#i love jimmy novak so much no one gets it

[sleepyeepy]

do you think cas felt it when jimmy died ? how long did it take for him to realize the weight in the back of his being had disappeared ? or was it gradual.. did cas feel jimmy dying ? this light of faith and loyalty blinking and fading out , overwhelmed by inhuman grace for just a little too long ? does cas feel lighter after jimmys death , no longer sharing a home in his body ? or is the absence returned tenfold with a guilt so intense it takes everything in cas not to buckle under it ? how does cas mourn him once he realizes what has happened ? does he ignore it , the pain too much and he too busy ? does he take a page out of the winchester book of grief and drink himself silly (ridding an entire town of liquor for a week) ? or does he try and do his best to give jimmy a proper funeral. a handmade headstone in a flower field out in the middle of nowhere reading ‘in fond memory’. what about heaven ? does cas visit jimmy to beg for forgiveness ? do you think that cas did everything in his power to make up for this one transgression by making jimmys heaven a work of art tailored to relieve an innocently devout man of the tragedy he’s faced. do you think that jimmy , with time , learns to have faith again ? from heaven does he watch cas try to protect claire and realize that maybe things will be okay ? does he see cas’ unyielding love for jack and think to himself that he might have played a hand in that love , that cas holds onto the parental love he saw in jimmy and use that as a foundation for his own ? do you think cas is grateful for jimmy , knowing that his first experience with humanity made him into the man he became ?

DOES ANYONE THINK OF JIMMY AS MUCH AS I DO ? NO ? OKAY THATS COOL

[yandereunsolved]

Yandere Castiel pining over Jimmy Novak's best friend (S4)—why do you care for his vessel and not him?

Yandere Castiel became aware of your presence the day he became aware that Jimmy Novak was the person who would be his vessel. He didn't think much of you, simply another human amongst all the others. However, all humans are his father's creations. You seemed like what could be called a good friend—loyal. That is something he could relate to. A loyalty that in the beginning he respected wholeheartedly.

A positive beginning that aged like hard cider into a celestial being's desire of possession and obsess.

Yandere Castiel first met you face to face after possessing Jimmy's body. You had heard about his vessel's troubles and had come rushing over. It's an experience he will never forget.

You parked your vehicle in the driveway and ran out of your car in a panic. He could feel your heightened anxiety and panic, and he almost felt something. It was so peculiar. It made his eyebrows furrow and his nose scrunch up.

He was planning on simply leaving, but you stood in front of him and pestered him with questions. When Jimmy's daughter came out, you told her, 'Me and your daddy are just going for a walk. He isn't feeling well, so we are going to get some fresh air.' Which Castiel thought was ludicrous. He tried to rebuff by telling you 'He is an angel of the Lord and that Jimmy Novak is his vessel—to which you promptly clamped your hand over his mouth and scolded him. 

He isn't entirely sure why he got in your human vehicle. He could have simply whisked himself and continued on the mission heaven gave him. He was supposed to. Still, with this unfamiliar reaction to you, he couldn't help but rationalize it as you being important to the celestial plane somehow. 

So that's how he ended up in a human hospital with you filling out papers that pertain to Jimmy.

Yandere Castiel found no need to pretend, so that's how he ended up dragging you into angelic affairs. Or perhaps it was the other way around. You were quite insistent on staying near him after he explained the situation to the extent he was allowed. There wasn't even a hesitance on your part. You were simply protective over his vessel, despite the fact he is the multidimensional being inside the vessel.

That's when that odd sensitivity popped up once again.

It was almost like you were just as concerned for him as you were for Jimmy. It was quite a useless emotion for you to have, but he was still... flattered? by it.

Yandere Castiel reluctantly separated himself from you to an extent. You had attracted attention from both heaven and hell, so he had to. He had to. Right?

Heaven wasn't pleased with him getting distracted. They essentially wanted to allow you to wander back into the world with no angelic protection. It's like leading a lamb to the slaughter. Now Castiel is no stranger to that. He's watched his brothers and sisters slaughter humans for much less egregious acts. Though this time it felt wrong.

He ended up warding you from all angels, including himself, with your consent, of course. He left a specific engraving on your ribs that roughly translates to 'mine. touch this human and I will smite you where you stand.'

Yandere Castiel felt as if his grace had been ripped from him when he was away from you. Could God have created you specially for him? It was an impossible thought. One no angel should have for a human. That's how mighty beings fall. It is heaven's number one rule not to love anything, not even the humanity their God created.

He pushed himself into the mission he was given and tried to ignore the sizzling sensation all over his celestial body. It's a spiritual reaction to being left without your presence for an extended period of time.

He worked with Uriel, then had to kill his brother. He had to kill many more for you to protect you. He met the Winchesters and learned about them; grew attached. Anna tempted him into developing the capacity for human emotion. He was so lost. You were; you are the only thing that makes him feel found—safe.

He took that safety from himself in order to protect you.

Foolishly, he seeked you and, in return, your presence.

That's when heaven knew they had to reprimand him.

Yandere Castiel experienced things up there that would physically not only break a lesser being's psyche but erase it. If anything, it only made that sizzling sensation evolve into a scorching one. It was as if his feathers were being stripped off one by one. An unforgiving hand that forces him towards you. The heart he doesn't have broke and learned to yearn.

Like an obedient soldier, he listened to their words. He swore his loyalty once again, and he was allowed back onto Earth. He didn't go to Jimmy first, no. He scoured the earth and thought you were gone for good until you called for him. That was a rash human decision. You were only hidden unless you made yourself known.

Yandere Castiel had to come and see you. He had to explain himself and rid this fiery ache from his celestial body. Only when he came to your call, your first question was about Jimmy, not him. You looked past him. You ignored the agony that was everywhere on him.

Why? That feeling didn't ease at your lack of care for the angel in front of you.

Your demands to know where Jimmy was and if his family was safe fell deafly on him. He had to put you in your place. Yes, it was out of anger and hurt, but also a certain amount of righteousness he felt he had to regain. You belong to him, even if you don't like it.

