushing hard place where no one makes sense and Dean doesn't even believe in the blaze of glory death, doing something HEROIC now, let alone not believing in it because he thinks he deserves better and a happy ending at the end of this all...

Lowest point, unlocked! \o/

Oh, ALL those notebooks are his individual deaths... How he dies. "heart attack. burned by a red-haired witch" HEY ROWENA

Are they potential deaths or ones still looming over him, disappearing as he passes those marks? Or are they his entire history of deaths not died?

"Unfortunately, none of these books say you die today"

....

So are they potential future deaths or what?

I mean, Billie just introduced hope to his life.

"I stand witness to a much larger picture" they could not have picked a better character to be Death. She has such DEPTH and WEIGHT to the way she speaks, and such an amazing calm, powerful aura of energy. I just love her so so much.

OH GOSH this camera angle with the scythe in the background behind Dean's face... Gotta save and remember to add that to this, because after telling him all the ways he dies, Billie moves onto his big picture cosmic weight. That he's important. And Dean has the scythe symbolically pointing at him as she talks, telling him he's at those crossroads of life and death but not today... Is this going to be a burden like the one Chuck laid on him, or Billie reminding him that a heroic life is not such a bad thing?

I really think this is one of the best episodes of the show and I got a few minutes left of it and don't know how this resolves :P

SHE IS LITERALLY giving him the 4x01 Cas speech - "you have work to do" and telling him he's important, telling him he deserves to live... Kinda still like I hate you but you're important, and setting aside past grudges. There's more for him to do.

"And trust me, having my eyes opened to the importance of any humans, especially Winchesters, is not a thrill." HA. yeah, she's an anti-Cas but she and Cas are literally bouncing off each other in the story anyway since he stabbed her and then got stabbed himself in turn.

Rhymes. Rules. Reason. Billie is the best character on the show and I love her.

"So, you wanna die, but I say, keep living." "Hmm."

This is NOT the same as what happened with Cas - but he may not remember it - but it works in sort of mirrored ways. Cas utterly defeats the Empty with his will to live, may not remember it, and may have to piece his newfound will to live together himself in this new hopeful return to life. I hope. Dean has no will to live, and orders of work and purpose are just the way his life goes, the orders endlessly being placed on his head by every cosmically powerful figure... God, Death that time in 6x11, Billie now, JOHN every day of his life from aged 4 to 27 and then one final order to haunt Dean to his first grave...

"I need to know. My mom" *wakey wakey*

Oh, and there's the so far missing hope. She can't lie to him and say Mary's dead, so she cuts him off in indecision and uncertainty, and THAT, unfortunately, is a massive step up from where he was in total despair that there is no one he can save...

And Cas may very well be back in his life to give him the hope that it can be done again by the end of this episode... Aaaaaaaaaaaah.

Anyway Dean goes wakey wakey at last and the house seems to be wrapped up, yay.

there's exactly 5 minutes left, which is always the omen. :P

Sam comforts Shaun's mom, and wanders through the scene, looking small in the chaos, to rejoin Dean at the car.

And like in 11x17 Dean lies again.

Sam is too smart for that, chases it up when Dean tries to brush it off as luck, and says that when Dean says they talk about it later, it means they won't talk about it and it's Dean's way of shutting off a conversation from ever happening...

Sam calling out their communication issues? I am LIVING

Dean glances at the mom, and is reminded that they do this job for a reason, that he bargained to save the souls of the children... Sold out the info about Jack for it...

"I saw Death. The Death."

*Sam does the eyebrows*

"He's dead"

"No she's not"

*EYEBROWS*

"it's billie"

And Dean goes on to even say that she wanted intel, and does Sam pick up on it?

... no he doesn't. He doens't ask or guess what it was...

Dean repeats the line about work to do, which is also, especially in the context of Sam and Dean talking, what they say in instances like for example 2x22 when Dean had just sold his soul for Sam, when they're about to go back to work with their regular job. The open the trunk of the car and look at their gear and announce they're going to go kick ass phrase. (Which, of course, in 4x01, Cas was subverting the context by saying it to Dean away from Sam, putting the burden on him - Billie at least made it about Sam and Dean both but that she was talking to Dean)

But they're sitting on the back of the car, keeping the trunk closed... Not moving on

And Dean starts talking about how he's not okay.

And how he always believed in what they did - saving people hunting things - that losing John or Bobby or people they cared about was a hit he could take for the higher purpose. Billie has just REMINDED him that he is bound to a higher purpose. But he's so lost, and he's lost people who he CAN'T lose. Mary and Cas at once is just TOO MUCH. It makes the universe cruel not poetic...

(I say, having it paused here but knowing Misha's in the credits again as an awful TEASE :P)

He just needs a WIN.

And he may just get one because he told 90% of the truth to Sam, conveyed exactly what was going on behind that line about not believing in anything from last episode, the power of which narratively brought back Cas because that was a huge step in his grief arc, to admit it. Now he's explaining it, telling Sam how badly it's all got to him...

Oh god where is Caaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaas.

They're driving off and there's music, which... agh.

drive drive drive sexy car

Omg we're going back to the house... More grief on the mom for her son... Just really WALLOWING in how much loss hurts everyone, and even when the soul has moved on, that Dean got a win for their knowledge of the afterlife, that they know ghosts can go to a better place, the mom doesn't, she has lost Shaun and that's it for her. No closure, just pain.

drive drive drive

Billie reading Dean's book

I think Billie really has a huge interest in Dean... :P

drive drive drive... Okay so Yockey is the new Robbie montage guy.

Also Sam is asleep while Dean drives - this seems to parallel 12x20 where he was asleep and Dean checked his messages from Mary...

Bring bring?

BRING BRING.

Called that like a boss :3

WHAT, NO "HELLO DEAN" ON THE PHONE?

FUCK YOU YOCKEY I TAKE IT ALL BACK I HATE THIS ENTIRE EPISODE

I mean there probably was one under the music if that was Cas...

Well this alley has that cross from 11x06, aka the start of Cas's depression arc, the one where Metatron was teasing him about a real life angel on camera...

drive drive drive

Cross reflected in the car

Hey, bison sign

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Has he just been waiting at that phonebox for hours.

I'll just wait here then... I'll wait for you...

Well that got fucking tied up with a fucking bow, from all the left over crap Robbie left lying around.

God I don't even have anything to say... Cas waited. For Dean. Like the love ballad warned he would. Because he's Dean's real life angel, and Dean's win. It was FOR Dean. Dean's arc narratively brought Cas back into his life, but on Cas's side of the story they fully fleshed out the end of his depression arc and made Cas bring himself back on his own terms so it doesn't shove Cas into a subheading for Dean even when the bigger story is handing Cas on a plate back to Dean...

And that, my friends, was one hell of a fun game :P

#13x05 #season 13 spoilers #suicide mention cw #yockey fanclub #holy shit this episode was wish fulfilment of the highest order #Sometimes it is poetic #my stuff

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anniehowsback · 7 years

Text

House of the rising...

SPN fic: R, 9K words, post 12x23, Sam POV, h/c, mainly Sam Dean Cas and Jack, heavy on the speculation based on spoilers, including a gratuitous wet-shirt-scene.

Trigger warnings: show typical violence and self harm, major character death (but resurrection!)

Dawn was breaking by the time he made it back outside.

Sam had collected himself before opening the door, unsure of what he’d find, but the scene was simply quiet and beautiful, with that early-morning-glory vibe of a lake lying at the foot of the mountains. The sky was lighting up, the stars were fading in the background, and mom was gone and Castiel was lying dead in the dirt.

Sam took a shaky breath and walked over to his brother.

Dean was sitting on the ground, holding Cas’ body propped up from behind, arms wound tightly around him. Sam could see the top of Dean’s bowed head, but his face was hidden, buried in Cas’ shoulder. He was humming ‘Hey Jude’ so softly under his breath that Sam thought he might be imagining it. By contrast the angel’s (his friend) head had lolled awkwardly to the side, and his face had gone slack, eyes open and unmistakably dead.

Sam stood over them for a long moment, staring at the point where the rift had swallowed mom and Lucifer.

Trapped in a hellish world with Lucifer. Of all the things he’d wished he could have in common with his mother, things to talk about and bond over, this was not a scenario he had ever even considered.

He refocused his attention closer, and squatted down next to his brother and their dead friend. Dean ignored him until Sam reached out and closed Cas’ eyes.

(read it on A03)

With a deep breath, Dean looked up and uncurled a little. Sam was surprised to see that his brother appeared to be calm and his face a little pale, but was apparently entirely dried-eyed.

“You ok?”, Dean grunted.

“Yeah,” Sam answered. “You?”

Dean nodded.

“We… need to bury Kelly,” Sam tried, and Dean nodded again.

“Pyre. Deserves a proper send off.”

“We’ll have to make one for Cas too.”

