#HERE'S CLAIRESTIEL FEELS

[liminal-zone]

working on something. fingers crossed.

fic: an offering made by fire (WIP)

summary: Claire Novak’s fathers are dead. And she’s going to burn the entire world to bring them back. (Canon compliant to 15x20, from a certain point of view.)

her eyes open. it’s been over a decade since she burned with the grace of a seraphim. now the voices of angels are ashes in the wind and castiel no longer answers her prayers.

(“he is gone,” sam tells her in the same breath as he says “and dean--”)

her fathers are dead. 

the flame inside of her is waning, a ghost of what it was, and she is cold, so very, very cold, shivering in the absence. and she will stop at nothing but to give the flame what it needs -- oxygen, kindling, fuel. she will bring them all back if only to feel warm again.

*

kaia holds her close, and her warmth helps but does not heal. “you’re angry,” she says. 

“i’m going to burn the whole world to--”

“you’re angry, but that doesn’t mean you have to fix it. it doesn’t mean you can fix it,” she says.

(it doesn’t mean it needs fixing, a whisper says)

“it’s wrong and it’s not fair and what if they never knew--” 

she weeps, fat tears hot on her cheeks and damp on her shirt. kaia clings tighter. 

she doesn’t say: i wish i wasn’t this body, wasn’t human, wasn’t meant to be locked in this useless flesh. if i was an angel, i could-- 

*

if i was castiel again, i would--

*

sam lets her in the bunker, lets her research on her own -- he’s paralyzed by grief, unable to stay, unable to point her in the right direction. he is keeping secrets, lying by omission. but his grief is real; she can taste the soot in her mouth. 

so she prays. there must be an angel alive, there must be something that can help her. 

her fingers run along the carving of castiel’s name in the wood. help me, she prays. you can’t be dead, you can’t be. 

*

she dreams of a lake, a big broad expanse of water and reeds and fish and sand. it smells fresh and green, alive and welcoming. she could sit on the pier and dip her toes in, or wade out for a swim, or just listen to the gentle sound of water and wind. but she knows, somehow, that this is theirs. she is trespassing on something special, sacred. this is dean’s, she thinks, and castiel stood here, often. watching. this is a place that holds memory. holds something akin to love. the sun overhead is warm, and she can feel it on her skin. 

Father, she says. 

hello, claire, a voice says. and her eyes fly open.

[venusdebotticelli]

I just wrote a really long post that I don’t think I’m gonna actually post, or at least not just yet, because it’s very rambly and badly structured and I feel like I’m not being eloquent at all today and am taking very stupid and unnecessary twists and turns to get my point across, but it basically boils down to this:

I’ve been very disenchanted and disengaged with supernatural lately, my investment in the show taking a huge hit and going in steep decline since they killed Charlie. But this episode right here¿? This wonderful beautiful episode tonight¿? It just reminded me why I love this show so much to begin with, and why I love these characters so much, and just how incredibly good it has the potential to be when it focuses on its strong elements and writes them lovingly and to their true potential, not blandly half-assing and shying away from them.

It was a great piece for Dean and Cas’ relationship, painting the subtext with the romantic aspects that I feel have been sorely absent from it lately. It also strongly highlighted the familial love in Team Free Will, without it in any way deterring from the more intimate romantic one between Dean and Cas, but just adding more depth to it instead, and vice-versa. It was also a love song for Castiel as a character, and very promisingly laid the groundwork to deal with the very pressing issues of his self worth and non-belonging and suicidal feelings that just need being dealt with already. And it had heaps of mythology and continuity with/additions to original angel canon and characterisation that were quite butchered in the latest seasons (*cough*buckleming*cough*) and that are just so incredibly interesting to explore, and make the angels the awe-inspiring, inhuman, powerful marvels that they haven’t been in quite a while and I really missed, because Supernatural is best at writing its angels when they explore their humanity without discarding their vast, alien inhumanity. Also Cas in a female vessel has been a dream of mine forever, and I didn’t think I’d ever be lucky enough to properly get it in canon ;u; (because Clairestiel was too brief and pressing to count, and idk, I feel like my only criticism of the episode is just that the actress they chose for Cas just didn’t feel like him at all¿? She didn’t get his mannerisms or way of being in the slightest :S)

And basically I just want this episode to lovingly cradle me in its bossom forever, because it’s exactly what I know Supernatural can be and hasn’t in a long time, and what originally made me fall in love with it. 

So tl;dr: Thank you Steve Yockey, that was fucking beautiful ;u;