"I learned my lesson while I was away. I serve Heaven, I don’t serve man. And I-I certainly don’t s-serve... you."

He's just an obedient little soldier who has been broken by you.

[sl-walker]

Self-Promotion as Distraction

Want something to read? Here's my stuff that I'd rec, along with what kind of mood it's good for. Feedback adored if you read any of these and wanna give it.

Supernatural - The (Second) Book of James - Long Good if you like stories written before Season 9, tons of angel lore and metaphysics, angel-vessel relations, Jimmy Novak, a story told backwards-and-forwards, and something with a very bittersweet ending that is not actually the ending. Some warning for tragedy, of a sort. If you love Cas and Jimmy, though, it's a hell of an adventure, especially if you like Cas as a total badass.

Star Trek: The Original Series - The Arc of the Wolf - Long Good if you love your Trek stories very grounded and humanistic. Pretty much the life story of Montgomery Scott, it's very much a Scotty story first and a Trek story only sometime after that. There's drama, humor, high seas piracy, friendship, found family and even if you don't actually know Trek very well, I've been told you don't need to in order to enjoy it.

Star Wars - Witness me - Long Good if you like Maul and specifically Obimaul, especially with the more Legends lean on Maul's characterization. Basically an AU where Maul was captured after Theed, the series doesn't ignore the fact that Maul was cut in half, so it's very heavy on the psychology and relationship building. It also has a whole gamut of emotions explored, and beyond the Obimaul, you also have found family and friendship building and an absolutely awesome cast of clones in Blackbirds: Year One. Probably my most popular work, and not entirely without reason.

Star Wars - Undersong - Long-ish Good if you like id-fic! A Sith AU where both Obi-Wan and Maul are raised by Sidious before escaping together, it's largely written in a serial format, with short chapters and a lot of momentum. Good if you don't like long, dense chapters, but do like a story with some real rollercoaster emotion. I enjoyed the hell out of the supporting cast, and so does everyone who reads it, too.

DC Comics/JLI - Past Resolution's Power - Mid-length Good if you want a shorter tale but with teeth. The prequel series to Stardust, this one primarily looks at the short span of time between the book Justice League: Generation Lost (and Booster Gold Vol. 2) and Flashpoint, mostly centered around Booster, but also with Rani and Rip and Michelle and Guy. It's a pretty heavy and genuinely mature story, though it's got its light spots, too. Also called the Mk. I timeline, as its the first.

DC Comics/JLI - Carbon Cycle - Long Good if you want something long, involved, sometimes incredibly fluffy and definitely filled with warmth. The Mk. III timeline -- meaning the third reboot, versus the Mk. I timeline above -- takes place mostly around DC's Rebirth era, on the notion that the characters aren't getting cleanly reset every time and instead that there are these echoes from past lives. The main story, Stardust, is Booster/Beetle slowburn, lots of funny but also lots of sincerity, and later on some heavier stuff creeping in, but the supporting cast has some serious screentime, too.

How about you, Tumblr? GIVE US YOUR DISTRACTION RECS.

[veryace-ficrecs]

Destiel Fic Recs

This list will include all ratings and tags, so read at your own discretion! :)

Clean up, aisle you by withered - Rated T

Dean’s the baby whisperer. A regular Daddy Daycare, only with a better car and less of a gut.

He’s gotten used to kids coming up to him during backyard barbecues in the summer. Whether it’s asking him inane questions or requesting piggyback rides, or making proclamations and abruptly leaving, Dean’s pretty nonchalant around kids as a rule.

It’s why he does nothing more than blink when he feels a small hand grab his, and flash a surprised, “Hey there, bud” upon discovering he’s been claimed by some random kid toddling around unattended in the snack aisle

The Dadification of One Castiel Novak by runraerun - Rated G

When one of Cas’ old I.D.’s gets rejected, Sam and Dean tell him afterwards it’s because his picture is outdated—but this doesn’t make any sense, Castiel explains; Angel vessels don’t age. Dean has to break it to Cas that he doesn’t look like he’s in his 20’s anymore.

In Due Time (Dean Winchester is Saved) by caelum_writes - Rated T

A 26-year-old Dean is transported to 2021 and confronted with the unfathomable - a future where he is happy, safe, and loved. --- “Aren’t you gunna say it?” he asks tentatively, as if he’s crazy for picking up on the obvious. “Yeah, you’re me. Past me, anyway,” the other Dean replies. “I wanna know from when.” “What are you talking about?” “Time travel,” the older Dean states as if it’s so obvious and ordinary. “It happens.” “To who? Marty McFly?”

if wishes were horses by teen_dean - Rated T

“Thought it was me at first,” Dean said. “Just not in my nature to settle. But then I thought: there’s not supposed to be suffering here. So what’s with the heartache?” He sighed. “I know I can’t make Cas show up if he doesn’t want to. Maybe he doesn’t want to take a chance on me. Maybe he’s moved on. But then I gotta feel lonesome for eternity and call it Paradise?” “Dean,” said Mary. “Are you going on a hunt in Heaven?” “Yeah,” said Dean. “I reckon I am.”

Water, Sunlight, T.L.C. by youaresunlight - Rated T

Cas is turned into a plant after an unfortunate skirmish with a coven. Hannah brings him to Dean and Sam to seek their help, and Dean has a few emotional discoveries while taking care of Cas. I assure you that this is not (I repeat, not) a crack fic, and I'm rather very proud of it so I hope you enjoy it as well.