Dean didn’t reply immediately, tightening his hold for a second. Sam was afraid an argument was about to come up, but then Dean nodded a third time, looking perhaps resigned and dejected, or even defeated. He lowered Cas back down to the dirt, in the middle of the ragged scorch marks of now-gone wings, and let Sam pull him up to his feet.

They set to work silently. They had built pyres so many times by now that they didn’t even need to talk to each other to coordinate. They could tell the best place at a glance, and they knew the type of wood needed, and how much. Sam scoured the woods for some longer branches needed for the outer structure, while Dean hauled all the firewood staked by the house.

The early morning dew made everything around him shimmer, but it was shit for firewood. A pretty, useless sight. Heh, Sam smirked to himself. Pretty useless. No one to share it with. So many dead because he had trusted the Brits (Eileen, god, Eileen). Mom gone and probably being tortured that very moment and never coming back. Everything was wet. They were going to light the pyre with their friend on it and it was going to smoke and hiss and-

A sob broke out suddenly out of Sam’s throat while he was smack dab in the middle of the trees, alone. He hadn’t expected it, but once he started he simply kept going. He cried, on and off, through the entire process of building the pyre. Dean never shed a single tear.

They wrapped Kelly up in the bed linens, and even put the fresh flowers they found around the house with her. After lighting her up and standing respectfully for a moment, they went back to work for Cas.

Jack observed them from a window the entire time. Dean asked if they were going to have a problem, but Sam said no, not for now, so they left him be.

Before wrapping Cas up in one of the sheets, Sam asked Dean if he wanted to keep the trench coat. Dean was taken aback by the question, and for a moment his calm demeanor wobbled. He looked at Sam, stricken. “I can’t. It’s his.” Sam didn’t argue the point, and they just finished their work.

They stood guard and kept both fires burning until all that was left were ashes, which they then swept into the lake.

They left the place at dawn the following day. In less than forty-eight hours they had lost half their family, and gained a nephilim. The drive back was uneventful. Sam couldn’t help but feel that it was simply the calm before the inevitable shit-storm.

If the first time they had driven to the lake cabin they’d been frantic to beat Lucifer to the punch, the second time… Sam wasn’t sure what the hell was going on the second time, but Jack had said something about having figured out the ‘grip of death’ and how to break it, and Dean had hauled them all off right back to that damn lake. Sam had actually gotten nauseous, but whether it was from the reckless driving or the worry over this being a massive misunderstanding (and they’d had more than their share of them with Jack over the past few weeks) he couldn’t say.

Misgivings aside, when they’d reached the lake Dean had frog-marched Jack right to the edge. The nephilim had dipped his hands with a smug flourish, and the entire body of water had lit up.

And then nothing.

Several moments passed, and then Jack’s face crumpled and he started crying in frustration, working himself up into a tantrum. Dean, meanwhile, was absolutely furious, and had stomped right off, so it was Sam who noticed the dark blob appearing in the middle of the lake, slowly making its way to the shore.

“Hey!”, he yelled, catching both their attention. Early morning mist was still rising from the trees all around them, and rolling across the lake, but within moments the dark blob coalesced into a dark head, and started to move faster in their direction.

Dean waded out until the water was up to his knees, and then froze into place, waiting.

Sam held his breath. Please, he thought. One more miracle. Please.

As soon as he reached shallow waters, Castiel stood up, water pouring down from his sodden clothes, alive. He walked purposefully towards Dean and they hugged, hard and long, before they both stepped back onto the pebbled beach.

“Hi Sam,” Cas greeted, voice even more wreaked than what Sam remembered. Sam pulled him into a tight hug of his own, even though his friend was wet and icy like a drowned corpse. He could feel him breathing and, when he paid attention to it, he could even feel a heartbeat through the water-logged clothes.

Cas was white as a sheet and his lips were blue. The fact that he wasn’t shivering wasn’t necessarily a good sign.

Dean grabbed Cas by the wrist. “You’re going to freeze to death, and then we’ll be back to square one.”

“That’s easily avoidable,” Cas replied, shaking him off. He shrugged out of his trench coat and his jacket in one go, dropping them to the ground, and went for his tie before either brother could say anything. His white shirt was plastered to his body, effectively transparent. Sam couldn’t see any wounds, or any remnant of wounds. He did note that Cas had a lot more muscle mass than he’d given him credit for up until now.

Dean was gaping.

It seemed that all the adulting was falling to Sam these days. “Let’s get you inside and dry you up,” he cajoled. “Both of you.”

“What about my mom?”

The three of them turned to watch Jack. The nephilim was looking expectantly at the lake, and then back at Castiel. “Is she coming?”

“You must be Jack,” Cas greeted, stepping towards him. Their eyes lit up for a moment, blue and gold, as they regarded one another warily. “Your mother’s soul is in heaven. There’s nothing here but remnants of her physical body. I’m sorry, but that’s not enough to bring her back.”

“How come you came back, then?”

Castiel glanced at the Winchesters before attempting an answer. “My Grace was spent here. And I heard the call.”

“Wait, you what??” Dean stepped forward, jamming his finger in Cas’ chest. “I’ve been praying-!”

“I know.”

“You… and you only answer now?”

“I wouldn’t have answered the summons at all if it wasn’t for your prayers. But I couldn’t pull myself back together on my own, Dean. I don’t have that kind of power. No angel does.”

“Right,” Dean breathed, anger dissolving, and something suspiciously close to tenderness spreading across his face. “Well, if I’m freezing, you must be fucking miserable. Let’s do a little B&E and warm up.”

“We don’t usually do this, Jack,” Sam felt the need to clarify.

After all this time where Dean seemed to cycle between only two moods (homicidal rage and apathy), now that Cas was back he declared a season of celebration. Out drinking at a different bar every night, flirting with every woman that so much as looked either in his or Cas’ direction, and quickly sleeping his way through all the willing ones he could charm. Sam had grown exasperated with his antics before the week was out, but would tag along just to keep Castiel company while Dean was being an asshole.

Dean kept pushing women at Cas, and when the angel inevitably failed to follow through, he’d claim a duty to satisfy the lady, and off they’d go.

Castiel was clearly growing more and more uncomfortable with each instance, but Dean was determined to get him laid. “You’re a virgin again, Cas! You get to make up for the crappy first time you had with that reaper!”

“I’m really not interested in carnal congress with human women, Dean. The risk for an angel is too high, as we’re reminded daily.”

Jack was… well. Sam wasn’t thinking about it just now.

Some type of trade fair had blown into town, bringing lots of strangers to their usual watering holes. Dean was busy ‘teaching pool’ to a blonde in a power suit, while Sam and Cas nursed a Belgian beer courtesy of a guy who was really into marathon running. He was telling them about the various places he’d travelled to to run, Cas occasionally remarking that he’d seen them as well, while Sam listened with interest. The guy didn’t have much range, but he was nice and had a good sense of humor.

At a certain point he made Castiel smile with a detailed recount of the Tokyo marathon he’d run two years previously, and Sam noted the guy suddenly leaning way more into his friend’s direction, and basically cutting Sam out of the conversation. Thinking this was likely to be a better ‘teaching experience’ than any Dean had thrown his way recently, Sam quietly stood up and went to sit at the bar on his own.

One moment he was chatting amicably with the bartender, and the next Dean was standing right next to him.

“Where’s Cas?”

Sam looked back at their table, now deserted. “I left him with Steve maybe half an hour ago? I dunno man.”

“Steve? Who’s Steve?”

“One of the salesmen of the group?” he gestured vaguely around the bar, packed with people in suits. “He was really into Cas, I just gave them a little room.”

“Oh! Of course! Leave him with ‘Steve the salesman’! Did you at least check him?”

“Dude, it’s Cas. One, he just needs a glance to see true faces, and two, he can take care of himself.”

“Let’s… not go there.” Dean pulled out his cell and checked it. “He’s still around here somewhere. Come on.”

“Dean, let him-“

But Dean had already taken off and Sam, fearing for Steve, shot right after him.

Their search ended five minutes later, after making sure the toilets and the back lot where empty, or at least empty of their friend (Sam was pretty sure he’d spotted the woman Dean had been flirting with in the company of another guy). They found Cas and Steve out front, leaning against the Impala and looking up at the stars. They had darker beer bottles now, and Castiel was pointing out stars to Steve, who was hanging on his every word.

“There you are!” Dean greeted with false cheer. “Who’s your friend, Cas?”

“Dean, this is Steve. We were comparing the view of the Milky Way from here to the one in Australia.”

“Out in the Bush,” Steve added, immediately straightening and sizing Dean up. “I ran a high-endurance 24h hyper-run there last winter. Goes through the night.” He gave Dean a firm, salesman handshake and held direct eye contact. Dean grinned, dimples showing.

“Cas has a remarkable memory for detail,” Steve continued warmly, shooting Cas a little admiring smile.

“That he does,” Dean agreed, going from a grin to a full-toothed smile and clapping a hand on his friend’s shoulder.

Cas, who, as far as Sam had seen, had been enjoying himself but had also been essentially oblivious to Steve’s flirtations, was starting to look uncomfortable.

“I mentioned the Impala and Steve suggested we come see it,” he said, a little defensively.

“Yes. I’m not much for cars myself, but even I can tell it’s a real beauty.”

“Dean is a wonderful mechanic,” Cas said, brightening up. “He’s fixed my truck, and plenty of other cars. He can fix anything on wheels.”

Sam saw Steve’s face fall slightly.

“Interesting. So… wanna show me your truck?”

“Oh. I, hum, lost it.”

Before Steve could ask how exactly one ‘loses’ a truck, Dean plucked Cas’ beer out of his hand, took a swig, made a face, and handed it back. “Yeah, and we’re leaving, so… nice meeting you, Steve.”

“Dean, I’m-“

“I could give you a lift, if you wanna stay,” Steve tried urgently, reaching out a hand.

Castiel looked at the proffered hand and put his beer in it. “Thank you, but it’s better that you don’t drive me where we’re going. It’s supposed to stay a secret.”

“Oh god, let’s just go,” Sam groaned, by now embarrassed on behalf of all of them. “Sorry dude. Better luck next time.” He clapped Steve on the back and nudged him out of Dean’s way. Dean smirked at him again, before hopping into the driver’s seat and revving up the engine unnecessarily.

They left Steve standing alone in the middle of the parking lot, staring dejectedly after them and holding both his and Cas’ unfinished fancy beers.

Dean stopped suggesting bars after that.

Sam’s plan was to get up early for a jog, then a nice long shower before anyone was up and about, followed by one of Dean’s hot breakfasts.

Instead the moment he stepped out of his room he found a streak of symbols painted in blood all along the hallway, and several lightbulbs dead and blackened.

“DEAN!”

His brother staggered out of his room, instantly waking up as soon as he saw the bloody mess.

With a silent nod, they armed themselves and started sweeping the bunker noiselessly. They found Jack in the war room, sitting cross-legged on the table, looking mighty confused. Underneath him there was an intricately designed protective circle, also in blood.

“Castiel said to wait here for him. Can I get up now?” He pouted, bored.

“When was this?”

“About six hours ago? A little after you guys went to ‘sleep’. So lame.”

“Stay put,” Dean growled, making Jack roll his eyes but slumping back down obligingly.

They found more symbols on the front door, and in the kitchen. The ones outside the shooting range were fresher. Finally they reached the garage, where they found Cas slumped in front of the outside doors. They were covered with glistening runes, and the stink of blood was wafting around the entire room.

Cas was in his shirtsleeves, arms soaked in red from the elbows down. He was also about as white as Sam had ever seen him. Even his lips had absolutely no color to them.

Dean immediately put his gun away and ran to their friend’s side, hands going for the face as Cas blinked lethargically up at him. Sam held his guard until Cas spoke.

“You’re safe. I put the wards up in time.”

“Cas! What’s happening?”

He was still bleeding sluggishly from both forearms, slashed open lengthways with his own angel blade, which laid forgotten to the side. Dean and Sam took Cas’ tie and belt to make tourniquets.

Castiel looked at them blankly, clearly confused. “You’re safe,” he repeated, slowly. “The wards.”

“What about them?” Sam prompted, as they raised his arms above his head, trying to stop the bleeding.

But Cas just blinked hard again. “What?”

“You’re ok, we’re all ok,” Dean started babbling under his breath. He shot Sam a look, then left him there to try and keep Cas stable while he sprinted back into the bunker.

“Hi Sam,” Cas whispered.

“Hey, Cas,” Sam smiled at him, tensely.

“I think Dean is mad at me,” he said with a sigh.

“No, Cas, he’s just worried. We don’t like it when you get hurt, remember? We talked about this before.”

“I had to,” he bristled.

“I understand, but you could have at least asked for help. We’re right here.”

Castiel frowned. “But you are helping me. Why do I have to ask?”

Dean burst back into the garage, carrying their heavy-duty first aid kit and a couple of towels thrown over his shoulders.

“You have got to stop doing this, Cas. You’re going to give me a heart attack,” Dean chided as they each set to work on one of Cas’ arms.

“Sorry,” came the automatic reply, followed by a frown.

They poured disinfectant over the wounds, laid down the clean towels and his arms over them, and cracked open two suture kits they had pilfered from an ambulance at a crime scene a few weeks earlier.

“I’m an angel. I’ve done this countless times before, it’s a sound tactic. It achieves the result.”

“Shut up,” Dean growled. The brothers started stitching up simultaneously.

“Cas, remember when you told me I was precious to you? And that the price of losing me wasn’t worth anything?”

Dean shot him a funny look. Yeah, Sam hadn’t discussed this with his brother, because it was something between him and Cas. Also, he may have been rightfully pissed at Dean at the time. No matter now.

It was still one of the nicest things anyone had ever said to him.

“Well, you’re our friend, and you’re precious to us, too. Losing you isn’t worth it either, ok?”

Cas didn’t reply, he just looked equally touched and confused. Sam wasn’t sure he had gotten through to him, but at least he hoped it was a step in the right direction.

Dean looked chastened, even though Sam was dead sure his brother shared his sentiment, and had been saved the trouble of saying it out loud to boot.

Jack wandered in shortly after. “What’s that?”, he pointed to the sigil.

“A protective ward,” Cas replied tiredly.

“Why?”

“It hides us from anyone investigating that power surge from last night.”

“Wait, which power surge are we talking about here?”

Jack shifted uneasily from one foot to the other. One good thing about the nephilim was that he definitely hadn’t learned how to lie yet.

“Cas? Jack?” Dean continued, anger mounting.

“I thought I could take a peek into a parallel universe,” Jack admitted sheepishly. “Look for your mom and my dad. Huh, it didn’t work. Also, you need to buy some new lightbulbs.”

“Our mother is gone, and so is your dad, and good riddance to him!” Dean hissed. “Look at the mess you’ve made!”

“Dean,” Sam chided, just as Jack defensively claimed he was going to clean it all up.

“No, Sam, this is your fault too! You have got to let mom go. Stop putting ideas in his head. Look at what happened to Cas!”

“I make my own decisions,” Cas growled, instantly pissed.

“You died! Now you’ve nearly bled out!”

“It’s not my fault,” Jack cried. “That’s so unfair! I only wanted to help!”

“Stop helping, Jack. You only make things worse,” Dean spat savagely.

Jack went red in the face. Sam thought he was going to burst into tears and throw a tantrum, as usually happened when he got upset, but apparently this time his indignation took over because he stood his ground as tears and snot streamed down his face. “DO NOT!”

He lunged forward and took Castiel by the hands. There was a double, blinding flash of light, blue and gold, so intense that even though Sam had closed his eyes as soon as possible, he was still only seeing white for several long moments afterwards. His face, his hands, all his uncovered skin tingled as if he’d been standing in the sun all day.

He could hear and feel Castiel panting, still sitting between the two brothers.

“Cas?” Dean called, frightened.

“I… huh… huh…”

His eyesight finally came back. Castiel appeared healed, if a little windswept and wide-eyed. In fact, he looked like he’d just received an electric shot. He turned to look in turn at Sam and Dean, a big smile splitting his face in a way Sam couldn’t recall ever seeing.

He blinked, and Cas was gone. A gust of wind shot between the two brothers, and a rustle of feathers, a distinctive sound Sam hadn’t heard in years, echoed faintly.

They got up off the floor. Dean looked around, a little frantically, and called for Cas again. Sam went to Jack, who was still sniffling and hugging himself miserably.

Presently, heralded by a breeze that ruffled Sam’s hair, Castiel re-appeared.

“My wings! Dean, my wings! I can fly again! I never thought-“ he marched up to Jack, and took him gently by the shoulders. “Thank you,” he said with feeling, “but you must never do this again. The wards covered your magic, otherwise you’d have all of the remaining angels clamoring to get at you right now.”

“I don’t want to do it again,” Jack sniffled. He showed them the palms of his hands, blistered and badly burnt. “It hurt.”

“You won’t have to. I’ll make sure of it,” Castiel vowed.

“Cas,” Sam called hesitantly. “Are you-?”

“Whole,” he replied, still amazed. He reached out to the brothers. “Sam, would you like to visit the archives of the Louvre? Dean, would you like to have pie from your favorite place in Wisconsin, every day? I can do it for you, again. I can really be useful-“

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on!” Dean waved Cas’ hand down, and grabbed him by the elbow. “Don’t you go disappearing on us now, ok? That’s all I’m asking. Please, Cas. Just… stick around? And don’t attract attention from the other angels by flitting all over the place. You can still use the car I fixed up for you. It’s all gassed up and I got the tape deck working again… much better than angel taxi, any day.”

“Of course, Dean,” Cas said quietly. The angel and his brother shared a long look.

Sam cleared his throat.

“When do I get my wings?” Jack demanded suddenly.

“Nephilim don’t have wings,” Cas relied apologetically.

“That sucks! Why is my life so unfair?”

“Shut up,” said Dean.