Where Overreaction Meets Sam Winchester And They Live Happily Ever After by LazyBaker - Rated T

Dean is suddenly eating healthy and the world (i.e. Sam) is not prepared for such change.

nightlight by fleeceframe - Rated G

But the thing is, as he gets closer, he has to blink his eyes to make sure he’s seeing things right. Because that’s definitely Jimmy’s body slumped over against the trunk of one of the apple trees, but floating above him is- well, it’s a floating light, a sphere with a one-foot diameter, just hanging out at Dean’s chest level. Dean approaches it carefully with a furrowed brow and half-raised hackles. “Cas?” Dean prompts slowly. “Is that-” And the orb is glowing out sweet and white like it could easily be used to keep away the dark in a child’s nursery. It’s so welcoming. Like Dean could just reach out, out, and catch that gentleness in his hands without any sort of consequence. “Hello, Dean,” the orb hums. or the one where cas gets expelled from his vessel and he isn't as much of a dude as dean thought he was

Something Dumb to Do by PorcupineGirl - Rated T

Dean sits back in his chair, drinking his coffee and watching Castiel. After a few moments, he realizes that the soft, mellow feeling in his chest is… contentment. He's not happy in the way that a little kid is happy at their birthday party, or even in the way that he is when Cas or Sam has been miraculously brought back to life after one of the long string of disasters in their lives. He's happy in a new and different way. And has been, maybe, for a while now. Nearly as long as Cas has been living here, human, in the bunker. And then Dean Winchester has a moment of absolute clarity.

Bee Mine by solisdraconis - Rated G

Castiel is human for the first time. He faces all kinds of new human challenges, like picking out birthday presents, hangovers, and the flu. Good thing Dean is there to help him through it. Gadreel never happened and Cas never got kicked out of the bunker. And he met Charlie. How things should have gone, of course.

love (is a burning thing) by rupertgayes - Rated E

Dean doesn’t know why it started, and unlike his brainiac of a brother, he’s not exactly cracking open a psych textbook to find out. People have their things, that’s just how it goes - you like it rough, you like toys or melted wax or feathers, you can’t get it up unless your partner’s wearing a sailor outfit, whatever. If the spirit is willing, who cares? Dean just wishes some of his things weren’t so fucking embarrassing. Or: Dean likes Johnny Cash songs. A lot. More than he should. And then he meets a certain angel with a very deep voice...

I'm Dreamin' of a Grey Christmas by almaasi - Rated G

Coming in from the snow, Dean notices Cas now has a streak of grey in his hair. Angels don't get older. But Cas has been getting older for years. Is this a loophole that can save him from his deal with the Empty? Or is "adorably middle-aged" just another thing to add to the seven million reasons Dean wants to kiss him?

Enemies Closer by almaasi - Rated T

A "You caught me keying the wrong car in our middle-school parking lot, but when you found out my motivation you wanted to help me... except now we're both complicit in the same crime, and we have the power to end each other's teaching careers – and as they say, keep your friends close but your enemies closer – sooooo is a nerdy date at your after-school A.V. club close enough for you?" AU

He Called Me Honey by almaasi - Rated G

After having a weird dream in which he kisses Cas, Dean accidentally discusses the matter with Sam over pancakes. (Then Cas shows up. Dean is a flustered mess.)

[what-if-i-just-did]

Part One

Trigger Warnings: kissing, implied feeling unworthy of love, and mentions of a handjob, having a nightmare, sexual attraction, and casual suicidal ideation

(this is not smut)

(Is this over a year late? Yes. Am I finishing it anyways? Also yes.)

Space For Two

Dean was lying in bed. When they came home, Sam had had a bit of a freak out. It was fine now- Jody had texted with a hunt, and Sam decided to go it alone and leave Dean and Cas to figure themselves out. They'd been practicing with switching control and co-piloting, and if that had ended up with Cas giving Dean a handjob while they were in the same body, then, well, that was their business.

Maybe it had been smart of Sam to leave.

Dean sighed. Cas? Yes Dean? (what does he want?) (He's so adorable) I can't sleep. I miss you. (I know he's right here but I want to kiss him and I can't even if I'm allowed now) I know, Dean. I wish to kiss you too. Dean sighed. (I miss you so much right now) (wait a second- ) If I dream, can you come into the dream too? (can we kiss? please please please tell me yes) Yes! Yes, we can- we can kiss. In your dream- how did I not think of that before? Yes Dean, yes. Elation radiated off of them, indiscernible who from. (I get to kiss Cas I get to kiss Cas I get to kiss Cas) (holy shiiiit) (fuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuckfuck) (yesyesyesyesyesyes) (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) (Dean is so exitable-adorable-exited-happy... I did that) okay okay okay I need to freakin' sleep then. (wait no way I can now) can you mojo me asleep? Of course, Dean. And the next second, they were in a dream. It was Purgatory, and Dean was gripped with a sense of instunctual fight-or-flight. Of course. Of-fucking-course is it a nightmare (does he have nightmares often?) Don't worry, Dean.

The scene changed. It was a forrest lake, now. Dean turned around just in time to see Cas morph into existance. "Cas!" He yelled, running the two steps towards him and smashing his lips into his. (CasCasCasCasCasCasCasCasCasCasCasCasI'mKissingCassssss) (He smells the same he looks the same (still pretty) (he still looks like Jimmy Novak) he feels the same he's the same I love him so much) (Dean Winchester wants to kiss me / is kissing me) "Cas" Dean breathed. "Dean", Cas breathed back.

"This is weird. I still have your thoughts, but I can see you." Jezus Cas I missed you.

I love you

"Hello, Dean."

(ohmyfucks his voice is so hot I wanna die) (it's still the same voice- still Jimmy Novak) (I get to fucking have this? I get to kiss-him/love-him????)

Cas raised his eyebrow and tilted his head. "This voice is attractive to you?"

"Uhm." Dean stared at him. (that expression is too) (YES!!?! Duh???!)

Cas chuckled.

I can definetly experiment with that...

[soullessjack]

i don’t think there’s anything new I can add to the performative-jack studies because it’s like..very cut and dry, guy who’s constantly perceived as a threat does his best to seem innocuous and friendly..but there is an underlying layer of exactly how jack tries to present himself to others (that I’ve definitely already posted about but whatever).

soo like. take this outline for example:

Jack: “He still has to be killed.” Cas: “Doing that might kill Dean as well, so [I] doubt any of [us] would be willing to do that.” Jack: “I would.”

‘Cas is a little shocked by how calmly Jack says this, and Jack says he knows what Cas is thinking; that this is Lucifer’s gene pool talking. It’s not. “I’m not my father. I’m not my mother. I’m me.”