“I’m sorry,” said Castiel.

Sam just sighed. He could empathize with that sentiment, however misplaced.

“Where’s Cas?”

Dean paused from his meticulous gun polishing session and slowly turned to look at Sam.

“What do you mean ‘where’s Cas’? I thought the two of you were busy teaching Jack how to shoot. Like that kid needs to be any more deadly…”

“No, his hands still ache, so he got himself a book and holed up in his room. I just went by and he’s listening to blues at full volume. Dean, where did he get blues music?”

“There’s a whole collection of vinyls left from the fifties, I told you a bunch of times. At least the Men of Letters weren’t into heavy metal. What about Cas?”

“He said he was going to get something for Jack’s hands, but I haven’t seen him since. This was this morning.”

“Great,” Dean threw down the rag he was using and pulled out his phone. “And his phone’s off. Or out of range. Just peachy.” Without wasting time, he pulled up a geo-tracking app.

“Maybe he’s flying. He seems to have really missed it,” Sam suggested.

“Or maybe he took his car out for a joyride to… the fucking hospital? What the fuck is he doing at the county hospital? And why not Lebanon General?”

“That’s what? Two hours away? Without traffic?”

Dean didn’t pay him any attention. He quickly dialed the hospital, and asked about a James Novak or a John Doe. There was no one on file matching Castiel’s description either in the ER or the morgue, but the receptionist admitted they were having issues with their network, and there were several people still being processed.

“Goddamit,” Dean slammed his fist on the table, seethed for a moment, then pulled a tazer out of the nearest weapons bag and headed down the hallway, brandishing it.

“Dean!”

His brother marched up to Jack’s door and pounded on it. They could hear a throaty female voice crooning about being hard done by a man and somebody stomping around. Finally Jack opened his door a sliver and peek out suspiciously.

“Listen up, Jack. Me and Sam have to go out. Cas is not here, so we’re leaving you alone and in charge of the bunker like a big boy.”

“We are?”

“I’m an adult!” Jack complained.

“You’re not even a year old, Jack,” Sam interjected.

“We’ll be back by tomorrow morning. In the meantime we’re trusting you to hold down the fort, ok? You lock yourself in, don’t go out, and if somebody tries to come in, you taze them.”

He shoved the weapon at Jack, who cradled it in his arms, trying not to use his palms. Dean gently guided his fingers so he could aim and press the trigger, albeit gingerly.

Jack brightened up considerably. “Supermurgitroid!”

Dean squinted at him suspiciously. “Did you get into my collection of vintage ‘Busty Asian Beauties’ again?”

Caught like a deer in the proverbial headlights, Jack didn’t deny nor confirm. Dean pinched the bridge of his nose and took a calming breath. “There’s cans of Spaghetti-Os in the pantry, and a full tub of ice-cream in the freezer. If you finish it you will be sick and I will know. Above all, don’t use your powers while you’re alone. Got that?”

“Yeah, whatever. I could come with you,” Jack said petulantly.

“It’s just research, Jack, and lots of driving. It’s going to be pretty boring,” Sam soothed. “And, I suspect, very unnecessary,” he shot a look at Dean, who ignored him.

“Can we count on you to keep the bunker safe?”

Jack preened.

This is a bad idea, Sam thought.

Twenty minutes later they were loading the Impala in the garage, Jack observing them excitedly.

“We’ll be back by morning,” Sam told him.

“Tomorrow evening at most,” Dean added. “Certainly no more than two days. We’ll call you if we’re late.”

“Wait… you might be gone longer than that? Where’s Castiel?”

Dean slammed the trunk closed. Jack was looking at him anxiously now. “He’s coming back with us, don’t worry.”

Over the years Sam had endured Dean’s ‘creative driving’ too many times to count. Hell, he’d engaged in it himself more often than he’d care to admit. Recklessness and putting lives on the line was always part and parcel of the job, and sometimes staying in your lane in heavy traffic could quite literally make the body count soar, more immediately than any potential pile up.

But that, Sam felt, was for emergencies. Castiel going quiet for half a day?

“Dude might just want some space, Dean.”

“Shut up.”

“And, he can take care of himself.”

“Yeah, you keep saying that.”

Dean slammed a cassette tape into the deck, and cranked the volume as high as it would go. Led Zep blared out of the speakers as the car, impossibly, squeezed between a truck and a minivan.

Sam braced himself in his seat as best as he could, aided by long practice, and indulged in a sulk. Why Dean had seen fit to drag him out like this didn’t matter much anymore; they were going, and that was the end of it.

Cas, if you’re just minding your own business, heads up ‘cause we’re about to barrel right into it, Sam prayed. Learn to tell Dean when you’re leaving, ok? That’s all I’m asking.

They made it to the county hospital, unsurprisingly, in record time. They probably racked in a whole box-worth of speeding tickets, but their license plate wasn’t exactly tied to their real address. Or their real names.

Anyway.

Cas’s car was still on the premises. After driving around a little, they located it in the underground visitors’ parking lot, looking perfectly normal.

Dean had managed to descend into the cold rage Sam had witnessed time and again in the weeks between Cas’ latest death and resurrection. He methodically parked next to Cas’ car and strode purposefully, stone faced, to the morgue, where he breezed right in on the strength of an FBI badge and attitude, even though they weren’t wearing suits. He checked for himself all the corpses stored there, and when they didn’t find Cas, he swore under his breath and headed to the ER. Sam checked out the three cafeterias and the burn unit, thinking perhaps Cas had been seeking advice for Jack’s hands.

But he was nowhere to be found. Sam, despite himself, was starting to let Dean’s mood, which was edging out of anger and into anxiety, affect him.

“We’re sweeping the building. Meet me on the roof, we’ll work our way down.”

They found a bunch of smokers up top, oddly enough all clustered together. A group of health and admin workers, all listening intently to a woman in scrubs who kept pointing to the helicopter parked not far from them.

“And I’m telling you, I felt like this presence. Just as we were taking off. Only for a moment. And I thought ‘that’s your third shift talking, girl’, and I completely pushed it out of my mind.”

“But then the kid pulls through, and now you’re a believer?” a person in a suit, puffing on an electronic pipe, asked.

“Perhaps the tests at Lebanon General got mixed up,” interjected one with a lab coat.

“No, no, the heart defect had been detected in the first trimester. They had a C-section and surgery all lined up already, but the mother went into premature labor. I’m telling you, I thought the lungs were going to be impossible even before the heart got into it. I hate those situations.”

“Well, that’s NICU for you,” sympathized another one in scrubs. “So the lungs are holding? They’re not a problem?”

“Nothing is the problem! Echo, stats: healthiest premature baby I’ve ever held! I’m telling you, it’s like a brand new child! Back before we got here it was touch and go, and now the mother is nursing. Solve me that.”

The brothers shared a look, and headed back inside.

“Changeling?”

“Do changelings read as normal healthy human babies in medical exams?”

“I have no idea. I doubt there’s many cases in the literature. Demon deal?”

“Could be.” Dean took out his phone, then thought better of it. “Damn it.”

Sam glanced at him, bemused. “Yeah, Crowley was useful in that respect, wasn’t he?”

Dean shook his head, scowling. “I keep forgetting-“

“So you think Cas found a case?”

“We can ask him when we find him. You know, ‘presence’ could mean ghost.”

“A healing ghost?”

They fell silent as they passed a few civilians in the hallway.

“Or witchcraft could do it.”

They found the NICU unit, which was predictably locked down, with rigorous admittance policies. They could spy an open floor plan inside, and relatively few people. No way to go in unnoticed. If Cas was there he had to be invisible. Dean prayed under his breath, but nothing happened.

“We either camp here and wait for the parents to come out, or we gotta find some scrubs and get in there.”

They drifted back down the hall, looking for supply closets. They rounded a corner. Toilets to one side, and one lone door opposite them. As they headed towards it, the door opened and Castiel stepped out.

He carefully closed the door behind him, holding on to the doorknob, and regarded them silently.

“The hell?” Dean strode right up to him and jammed his finger straight into the angel’s sternum. “Where have you been? And why the hell with the radio silence?”

“My phone is dead,” Cas grunted. “We need to get out of here before security sees me. Help me get to my car.”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa: slow down, Cas. What’s happening?”

“I’ll explain on the way. Now, will you help me or not?” he growled impatiently. He was drenched in sweat, his hair in a state of disarray that the brothers had long taught him was considered ‘unprofessional’ and would get him noticed. His eyes were red-rimmed and feverishly bright and, as they stood there glaring at one-another, Cas started shaking with the effort of holding on to the doorknob.

“What’s in there?”

“Nothing of import. Can we get going?”

Dean pried Cas’ hand off the door and opened it. It turned out to be a well-stocked supply closet, but otherwise empty. On the back of the door, low to the ground, was an angel-banishing sigil, ready to be activated.

“Cas…” Sam started, but before he could continue, Cas gave a sigh and slid down the wall to the floor in a sort of semi-controlled fall, completely exhausted.

“-are you under attack?”

“No. It was my contingency plan in case I were discovered before I could regain my strength and escape. I’m glad I didn’t have to use it. Or, I won’t if you two’ll help me get out of here.”

“All right, all right, we get the message,” Dean started to sound less pissed and more concerned. He offered Cas a hand up, but Cas shook his head.

“I can’t walk,” he admitted sheepishly. “I used the last of my reserves to listen for your approach and step out to meet you.”

“On it.” Sam walked back down the hall, and headed away from the NICU towards Obstetrics. He tailed a couple who were going in, one in a wheelchair and puffing like a champ while her partner was low-key freaking out, up to a room. In the chaos of relocating the woman to the bed while she battled an oncoming contraction, Sam absconded with the wheelchair.

When he made it back he found that Dean had dragged Cas inside the washroom and was trying to make him look more presentable while he held him propped up to the counter one-handed.

Cas thanked Sam and sank gratefully in the chair, nearly passing out with the relief. They hit the nearest elevator and headed straight for the underground parking lot.

In fits and starts, Cas came out with the whole story. How he was initially simply headed to Lebanon General for some hospital-grade burn lotion, and how once there he had heard the desperate prayer of a mother about to lose her baby. How he had tried to board the helicopter mid-flight, but found it too crowded and had to resort to follow with the car. How even that brief flight, paired with the healing he had performed once he had arrived, had wiped him out, to the point that he had become suddenly visible in the middle of the NICU.

“I wiped the memories of all those present- also an effort. But there’s security cameras, and I’m almost certain someone saw me.”

“Almost certain?”

“I think I heard a prayer… I’m not sure. By that point I was finding it difficult concentrating on anything. My priority was hiding until I could make it back on my own. I figured I needed about two days to recuperate, provided I didn’t have to use my Grace for anything else. Then you came.”

“You had the car.”

“Of course, I wouldn’t leave it: you gave it to me, Dean. But I couldn’t- I can’t drive yet.”

They headed to the Impala, which was parked in a less conspicuous spot.

“And you let your phone die while on a hunt? That’s a rookie mistake, Cas.”

“I wasn’t on a hunt. And it got fried when Jack gave me back my wings, I just… haven’t had the time to replace it yet.”

Per Dean’s insistence, they loaded Cas shotgun in the Impala. Sam made an executive decision and asked for Cas’ keys.

He was glad Cas was going to be all right and that he’d had, all things considered, something positive to call a win in his bag; he wasn’t even annoyed any longer that they’d driven through three counties to pick him up. But Dean was still a bundle of raw nerves, and frankly Castiel had brought it upon himself.

As far as Sam was concerned, it was practical and made tactical sense for him to take the other car, while the two of them could hash it out in the Impala.

Dean agreed immediately, and peeled out of the lot before Cas could offer his opinion on the matter. Sam shook his head and headed for the other vehicle, planning a leisurely drive back.

Dean texted him that he was taking the back road and avoiding the highway. On a whim, Sam followed his brother’s route, albeit at what he imagined was going to be a much slower pace.

After about an hour’s drive, on a stretch of deserted road cutting through a tall, dark fir forest, Sam saw the familiar shape of the Impala stopped to the side, at an angle.

Sam stopped at a safe distance. He took his gun and his angel blade, and stealthily stepped towards the black car. There were fresh skid marks on the road- Dean had hit the brakes and wrenched the car to the side, while doing considerable speed.

He could see Cas’ head, still in the passenger seat, leaning against the window, and what had to be Dean with his hands and his forehead resting on the steering wheel. There were hints of movement from both of them, so they weren’t dead, at least.

As Sam reached the tail of the car he heard the unmistakable sound of a deep, gut-wrenching sob.

He approached on the driver’s side, lowering his weapons, and peeked in the back windows. Cas silently met his eyes with a worried, anguished expression, but he was entirely dried eyed.

Dean was crying. Dean was ugly crying, his entire frame shaking with sob after sob that he was trying to muffle with his arms. He was so caught up in it that he hadn’t even noticed Sam.

Cas gave him a wordless, minute head-shake. Sam retreated. He took the car again, drove it to the front of the Impala, and then approached on foot in full view.

Dean stepped out of the Impala and tossed the keys at Sam.

“You drive her,” he growled. He hadn’t really succeeded in composing himself, red-faced and covered in snot as he was, but Sam didn’t call him on it. “I can’t. I just-“ He stopped himself from looking back at Castiel, squeezed his eyes while he shook his head and stormed to the other car. He peeled away the moment he was sitting in it.

Sam got in the Impala. Castiel, still looking like death warmed over, audibly worked his throat.

“I never mean to cause distress to your brother. Or to you, for that matter. And yet it seems that’s all I’ve been doing, lately.”

Sam sighed. So much for letting them hash it out on their own. He started the car, and started driving again himself.

“This was a long time coming, Cas, trust me. And it’ll be better for Dean, in the long run. We tend to bottle up everything, even if we know we shouldn’t… it’s an ingrained habit. And that’s not your fault. But you do need to understand that we care about you, and that means we worry when we don’t know for sure that you’re all right. We lead dangerous lives. We don’t have the luxury of hearing your prayers to know that you’re still alive and kicking.”

“Yes… Dean said something similar. I suppose I forget.”

“Forget?”

“I consider you my family, my kin. But I forget that you’re not like my brothers, you’re not angels. You’re human. I mean, I know you’re human, but sometimes I just-“ he sighed, a desolate, lonely sound.

Neither of them spoke any further for the rest of the drive back.

When they reached the bunker’s garage they found Cas’ car already neatly parked in its usual spot. Jack came to greet them, in a really good mood, bouncing up and offering to help with unloading the car. Sam took his own duffel, and Cas declined a power-up, since Jack’s hands were still unhealed.

Sam was helping Castiel out of the car, assisted by Jack, when Dean appeared at the far door, looking somber and serious. He locked eyes with Sam and gave him a look that made Sam excuse himself immediately to go talk to his brother.

Jack was only too happy to make himself useful and escort Cas back into the bunker’s domestic quarters. He peppered Castiel with questions that the angel diligently, if tiredly, answered. As their chatter died off in the background, Sam asked Dean what was up.

“We have a problem,” Dean answered grimly.

“Well, you know what Cas is like,” Sam tried.

“What? No, shut up,” Dean said a little too quickly, especially for someone whose voice still sounded wreaked from crying. “It’s Jack. Know what he gave me when I got back?”

He held out the tazer, and Sam took it. It looked perfectly normal and unused.

“Open it,” Dean instructed.

“It doesn’t-“ Sam protested, but Dean took it back and pulled on the barrel, which came right off.

“It’s… not supposed to do that, is it?”

“Nope. And check this out,” Dean showed him the inside: the wires were soldered solid, melted into an unusable mess.

“What did Jack say about it?”

“Nothing. I asked if there was any trouble while we were away, and he said, and I quote, ‘nope daddy-oh, everything cool’.”

“That’s…”

“A lie. A weirdly-phrased human-mimicking lie from an impossibly powerful supernatural creature. Remind you of anyone?”

Sam clicked his throat. He immediately thought of a white suit, an affected twang, and a Colonel Sanders-type mustache.

“I don’t believe it. How is he even getting to Jack? We’re warded! Cas warded us tighter than anything!”

At the mention of Cas, Dean gave a shaky breath. “I dunno, man. Old Yellow Eyes and Lucifer both got to you despite our best efforts. I wouldn’t be surprised if knock-off fast-food snake-oil salesman got his fucking hands on him somehow.” Frustration mounting, Dean mimed strangling someone. “Fucking… Fuckhands McMike.”

Sam raised his eyebrows. “Ok, there, let’s not jump to conclusions. Maybe Jack was just playing with the tazer and he broke it. As for the slang, that’s not even Southern. You said it yourself, he’s been looking through your sixties skin mags… apparently he actually reads them.”

“Yeah, sideways,” Dean huffed, unconvinced. He passed a hand over his face, taking a quick look around to make sure they were still alone. “I don’t trust him. And I especially don’t trust him to stay safe. He’s angel enough to get into serious trouble on his own without telling us a goddamn thing. We need to keep a closer eye on him.”

Sam bit back a ‘are we still talking about Jack’ retort since he essentially agreed with Dean and he didn’t want the discussion derailed. Luckily he had just the thing.

“So you know how the Brits bugged the entire bunker,” he asked, taking out his phone and opening a password-protected app.

Dean’s lip curled, but he nodded.

“Before torching their place last June I did a little harvesting. I mean, the idea of remotely checking what was happening inside here seemed-“

“Creepy? Invasive?”

The phone emitted only static as Sam cycled through a list of rooms.

“Useful.”

“Wait… which rooms did you bug exactly?”

Sam pretended not to have heard him. Truth be told, there had been more than one instance in the past few months where he’d been grateful he could check up on his brother at a moment’s notice. He hadn’t mentioned it to Dean because… well, because.

With a final burst of static, the kitchen came through, loud albeit not entirely clear.