“You’re all so focused on saving Dean, but Dean is Michael’s vessel. There’s a good chance Dean isn’t even alive. Is Jimmy Novak still alive?* Could anyone save him? It’s Michael. And Michael has to die.” ‘Cas stares at Jack, who looks coldly collected.

post-war jack is straight up traumatized and jaded by everything he’s seen and experienced in apocalypse world, still making efforts to be kind and sympathetic of course, but with a bit more edge to him now. for six months he’s been fixated on killing Michael, and he’s way more willing to do the Hard Thing (kill Dean) than he might’ve been before to do so (which actually reminds me a LOT of the chicken/snake story from ouroboros but we won’t get off subject).

obviously he still cares about/loves Dean, we’ve seen that in the rest of S14, but he’s also seen what Michael did to another world and wouldn’t put anything before preventing that. *he’s also very willing to hit Cas where it hurts with the Jimmy comment

but the thing that sticks out is Castiel immediately assuming that Jack’s calm, cold collectedness in the way he talks about killing Dean/Michael is somehow evidence of Lucifer’s influence or heritage; that Jack couldn’t possibly feel this way by himself. even Jack refutes it, stating that he’s neither of his parents (ie, it’s his own decision to kill Dean if it’s necessary). I think it’s also interesting he mentioned not being his mother, because I think that’s why Cas is so surprised by his demeanor and jumps to attribute it to Lucifer.

from day one Kelly’s heritage was the only argument Sam and Cas had against the idea that Jack would be evil. to be fair, Jack does take after Kelly a lot; he even looks like her to some extent. but treating Kelly’s heritage as the It-factor that makes Jack good, treating him as basically an extension of Kelly who must be good and kind because she was good and kind (literally an inverse of how Lucifer’s heritage is treated) is still just dehumanizing.

the distrust he faces is understandable coming from AU Bobby and people who are being actually displaced and exterminated by Michael, but the fact that Jack is subject to the same scrutiny from his own chosen father as well adds to why he represses these parts of himself so much, why he puts on that naive nuclear-son personality and basically butters everyone up all the time.

I think the only times when Jack has actually unmasked himself were at points of extreme low empathy, because most of the time his facade is put on for the sake of other people and the fear they feel towards him. he obviously wouldn’t have to worry about that while he’s human, but like I said, he’s literally a war veteran/criminal by this point. he’s gonna have a little more edge to him than before, and a little less empathy for the small things.

the second and probbaly more obvious one is his behavior while soulless, completely lacking the empathy required to care about keeping up his facade—so much so that he just bluntly tells Mary that he’s annoyed by everyone eggshell-walking around him like he’s a time bomb again. then, *checks script* like a flip switched, he goes back to that facade and reassures Mary that he knows they’re doing it out of love. He’s blatantly performing his emotional responses now.

jack is still soulless for like…three (?) episodes in S15, and still incapable of really feeling any emotion despite being able to logically process them. like he is literally so empty inside that he resorts to binge eating to feel some kind of sensation. but he’s consistently playing up the happy-go-lucky shtick when he isn’t just depressed and withdrawn (especially the church basement scene where he immediately gets the dumb Bambi look when he sees Cas after his failed cannibalism attempt).

got a headache while writing this so I’ll just leave it here but like. A Lot of the reason why Jack performs so much is because specific traits he shows are not only taken as threats, but are also associated with Lucifer and treated as signs of his “true nature” <- click that link it’s important for context

Mk that’s all byeeee (*´ -`)

[monstermoviedean]

Omg ur so real for the whole “should jimmy novak be cas’ biggest/greatest regret”. i have a whole laundry list of things he could insert instead but if ur willing id love to know what you think should be up there as things he regrets most lmfao. (totally feel free 2 ignore this no matter what!!! obviously free country free website etc etc but also i promise im not trynna stir the pot im genuinely just curious as well as… drunk And therefore possibly entirely tone deaf... 2 b honest)

4 me it would be the whole purgatory thing and the leviathans getting loose as a result (as well as cas and dean getting stuck in purgatory) like. Lowkey. i don’t blame cas for Bobby dying i truly don’t hold that resentment in my heart but it’s an unavoidable fact that leviathan dick roman would never have killed Bobby if cas didn’t do what he did despite warnings from not just dean sam and bobby but also from Balthazar and the Fate girlie (i forget her specific name lol something with an A) and tbh there may be more characters who warned/cautioned/told him not do it (there also may not be other characters but yk gotta cover my bases)

also cas breaking the wall in Sam’s mind was because of the whole busting open purgatory situation so that’s a 3rd consequence of that decision. andddd also cas’ whole staunch refusal to deal with the consequences of HIS actions (episodes Reading Is Fundamental - where he wakes up in the hospital - until essentially halfway through the finale) by saying he doesn’t fight anymore etc etc just avoiding everything Negative even though all the Negative things he’s avoiding are literally his responsibility (and Crowley’s , to be fair, but Crowley is also the literally king of hell we expect this behavior and disregard for humanity from him so I don’t rlly think it can be held against him. It’s essential to his characterization).

Anyways like I said feel free to ignore this I just saw ur post/tags and it made LOL

oh my gosh THANK YOU! no i'm so happy to talk about this and so happy you sent this.

you hit some big ones for me! and i want to be clear that i don't want to assign feelings to cas. i am not saying "cas should feel bad" or "cas not feeling 'bad enough' indicates he himself is bad." i am saying, if i were cas, there are things i would regret as much or more than the novaks. and while i think some of these are things cas regrets in canon, others are not. i am also totally okay with the "bad writing" excuse to explain why the novaks are stated to be a bigger regret than any of these things, given it's somewhat of a throwaway line in a buckleming episode.

anyway, in no particular order:

breaking sam's wall. 100%. here is an excellent recent post from @scoobydoodean regarding how that decision was cruel, and intentionally so. you could say that cas "redeemed himself" by taking on sam's hell trauma, but 1) that's not the same as regret and 2) that doesn't undo the suffering sam (and dean and bobby to a lesser extent) endured as a result of cas' decision.

the leviathans getting out. that's a lot of carnage and i don't think it's unfair to say this is cas' fault. unintended, for sure, but a consequence of his actions. (i don't blame cas for bobby's death either but i get what you're saying)

everything you said about refusing to deal with the consequences of his actions. YES. i don't have additional examples atm but i think there are others.

the fact that by season 13 there are only a dozen or so angels left. that's not 100% on cas. heaven lost angels in seasons 4 and 5, and angels fought for and against cas in the war against raphael in season 6. but he also killed angels for not bending the knee to him. he killed angels like balthazar for questioning him. angels were lost rescuing him from purgatory. angels were lost in the fall, which was sealed with his grace (though not his intent). and more angels fought for him in season 9. he does have some angel blood on his hands (though certainly not all of it!).

i'm still mad about him torturing aaron birch.

also maybe not something he should regret, but i think it would be nice if he apologized to dean for abandoning and running from him in purgatory. i'm also iffy on whether to include lucifer - cas does bear a lot of responsibility for everything that happens with lucifer after cas says yes to him, but i also know that cas suffers greatly because of that decision. i am not suggesting cas needs to "do penance" but i think cas thinks he does, and being possessed by lucifer would feel like penance enough for letting him out.

[crackers4jenn]

Jeremy Carver didn't get the respect he deserves in that pollsnatural writers poll. I need to remind y'all who was doing a lot of the heavy lifting when it came to early destiel. Jeremy Carver wrote (or, was credited as the writer) for the following:

3x11 "Mystery Spot" - not a destiel ep, just a banger 👍

4x03 "In the Beginning" - aka the first hint of Cas being sympathetic to Dean. 3 episodes into Cas's existence Jeremy Carver was asking the big questions, like what would it look like if Dean and Cas stared all soulfully into one another's eyes??? I MEAN,

4x20 "The Rapture" - the Jimmy Novak episode. Gave us Dean's tranquil fishing dream, Cas's note-passing interruption. Gave us all the conflict of Dean witnessing Jimmy Novak in place of Cas. Gave us that mic drop "I learned my lesson while I was away, Dean. I serve Heaven, I don't serve man. And I certainly don't serve you" hell of a walk-off line.

5x03 "Free to Be You and Me" - do I even need to expand on this one??? "I need your help because you are the ONLY one who will help me," Thelma and Louise quote, Bert and Ernie quote, "you are not gonna die a virgin," the Raphael confrontation, etc etc Dean tells Cas it's the happiest he's been in years!!!

5x08 "Changing Channels" - another classic episode that's great even without the undercurrent of destiel. But undercurrent there is. One of the recurring themes of the episode is Dean being worried about what Gabriel's doing to Cas. Plus, helloooo, "pretty boy angel" Jeremy Carver's horniness for Misha CAME THROUGH.

5x18 "Point of No Return" - do you all not remember "last person who looked at me like that, I got laid" do you all not remember "I gave EVERYTHING for you, and this is what you give to me????" do you all not remember "what the hell happened to him? / "me"???? And a sidenote: do you all not remember Cas carving a banishing sigil into HIS OWN CHEST?????? Again I say, Jeremy Carver's crush on Misha CAME THROUGH.

8x01 "We Need To Talk About Kevin" - I'm pretty sure at this point JC became showrunner, so there was a ~shift in the blatancy of destiel in his writing, but still. This ep is the start of the Purgatory flashbacks, the first peek at Dean's guilt over Cas not making it out with him.

8x23 "Sacrifice" - the 'ET goes home" bar scene, the dozens and dozens of pages worth of meta about cupid and the arrows and the two dudes falling in love in front of Dean and Cas.

9x01 "I Think I'm Gonna Like It Here" - Dean's "please, man, I need you here" prayer to Cas, which miiiight be the first time he prays to Cas seriously. Their v. soft phone call sometime after where Dean is just as worried for Cas as Cas is for him. Plus, hey-o, would it be a Carver episode without objectifying Misha in some way? This is the ep with the infamous laundry scene, of Cas shucking off his clothes in a very poignant loss-of-identity horny way.

9x23 "Do You Believe in Miracles?" - uh, ever heard of "to save Dean Winchester. That was your goal, right? I mean, you draped yourself in the flag of heaven but ultimately it was all about saving one man" which is pretty much a Castiel thesis statement dropped casually as dialogue.

10x01 "Black" - okay, picture this, Cas is depressed and lying wantonly atop a bed, clad only in a robe that's open juuuust wide enough his chest peeks through. To Sam, he wistfully admits "I miss him" as they tiptoe around the subject of Dean. Fanfic, you say? No, Jeremy Carver.

10x23 "Brother's Keeper" - there's a deleted scene of Cas showing up in Dean's dream, bloody and beat up, introduced by the bartender as Dean's "admirer." Not to mention! Winchester Derangement Syndrome. Not to further mention!! Shattered at the altar of Winchester.

11x01 "Out of the Darkness, Into the Fire" - gonna let this gif speak for itself:

[dontlikeconflict]

Silence Over Coffee (short destiel drabble)

Cas take a moment to look at Dean Winchester. He’s holding this tenseness about him that he never seems to quite get rid of, a stance of masculinity that he grips with both hands to get through every day. Right now he’s pouring creamer in his coffee, and haphazardly tipping in sugar, not seeming to care if he uses too much. “I love you” Cas thinks, and Dean looks up almost as if he hears. Cas thinks about saying it like he’s thought so many times before, but the moment passes. Dean makes a joke, Cas doesn't get it. He laughs anyway.

Dean makes a joke, Cas laughs, and Dean hopes he can always make Cas laugh, it seemed like he was always the only one who could. He wants to spend his life, gently pulling laughs from Cas, a substitute for all the things he truly wants to say, a substitute for the kind of honesty that would shatter Dean.

Sometimes a part of Cas (maybe the part that's an angel, maybe the part that defied his angelic side) wants to take control of Dean's life. Play God in the most blasphemous way. He would steer Dean away from all that harms him, make sure he is warm and safe and loved, even if that love was facilitated by distance (as God or a father’s love always seems to be). But Cas isn't God, or a father. He is a messy excuse of a creature, and all he wants is to be up close. To run his eyes over every part of Dean, as if they were hands, and know him more every day.