“-cannot help you there. I’ve recently discovered I understand even less about human emotions than I previously thought.”

Dean tensed next to him and looked away, but didn’t move.

Jack piped up over the feed. “You mean how Dean was upset when he came back and he didn’t want to say why?”

“No, I know why. Or at least, he told me. But I still have trouble understanding the scope of human feelings. As angels we either feel nothing, or a single, all-encompassing emotion. This mixture that Sam and Dean, and even you, have, it’s… confounding.”

There was the clinking of cutlery on ceramic for a bit, then “but it’s not that. I understand what their feelings are. Sam is curious, and he says he wants to spend time with me, but I don’t think he actually likes me. And Dean avoids me a lot, and he’s tried to kill me in the beginning, but now he makes sure I’m taken care of, so maybe he doesn’t want to, but he likes me. A bit. And they’re both scared of me. You’re the only one I’m sure cares for me and likes me and isn’t afraid of it.”

“…you’ve come up with all of this on your own?”

“Atta boy, Cas,” Dean whispered.

But Jack didn’t admit to any supernatural tampering with his thoughts. He carried on, blithely candid. “I just want them to be more like you. Or maybe I should just be more like you, they like you a great deal.”

“We share a long history, Jack. I fought by their side for a lot longer than what you’ve known them for before they even conceived of me as an ally. I’m sure you can earn the same respect, it just takes time.”

“You think so?” Jack sounded really hopeful. “I mean, when you were dead they really missed you. Dean especially. I thought that was just the way he was, but then I brought you back and he changed completely. He hasn’t even talked about killing me once since that. Maybe you don’t see it because when you’re with him he’s at his best, but when you’re away he’s really down.”

“You shouldn’t eat all of that ice-cream. You’re going to make yourself sick.”

“Oh, come on!” Dean interjected, looking at Sam for support. Sam shushed him.

But Jack had taken the hint, and changed the subject. “They hurt, don’t they? Your wings.”

The brothers shared a look. That wasn’t something either of them had noticed.

“No, I wouldn’t say that. Not physically. Not in any way a human could feel. It’s a uniquely angelic feeling. Metaphysical. I can’t sustain them, you see. I don’t have enough Grace left, and what little there is, I have to stretch to the point of tearing to unfurl them and take flight.”

“I’m sorry. You shouldn’t do it, then.”

“It’s not your fault. And I only do it when necessary, certainly not for pleasure. I’ve learned to appreciate the slow pace of human transportation, the lull of a soundtrack, and companionship when travelling. You can’t have that on huh, angel taxi.”

Despite the subject, Sam could hear a smile in his voice. He tried to make eye contact with Dean again, but his brother avoided him studiously.

“I think I know what you mean. Like the fact that no one likes me. And that I’m the only one of my kind. Sometimes I think about it, and then I think about my mom and… it hurts. Not like my hands, but it still hurts.”

“I wouldn’t say you’re alone. Though, I’ll grant you, feelings are maddingly complicated.”

“I wish I couldn’t feel a thing.”

“It’s a sentiment I’m familiar with. But that would be casting away your human heritage. A human heart is what your mother left you.”

“It’s easy for you to say! You’re an angel!”

“Barely. It’s true that Grace mutes my feelings, and perhaps my understanding of others’… but I do feel. And if I could choose, believe me I’d take human emotion over the cold and uncaring distance of Heaven.”

“Why don’t you just get rid of your Grace, then?”

“I can’t. I’m needed, my powers are needed. I prefer being useful to the Winchesters, and to humans in general. And I have to protect you.”

“I don’t need protection. I can protect myself, and I could even protect the Winchesters for you!”

“I’m sure you could, Jack, but-“

“Yes I can! I didn’t tell Dean because I don’t want him to worry, but an angel got in while you were away. He attacked me and I vaporized him! All by myself!”

The brothers shared a grim look and started moving towards the kitchen.

“’Cause see? I’m a half-breed and you’re… huh that angel called us a lot of nasty things, I don’t want to repeat them. Anyway, we can pick sides, and you can be the human, and I can be the angel and protect everyone!”

“Jack, what are you-“

The static overwhelmed the line, and then abruptly cut off. Sam and Dean sprinted off. Sam could feel the inaudible waves of angel shrieking making his teeth vibrate in his skull. As they rounded the corner at full speed, they saw light pouring out of the kitchen door. Squinting, they pushed forward, calling both Cas and Jack at the top of their lungs.

Inside the room they found Jack standing over Cas, yellow eyes alight and holding in his hands strand upon strand of angelic Grace, shiny and finely spun like blue gossamer. The filaments still connected to Cas’ eyes and mouth, which were alight with his true form. The Grace was unraveling in Jack’s hands, who looked up in horror at the brothers, frozen on the spot.

With a pained cry, Cas materialized his blade and cut the filaments in one stroke. The light on his part dissolved, while the one in Jack’s hands pulsed once and then began to rot, turning dark and gooey like Leviathan ichor. Jack, panicking, tried to drop it, but it permeated his damaged hands, and then disappeared under his skin. Unlike other times, the light in his eyes wasn’t fading.

Dean went immediately to Cas, supporting him and checking him out, leaving Sam, once again, to deal with the larger concerns.

With his hands raised, and trying not to spook him, he approached the Nephilim, now cowering in front of the sink. “Jack? What did you do?”

“That was bad,” Jack whispered, aghast. “I had no idea-“ he looked up then, eyes blazing. “You wanted to do that to me before I was even born! Did you know that’s what removing Grace is like?? Do you even care?”

“It’s different! A different process! I went through it myself-“

“You’ve never cared!” Jack accused with a wail. “Nobody cares about me! You all hate me! My mom is dead! My dad is gone!”

“Join the fucking club, kid!” Dean yelled, still crouching over Cas, who wasn’t entirely conscious.

“No!” Jack retorted, releasing one of his energy waves, knocking Sam on his ass. “I don’t have to! You can’t make me! And if you want me gone, then fine! I know where there’s someone who wants me and who can understand me!”

With a burst of energy that made his nose bleed, Jack opened a rift, identical to the one of the day of his birth.

Sam called him one last time, and Jack spared a moment to look back at him. Instead of a terrifying super-powered abomination, he looked like a lonely, lost boy who didn’t belong anywhere. “I’ve got to find my dad,” he declared, just as he touched the portal and disappeared.

Sam cautiously approached the rift. Following Jack blind wasn’t a good idea, but they couldn’t let him get too far or they’d lose him.

“Don’t,” said Cas, getting up with Dean’s assistance. “That’s a hellmouth. We need to find a way to ward it before anything on the other side discovers it.”

“Meaning what, exactly?”

“Meaning,” said Dean, picking up Castiel’s blade and flipping it to hand it back hilt-first, “that we’re calling in the reinforcements, we’re getting Jack back, and we’re saving the world.” He took out his cell and placed a call. “Jody? We’ve got work to do.”

#spn fic #SPN #supernatural s12e23 #supernatural s13e01 #speculation through fic #destiel #Sam Winchester #Castiel #dean winchester #jack the nephilim #My fic

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ncfan-1 · 7 years

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Gotham 04X02, ‘The Fear Reaper’

Things I am looking forward to this episode: Jonathan’s antics, and finding out how the hell Barbara’s still alive. Oh, and Alexander Siddig’s face. Things I do not care about: just about everything else. This is Gotham.

[TW: Torture, abuse, patient abuse, suicide ideation, all the nasty shit implied about Warden Reed turning out to be one hundred percent true]

- First off, last week, I picked up on there being something messed up about Jonathan’s relationship with Warden Reed that went beyond the man being willing to literally sell him to a couple of goons. I had at the time assumed that this wasn’t the first time Reed had done something like this to him, but some other bloggers, when they posted their commentary of ‘Pax Penguina’, raised a likelihood that, while worse, unfortunately also happens to make a lot more sense. I’ll be interested to see if the worries they raised play out in ‘The Fear Reaper.’

- We open at the old Crane house. Sure took you long enough to get there, Gordon (Though since he’s talked to Merton, I’m assuming—hoping—that they know now that Jonathan didn’t go with those guys willingly).

- Okay, when I saw Grady up on that scarecrow frame, I laughed. I cackled like the inappropriate blogger I am. He’s an asshole and he had it coming, but it’s also just a funny image. Like, how did Jonathan even get him up there? He’s a skinny teenager who, given what a shitshow Arkham is, probably hasn’t gotten too much exercise over the past couple of years, so he’s probably quite weak. Also, Grady’s bigger than him, and probably thrashed around a lot. So… how does this work?

I do have to note that Jonathan did not kill him in favor of doing this to him, though. I note this because he is the villain of the episode pitted against a hero who has committed murder more than once. Okay, granted, Grady seems to have been tied up crucifixion-style, which would have killed him eventually because his lungs would collapse, but Jonathan’s been shut up in Arkham since he was about fourteen, so I’ll bet he doesn’t know that. So, things to keep in mind for the rest of the episode: Our hero has a body count, and our villain, as of the Grady discovery, does not. I do wonder if Jonathan’s going to kill Warden Reed. The episode might try to frame it as a point of no return, but let’s be real, after everything that was both presented and implied about him and his relationship with Jonathan last episode, if anyone has it coming, it’s that slimy fucker.