Cas stares so much. It makes Dean uncomfortable at times, not because it's bad (not really) but because he doesn't know what to do with it. He can't look back for too long, the intensity burns him, but he can't say a word. He looks at his coffee cup instead, giving it all his misplaced attention as he takes a sip (its too sweet)....

When he looks up Cas is still looking, he’s so obvious it hurts. Truly it is not Cas’ gaze that bothers him, but the forever-watching eyes of everyone else. He’ll never be allowed to enjoy love, there are too many anchors, too many eyes, too many claws. Dean is a survivor, but he does not get to live. 

The waitress comes over, one of the men is bold, flirty, nothing she hasn't seen before, but the other guy is unreadable, looking at the bold man with a look that could be love or hatred, depending on the angle. Neither of them orders food, just more coffee. 

Cas watches Dean flirt with the waitress and wonders if his vessel is a barrier. If he forced his Grace into a beautiful woman would this be easier? It would. But for a long time now, this body has become Cas’ home. It isn't Jimmy Novak, it isn't a vessel, this is Castiel’s body. This is his home, and god (please), he wants Dean to love it as it is. He wants to beg for it, but he knows that's not what Dean needs, knows it wouldn't work. Maybe Cas should do it anyway, just to be honest. Just for something real between them.

I love you, I would go with you anywhere, even if it's just this diner, right now, drinking coffee.

[sardonic-the-writer]

i think about jimmy novak a lot

i think about him sticking his hand in a pot of boiling water because an angel told him to. i think about him trying to get his family to understand what's going in with him before he dissappears because he loves them so much. i think about him going through so much pain and torture without even being in control of his own body the entire time. i think about him living in a white picket fence neighborhood where he has cream colored shutters and a snowy lawn. i think about him enduring a lifetime of mental and physical torture under the control of castiel just so his baby girl wouldn't have to experience one second of it

i think about jimmy novak a lot.

[senashenta]

Title: Horror High

Pairing: Destiel

Rating: NC-17 (in future chapters)

Warnings: Sex, Violence

Summary: John Winchester plants his eldest son at Caspar High in Jacksonville because weird things have been happening there: people disappearing. People reappearing only dead and drained of all their bodily fluids. Cocoons. It’s up to Dean to figure out what’s stalking Caspar’s halls and deal with it accordingly; but then he meets the New Kid—newer than him, even, the New-New Kid—Castiel Novak, and all his plans get severely derailed. Now Dean has to juggle the supernatural case—a really hungry jorogumo—and also the fact that he’s very quickly falling in love, something that is absolutely forbidden by his dad.

Meanwhile Castiel, shoved into the third new school in a year because his adoptive father—Chuck Shurley’s—job has them moving around a lot, struggles to fit in at Caspar High, not only because he’s the New Kid but because he’s the weird New Kid. Dean seems like a saving grace, a harbor in a storm, someone who doesn’t judge him—that is until Cas finds out about Dean’s night job. Cas’s life just got a whole lot stranger—but that doesn’t stop him from falling for Dean, regardless.

Notes: This is my first time writing Destiel OR SPN (though I have written SPN AU in other fandoms) so please bear with me while I get my footing.

Also HH was originally supposed to be like a 10-page one-shot and the next thing I knew it was 79-pages-of-11-pt-Arial-and-counting and I was looking for places to divide it for chapters so. Yeah. This storyline kind of just took over my brain and became a THING.

Top Dean and Bottom Cas which I know is the reverse of how 90% of the fandom writes them, but I am tentatively planning a sequel to HH (depending on how well it does or doesn’t go over) that will flip them around so be patient shhhh.

Cas is younger than Dean in this AU by like… six months. Dean’s official birthday is January 24th, and I used Jimmy Novak’s birthday for Cas, which is July 10th. Since they’re both in the same grade that makes Cas younger. Just accept it and move on.

I have never been to Jacksonville or Florida, so everything contained within this fic is completely fictitious; business names, street names, school names, place names, everything except Jacksonville, Florida itself. :D

ALSO, before anyone corrects me on stuff, I am CANADIAN and I know the CANADIAN high school system/curriculum. I really have very little idea of how the US school system/classes work so like. I’m just making it up as I go. :D;; (Literally how many classes do US high school students have in a day?? Up here it’s FOUR.)

Please excuse my interpretation of jorogumos, I took a LOT of liberties.

Chapter Two will be posted next Friday, if you're into that sort of thing. You can also read this HERE on AO3.

HORROR HIGH TUMBLR MASTER POST HERE.

HORROR HIGH Chapter One By Senashenta

Dean Winchester crept up the steps of Caspar High School in Jacksonville, Florida, and ducked under the line of police tape that marked off the area, heading for the little tent that had been erected just to the side of the building, near the bushes. The whole scene was theoretically being guarded by the police—but the officer they had left behind was asleep in his police car out front.

Bang up job, Jacksonville P.D.

That aside, Dean was good at his job, so sneaking into a crime scene was no big deal for him, guarded or not. And this was just your basic body check, there wouldn’t be any fighting or anything to wake the cop up—or that was the theory, anyway. (Even if there was, it wouldn’t be his first time being caught and or arrested, either, but they would probably just chalk it up to him being a nosy kid regardless.)

This was the first time his Dad had trusted him enough to drop him in a town to take care of a case alone. Of course, Sam was in Jacksonville with Dean while their Dad headed to Utah to look into a recent spate of killings there, but Sam was pretty much confined to school and the motel on this outing, as per their father’s orders. Still, Dean was going to be keeping a close eye on him: Sam had been known to rabbit in the past and he didn’t want to have to call his Dad and explain that he had lost his little brother (again.)

Now, Dean stealthily unzipped the tent flap and stepped inside, letting it fall closed behind himself.

What he was confronted with when his eyes adjusted to the darkness wasn’t a body so much as a cocoon, an oblong, rounded object the size of a person and wrapped in layers and layers of what looked almost like off-white cheesecloth or gauze. Dean leaned down and tapped at it with his fingers. It was soft, like silk.

Well that would explain why the police hadn’t taken the body away yet; there was no body, per se.

“Let’s see what’s inside you.”

Dean pulled the buck knife out of the back of his jeans, unsheathed it, and got to work cutting the cocoon open. The wrapping, though soft, was tough and sticky, hard to slice through, but eventually he hacked a seam lengthways along the cocoon, at which point he set his knife aside to pull the damned thing open.

Inside was the actual body; male, probably, and curled in on itself, shrivelled and desiccated and dried to a withered husk. At least it didn’t smell. Dean still made a face, even as he released the cocoon and picked up his knife, tucking it away again before exiting the little tent and heading off down the street, making for the motel he and Sam were staying at.

The Seafoam Motel wasn’t exactly high-class, but then none of the places they stayed at ever were. But it had walls and a roof, good locks on the door, it was cheap, and nobody asked too many questions about the occupants of the rooms, and those were all the important things. The Seafoam Motel ticked all the boxes for a financially strapped Hunter—and for his kids, too. Not that you would know it from Sam’s complaining.

At least it had wifi, the kid would have pitched an absolute fit if it hadn’t.

When he got back to the room the door was predictably locked (good job, Sammy), and Dean banged on it a couple of times, calling out, “Sammy, it’s me, open the door!”

After a moment of silence there was the sound of the chain lock and deadbolt being unlocked, and then the door was yanked open. Sam stepped aside to let Dean in and then closed and locked the door behind him, just like it had been drilled into him so many times in the past. “What’d you find?”

“Cocoon.”

“Come again?”

“Cocoon.” Dean repeated as he crossed the room, pulling his knife out and setting it on the little kitchenette table, then dropping into one of the rickety chairs. “You know, like the movie? The body was inside it. Wrapped up in this tough, sticky… I don’t know what. But it sure looked a hell of a lot like a cocoon to me.”

Sam was already heading for his laptop. “That gives us a place to start, at least.”

“Oh no, no no.” Dean headed him off at the pass, practically diving over and snatching the computer before Sam could get to it. “You’re not doing research all night, we have freaking school in the morning.” And then, “…I can’t believe I just said that.”

“Yeah, because you care about school.” Sam rolled his eyes and made a grab for the laptop, but Dean held it over his head where he couldn’t reach. “Dean.”

“I care about the girls at school.” He informed his brother with a grin, then added, “and it’s nearly two a.m., we’re going to bed. Research tomorrow. Sleep now. Besides, I have to check out the school some more anyway, just a cocoon isn’t going to give us much.”

Sam grumbled, eventually agreed, but still held his hand out for his computer. Dean deposited the laptop safely into his grasp and then started stripping down, falling into bed once he was in just his boxers and a t-shirt. “Get the lights, Sammy.”

Sam flicked the lights off with a long-suffering sigh.

-- --

Castiel Novak wasn’t having a great first day at Caspar High. He was relatively used to being the New Kid, his father’s job had them moving around a lot so he switched schools on a regular basis, but the hazing at Caspar was particularly mean spirited, he was finding, not to mention the building itself was an absolute maze, and he had been late for literally all of his morning classes simply because he hadn’t been able to find them and no one had been willing to help him out.

Now he was seated in the cafeteria, by himself but surrounded by the rest of the bustling student body, unsure what to really do with himself.

This wasn’t his first time being the New Kid. He and his father moved around a lot for his father’s job and Caspar High was the third school he’d transferred to since September. It was now January. His father promised that the moving would slow down, though; he could see how much it wore on Cas, even if the boy never said anything about it. He was going to start travelling for his seminars, instead, now that he felt Cas was old enough to stay home on his own. So Cas could potentially be at Caspar for a while.

He probably should have been worried about making friends. For most kids his age that would have been top priority, but Cas had always been a little different, and he thought he was fine on his own, if it came down to it, especially considering the first impression he was getting of the other students so far. It figured that the High School he was likely to actually graduate from would turn out to be full of nothing but jerks.

He was also possibly a little jaded from all the moving around he’d done in the past.

For the time being he just dug his lunch—a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, an apple and a bottle of water—out of his backpack, unwrapped the sandwich and began to pick little pieces of it off and eat them, rather than taking proper bites as he usually would. He wasn’t really all that hungry, considering there were at least a hundred pairs of eyes on him at the moment.

And then—

“HEY NEW KID!”

When Cas looked up, a basketball was flying at his face and he had no time to duck out of the way—but at the last possible second hands shot out of nowhere, snatching the ball out of the air before it could hit its’ target. Blue eyes blinked, and his head swivelled sideways to take in the stranger that had just saved him from a black eye at the very least.

The guy wasn’t overly tall—probably around Cas’s height, give or take—with short, tousled brown hair. He was sporting a t-shirt and a flannel button-up under a worn black jean jacket. He was also wearing ripped jeans. But Cas was most taken by his eyes, which were a sharp, beautiful forest green. As he watched, the other boy eyed the kid across the cafeteria who had thrown the ball to begin with—then abruptly pitched it back at the offender. The ball slammed into the other kid’s head, sending him flying backward out of his seat and causing laugher to erupt all across the cafeteria.

Then his rescuer just looked down at him for a moment before dropping down to sit next to him, straddling the bench. “They tried that on me my first day here, too. Same thing happened then. You’d think they’d learn.”

“Thank you.” Cas offered with a blink.

“No problem.”

“I’m Castiel.”

“That’s a mouthful. I’m Dean.” And then, “the fact that you’re wearing a tie right now isn’t going to help your popularity. Also,” he reached over to physically pull the tie off Cas’s neck and dropped it on the table in front of them. Cas allowed it, somewhat baffled. “You had it on backwards. Honestly, dude, just wear t-shirts like the rest of us.”

“I can do that.” Cas agreed. He owned t-shirts. He grabbed his tie to stuff it into his backpack. Then he returned to looking at Dean, taking in his features and mannerisms. He was exceedingly good-looking, Cas decided almost absently. At the same time, Dean was looking him over as well, seeming to take stock of him, gaze alert and analytical. Scrutinizing.