- Bruce in lock-up, while Gordon tells him that they will be talking about this. And Grady screaming in his cell.

(I love that Bruce’s go-to excuse was that he was looking for Selina.)

- Next, Arkham at lights out, inmates being strapped down to the beds, while Reed is setting papers on fire. Jonathan shows up—scythe in hand—and asks him if he’s covering up his dirty footprints. Oh, shit; the undertones are playing out. Is the show going to do something with this?

- This is satisfying. Well, not the “Jonathan Crane’s dead” part, but the other part. And Reed’s looking at his gun, tried to kill him, but Jonathan got him with the gas first. And does not kill him, I’ll add.

- We’ve confirmed also that Jonathan was in Arkham the whole time since we saw him in Season 1, presumably while Strange was in charge, too. We’ve also confirmed that he wasn’t given any kind of real treatment or therapy, that no one even tried to help him, that he was instead subjected solely to ice baths and electroshock. In a context that makes it clear that this was meant as torture, and not treatment. Great.

- We are going straight into cartoon villain territory, though, if in an “abused teenager violently lashing out” kind of way (It’s very obvious that it’s a child under all those rags and not an adult, even as he’s being hella menacing). I wonder if Jonathan believes everything he’s saying about dear old Dad when he’s not in an altered state of consciousness. I’m not saying it’s impossible for him to still love his dad and have complicated feelings about him, but all of this together is just a little much.

- (Show, if you’re trying to make me not feel sympathetic for Jonathan, it’s not working. Him gassing the patients to make them more volatile is bad, certainly—I don’t approve of it—but it’s nothing on the scale of what certain other characters in this show have done. It feels like a deliberate ploy to make him less sympathetic and more monstrous, instead of something he might have done organically, and I don’t appreciate being manipulated this way.)

- “Play nice.” “No.” For once, I’m inclined to be sympathetic to Gordon, since Oswald dragged the fucking press down to the precinct to bear witness to their argument.

- I’m not surprised Oswald wants Jonathan found, not after his public humiliation last episode. This does ramp up my sympathy for him, though, which I wouldn’t have thought possible, because Jonathan’s already in the top five of most uncomplicatedly sympathetic characters on this show, and having the local mob boss out for his blood just makes him even more sympathetic, because even as he’s gearing up to raise hell, I worry about what Oswald might do to him.

I am kind of interested to see how Oswald might react if he found out the whole story regarding Jonathan. If anyone might feel sympathy for the kid, it would be him, if only because the “got shut up in Arkham and had a bad fucking time” part of his story would ring a lot of bells for Oswald Cobblepot.

- “Like a chicken?” Jesus, Harvey; right after you told Gordon to play nice?

- And now Oswald has moved on to the list of people who uses Jonathan for his own ends, in this case using his name as a ploy to prove the GCPD is toothless.

- Selina and Tabitha show up at Barbara’s place. “No way.” Indeed.

- Barbara’s not quite as she was, but I wasn’t expecting her to be.

- Barbara still manages to be a better person than Tabitha.

- Alfred’s right; Bruce isn’t ready.

- Arkham being played as a horror movie when it’s a bunch of mentally ill people who’ve been fear-gassed is kinda gross.

- They’re not shying away from the fact that Gordon did kill Jonathan’s dad, though. I appreciate that. (I am kinda surprised he even recognizes Gordon, given the state he was in when Gordon got to him.)

- Oswald’s still being awful to Ivy.

- Barbara’s wonderful in how creepily unflappable she is. Oswald’s right in pointing out how unlikely it is she could have financed all this herself. (I’m thinking Ra’s al Ghul, and I’m thinking Barbara had a date with the Lazarus Pit at some point.)

- Back in Arkham. Jonathan confronts Gordon. He does look suitably horrified when he realizes it’s Jonathan, and seriously, how much of this shit Jonathan’s saying about his father does he even believe when he’s not in an altered state of consciousness?

- Gordon gets gassed, and honestly, I do not care about whatever it is he’s gonna see under the influence of the gas.

- “What will you see? One of your victims, perhaps?” Yeah, Jonathan’s definitely still in there. You’re not fooling anyone, kid.

- He sees Lee having slit her wrists. “You destroy everything you touch.”

- Jonathan tries goading Gordon into suicide, using language that makes me wonder if he isn’t suicidal himself. Though when Gordon shakes off the gas’s effects with ~~~willpower~~~, Jonathan isn’t there, so I dunno.

- It’s both more and less than I was hoping for, but Gordon does appear to feel genuinely sorry for Jonathan. He sounds like he actually means it when he tells Jonathan he needs help.

- “My father thought I was weak. All my life I was scared little Jonny. But I will never go back to being that scared boy again.” Ughhh nothing this show does will ever make me not feel sorry for him. Not with such a horrific backstory and the knowledge that he was being abused the whole time between Season 1 and now.

- (I am deeply irritated that Gordon just shook off the toxins’ effects with ~~~willpower~~~)

- And Ivy has had enough of Oswald, it seems.

- Water neutralizes fear gas?????? Are you fucking kidding me????!!!!!

- I love Alfred’s face when Lucius comes by with the armor. It’s a combination of “Oh, thank God” and “Fuck you, Lucius; don’t encourage him.”

- Selina is definitely not digging Tabitha wanting to cut off one of Barbara’s hands. But she can’t do it. Mercifully. Selina still doesn’t dig it.

(There is definitely something up with Barbara, though. I can’t imagine her being that calm about possibly getting one of her hands chopped off under normal circumstances.)

- And Oswald just straight up says in front of the press that he’ll pay the police to work for him instead. In what world does this work properly, without you getting arrested by the feds for admitting on camera you’ll bribe people?

- Ivy’s looking for stronger substances than just her perfumes. Honey, that’s so not gonna work out well for you. Ivy, please stop drinking it. Ivy, please stop.

…Oh, that’s not good.

- Falcone, fair? Falcone had honor? Are you fucking kidding me?! How thick do your nostalgia goggles have to be for you to say something like that, Harvey?!

- Baby Batman away! (The costume looks better with a cape, but Bruce probably doesn’t need to deal with that until he’s got the other stuff down pat.)

#ncfan watches Gotham

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darkot · 8 years

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I... am immensely pissed off right now.

I feel like I start every one of these entries like that, but... GOD DAMNIT!

For a year.. an entire fucking year, I had been meaning to make a Phoenix Wright painting with Edgeworth and Von Karma as the subjects and post it on December 28th, 2016--the date of the final in-game case--as an homage to the amazing game series that I fell in love with earlier that year. And I fucking missed it.

You can’t comprehend the deep seeded rage that stirs inside of me as of writing this. I just.. holy fuck, dude. I have no words.

It’s not just that, but a lot of other stuff going on that has been incredibly frustrating. I literally just realized the whole missed painting thing moments before writing this. That was just icing on the anger cake.

I worked for about 7 or so hours on the next storyboard for the film project I’m working on. Nothing inherently went bad with that, it’s just... my lack of speed is showing. I’m only billing the guy I’m working for, for 4 hours, because at some point I need to concede that it is my own lack of skill that caused it to take as long as it did. Granted, it was a very complex board. But still, it’s just.. argh.

I just finished watching the last dubbed season of One Piece last night, which was the final episodes before the time skip. Even though I already adored that show, that season was fucking astounding. I would go on to praise it further, if it wasn’t for this seething wrath that is currently dominating my mind.

The general theme towards the end of the season was that all of the main characters recognized that they needed to get stronger to tackle the challenge ahead of them: The New World. It was strangely coincidental because that’s a lot of how I’ve been thinking lately. Not that I need to get stronger in the physical sense, but.. I want to hone my skills further. I need to get better if I want to go where I want to go in the world. As of right now, I’m too weak.

Another thing that’s pissing me off: I ordered two art figures back in November, and they still haven’t arrived. Figma Archetype: He, and Figma Archetype: She. I figured that they would help a lot in drawing those story boards. But so far, they haven’t helped at all because they haven’t arrived! It is t-minus ten days until I can complain about it to the site I bought it from. I already tried emailing them to ask if they could contact the shipping company and make sure that it left Japan, to which they essentially told me to fuck off until 60 days had passed. So, I’ve been waiting.. and waiting... and waiting. And nothing. The tracking info for this type of shipping only has four entries. When it is processed in Japan, when it has left Japan, when it has arrived in Canada, and when it has been delivered.So far, it has gone through the first two.. but it apparently “left Japan” on the 16th of November. So, if the tracking info is to be believed, it has been in transit for nearly two whole months. That.. seems rather unlikely. But okay. January 15th. It’s still got time. Maybe I’ll wake up tomorrow and it will be delivered? I’ve been saying that to myself every day for the past eight weeks. But maybe tomorrow will ACTUALLY be the day.

Don’t even get my started about Overwatch. Again, nothing inherently bad has been going on with it. I ended today at 3070, which I’m pretty okay with. But the last match before me and my group ended really got under my skin. Or rather, somebody on the enemy team did, which I honestly don’t care to admit.

We were on Lijiang Tower. They were playing Reaper. I was playing Reaper. I was absolutely decimating him when we 1v1′d during the match. However, they ended up winning that round, so that gave him ground to start trash talking out of saltiness. Then, during the second round, I concede that I did absolutely nothing. Their team was too coordinated for me to be effective, and he won most of our encounters. So, he pushed it further and just kept goading me and goading me. I was honestly getting really annoyed. At this point, I hadn’t said a single word to him, but he was just making this a dick measuring contest. So, I switched to Pharah. At that point, I was absolutely slaying. I started the third round with 11 kills and ended with 37. I landed two direct rockets on an enemy Pharah that I don’t even know how I hit. For the second one I had to turn around 180 degrees and aim up above me.. it was weird that I was able to instinctively predict that, that is where they would be. I just trusted myself to land the shot and got it. From the kill cam on their end though, they must have though I was using some sort of bot, haha.

We won the next two rounds, and then it was tied 2-2. At this point that guy had all but shut up because we were making a big comeback. And in the final round, I choked. Fucking hard. It was a very close game. We had 90% on the point, they had 99%. At the very end, they started to make this last push. Their Pharah came in, and she had a Mercy pocketing her. Even though I had been doing insanely well up to that point, something about that just made me.. panic. I don’t like fighting a Pharah+Mercy combo as a Pharah without a Mercy. I am confident in Pharah vs. Pharah battles. I don’t like Pharah+Mercy vs. Pharah+Mercy, but I can deal with it. But Pharah+Mercy vs. Pharah is the worst thing as the lone Pharah. That said, I definitely had a disproportionate reaction. I saw the Pharah with the Mercy beam on here, and something in my brain said “I know, I can win this encounter my ulting them. I ult, am immediately two shot and downed by the damage boosted Pharah, their team capitalizes on the pick, rest of my team goes down, and we lose.

Nobody says anything. Not even that dickhead Reaper from earlier. But I have been beating myself up about that ever since it happened three hours ago. That could have definitely been a win. Perhaps we were going to lose no matter what happened, but I more or less sealed our defeat with possibly the worst ult that I have ever done in Overwatch. I don’t know what I was thinking. I had this sense of needing to carry because the other DPS wasn’t doing a whole lot. I guess my brain went “If I die to this Pharah+Mercy, we’re done for.” Talk about your self-fulfilling prophecy... god, that was stupid. I ended with 49 elims, which frankly is pretty decent. I was doing well that game. Up until the very end. But that’s just.. not good enough. I don’t settle for doing well and then messing up. It’s extremely aggravating to me. It sucks when it is somebody else who makes the mistake, but when I’M the one who throws the game, that feeling of failure is the worst..

So, mark that as another display of inadequacy today, along with how long it took me to finish that picture.

Though this hasn’t just been today, I’m having writers block when it comes to a character for that AQ3D series I’m working on. That has been bugging me for a week now. But DING DING DING, we’ve got three! That’s three areas that I’ve done shitty in lately! Do I hear four? Well, I haven’t streamed in over a month either because I still haven’t worked out the “second entity” idea.

I don’t know, man. My mind’s just feeling so polarized right now. Technically, I’m getting shit done. I finished a storyboard. I went up about 60 SR in Overwatch today. I am two lessons away from completing one of my school courses. But.. it’s just not good enough. That board shouldn’t have taken that long. I should have went up 90 SR today. I should already be done those final two lessons.

Like.. fuck, man. I.. I just want to get to a point where I’m satisfied with how I’m doing. People are right when they tell me that I’m my biggest critic. But that’s why I draw, and that’s why I play Overwatch competitively. To prove something to myself. That I can make a picture that I consider beautiful, or to reach master rank. Whenever I take on a challenge such as these, or entering an art contest (which I haven’t done in years at this point o.O), or auditioning for a voice acting role, or accepting my friend’s offer to do storyboards for the film series.. it’s to prove to myself that I can do it. That if I put my mind to it, that I can accomplish this, because my mind is great. That if I try my heart out, that I can succeed, because my heart is strong. But time and time again, I only end up disappointing myself. I always get in reach of that horizon, but always fall short. My family has always told me that I make them proud, but.. I haven’t ever managed to make myself proud.

The worst part is seeing my potential, and not reaching it. Like that 180 upwards airshot on that Pharah. That is possibly the craziest thing that I have ever done in Overwatch (I really wish I was recording/streaming, so I had it saved =/). Or the painting I did of Notch that blew up on Twitter (not in terms of skill, because that picture was god awful. But in terms of the response people had to it). Or getting 10 Twitch followers in 2 days. Sometimes, I feel like such a one hit wonder.

Aside from individual ambitions, I worry that it taints my overall dreams too. The other day, a friend on my team was going through a rough time. They were really down on themselves because of things their family was saying about them, and because of their own personal opinion of themselves. I gave a pretty long speech to them in our Discord text channel to try and lift their spirits. This, was that message: “It's not that big of a deal, Wild.. I was below 3000 just a couple days ago. Hell, I think I dipped into the 2800s last week. SR will fluctuate. Wildly, at times (hue hue). It's natural.

You can't let your Overwatch rank be a measure of your personal skill. In-game, or out-of-game. Back in season 1, I was determined to reach top 500 because I wanted to prove to myself that I was capable of doing it. That if I really set my mind to it and tried my heart out, that I could reach that goal. What I came to realize though, was that competitive Overwatch is one of the worst things to base any sort of personal merit on. At the end of the day, it is a team game. No matter how well you do, you alone can not determine the outcome of a game. It is a collective effort made by all 6 people. This is even true when you are playing with us. Sometimes, we'll be having a bad day. But you can't let that make you think that it was your fault. You're only one man.

Likewise, sometimes you'll be having a bad day too. But there is absolutely nothing wrong with this. Everybody does. We can even have a bad week or a bad month. But no matter what's going on, whether it's on your end or you're having a stroke of bad luck with team mates, that still doesn't say anything about you, or what you are capable of.

Through sheer will, you can do a lot of things. Single handedly winning a comp match is not one of them, however. That's like trying to win a football game on your own. It just doesn't work without teammates that are also on their A-game.

IRL, you aren't a failure either. You're only a failure if you give up. But we're all here. We're all trying our best each and every day, and that's all that anyone can fairly ask of you. Nobody has all of the answers and goes through life without a single bump in the road. All of us, even our predecessors, blindly walk forward and just.. try. Sometimes it doesn't work out. Or, sometimes, our best efforts at accomplishing something are slow. But that's FINE. Millions before you have gone through the same, and millions have come out of it alright.

"Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished." - Lao Tzu

No matter what's going on, I know you're doing fine, Wild. People may judge or criticize--even those close to us--but as long as you're taking one step every day (doesn't matter if it's forward or backward), then you're doing your part. Be kind to yourself.”

I was worried that the others wouldn’t be too happy about the wall of text, but the response was overwhelmingly positive. They were all telling me how brilliant and beautiful what I wrote was. (One even said to remember them when I’m famous, which was really out of nowhere o.o) That was one of those periodic reminders that I have the ability to change minds. Something in my delivery, or the way I speak, or the way I act makes people listen to me. I’ve made bigots think critically, I’ve made the pessimistic dare to hope, I’ve made the fearful test their courage. But, in this instance, the one person who I was trying to touch with my writing, the friend who was having trouble, didn’t respond positively. It did not seem to lift their spirits much at all. Once again, another example of seeing what potential there is, and not quite meeting it.

That’s the type of thing that makes me fear that I won’t succeed in my dream of changing society for the better. It seems like, no matter what it is, I am always one step short. What if my work doesn’t touch the lives that I’m intending to? Maybe it too will fall short of achieving greatness, as its creator does.

God, Herman Tech messed me up. This is like.. a psychological scar from that experience. I see more failure in myself than I know is there in reality. I just.. want better, for myself.

In a lot of these situations, it feels like it’s me, holding myself back. That if I could let go and be more expressive in my artwork, and trust my instincts when taking shots in OW, and just.. generally be me, totally uninhibited... that I could accomplish so much more. But, for my whole life, I have put on faces for people. I adapt my personality to whoever I’m talking to, so we both have the smoothest interaction possible. At this point, after doing that for so many years, I don’t know who “totally uninhibited me” is. I have a VERY vague sense of that. But I’ve been out of touch with myself for a long time, now. I’ve developed my philosophies and thoughts, but I’m still very distant from my soul. My being. That’s a large part of the discord that I’ve felt stirring inside of me. I think too much, but I really don’t know how to do anything else.

Well, tomorrow’s another day. Maybe those figures will arrive...

#personal

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