Eventually Cas shifted a little and asked, “are you new, too?”

“New-ish.” Dean shrugged, “I transferred in two weeks ago.”

“That’s why you’re nicer than...” Cas trailed off and glanced around the cafeteria.

“Literally everyone else here?” Dean suggested with a laugh.

“I didn’t want to say it, but yes.”

“It gets better. After a few days they forget. They’re dumb like that, the masses.”

“Zombies.”

“Uh,” Dean hesitated, but then allowed, “yeah, sure, kind of.”

“You don’t sound very certain, Dean.”

“Well, Cas, I just think zombies are probably different than in the movies.”

Wait. “Cas?” He called himself ‘Cas’ in his head, but no one ever called him that out loud except his father.

Dean gave him a little amused look, “’Castiel’ is a lot.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“As long as it’s fine with you, that is.”

Cas nodded and offered a smile. “It’s fine with me.”

Dean gave him a little grin back. “Great.”

The rest of lunch hour was spent with Cas actually eating his lunch properly while he talked with Dean and they got to know each other a little. No one else bothered them for the rest of the time they were in the cafeteria, and Cas was hoping he would have at least one of his afternoon classes with Dean, but when they compared their schedules, it sadly wasn’t to be. Cas resigned himself to hazing throughout the day for at least the next week or so—until the rest of the student body moved on.

It was a novelty to talk with someone who overlooked his innate strangeness. Cas was so used to people giving him odd looks that Dean chatting with him as freely as he was now, was… almost baffling. Dean seemed like the kind of guy who could be popular, have tons of friends easily, and instead here he was wasting his time with Cas. It was… weird. Not that Cas was complaining.

When the bell rang to signify the end of lunch hour, Cas was mildly disappointed that their conversation had to end. He shifted in his seat a bit before asking tentatively, “you could sit with me again tomorrow, If you wanted?”

“I’ve already got a spot where I spend lunch hour, usually. Not in here.” Dean replied casually, making Cas wilt a little, then; “but you can join me if you want. Meet me by the gym tomorrow at the start of lunch, okay?”

Cas brightened again, nodding. “Okay.”

“Cool.” Dean stood up and brushed the nonexistent dust off himself with a grin, “then I’ll see you tomorrow, Cas.”

Cas smiled back. “Mm, see you tomorrow.”

He didn’t know where Dean was going, but he was off to calculus class—assuming he could find it.

-- --

“Hey, New Kid.”

Cas was really getting tired of being called that, but at least this time there had been no malice behind it. More curiosity, if anything. He was seated in calculus, having found it with (relative) ease, trying to keep his head down and out of trouble when the voice spoke up from in front of him. He reluctantly lifted his head.

The girl in the seat in front of him was twisted around in her chair to face him, a wide smile on her face. Her hair was the reddest red that Cas thought it could possibly be. She gave him a little wave. “I’m Charlie. What’s your name?”

Cas hesitated before offering, “Castiel. But just Cas is fine.”

“Wow, yeah, ‘Castiel’ is…”

“A lot.” Cas echoed Dean’s words from earlier in the day. He was starting to relax now that Charlie was turning out to be friendly. He sat up a little straighter. “It’s nice to meet you, Charlie.”

“Nice to meet you, too!” Charlie glanced around, “I know most of the population of his school are jerks, but calculus is a pretty safe class, so you can relax a little. Oh!” She gestured to the side at another girl, “this is Jody,” and then to the boy sitting in the seat beside Cas, “and this is Garth. They’re cool too.”

Jody had short brown hair and dark eyes, and almost a maternal smile; Garth was tall and lanky, kind of goofy looking but gave him a greeting grin that Cas couldn’t help smiling back to. He was definitely feeling more comfortable now, in this class, at least.

“I saw what happened at lunch,” Charlie said, pulling his attention back to her, “Dean Winchester saved you, which, like… what was he even doing in the cafeteria? He always vanishes at lunch time. No one knows where he goes. It’s a mystery.” She wiggled her fingers a little, “he must like you, ‘cause he usually just keeps to himself, or he has since he transferred in, anyway.”

“Mn, he said he was new, too.”

“Yeah, by a couple weeks. No one dares pick on him, though, he’d kick everyone’s asses.”

Cas coughed out a little laugh. “I got that impression.” Then, after a slight hesitation, “he said I could sit with him at lunch tomorrow. So.”

“Ooh, exciting! You’ll have to tell us where he eats lunch, then!” Charlie grinned at him, then rolled her eyes slightly, “aaaaaaall the girls have a crush on him. He’s handsome and mysterious and blah blah blah.”

“You think he’s over-rated.” Jody informed flatly, though her expression was amused.

“Over-rated?” Cas questioned.

“Charlie is gay.” Garth explained. “Like, so gay.”

“So gay.” Charlie agreed.

“Oh.” Cas shrugged. It didn’t bother him. “I’m not entirely straight myself.”

Charlie just grinned. “So you don’t think Dean Winchester is over-rated.”

He cleared his throat and glanced down a little. “He’s not unattractive.”

“Yeaaaah that’s what I thought.”

“I like girls, too, though, I just… I like who I like. I don’t care about their gender.”

“That’s valid.” Charlie gave him a reassuring smile, then just changed the topic entirely; “where’d you move from?”

Cas blinked. “Wichita, Kansas. My Father and I move around a lot for his job… or we did. Now that I’m older I guess he trusts me to stay home alone so he’s going to start travelling instead. So I’m stuck here.”

“It’s not so bad here once you settle in,” Jody reassured him.

“Yeah,” Charlie nodded, “and you’ve got us now, so it’s not like you have no friends.”

“You just have weird friends.” Garth laughed.

Cas couldn’t help the little grin that crept across his own face. He was actually perfectly okay with having weird friends.

-- --

In history class, after calculus, somebody tripped him on his way to his seat and Cas fell flat on his face. The rest of the students laughed. Cas just got back up and continued on, pretending nothing had happened. That was the best way to deal with bullies, he had learned, over his long and sordid history of transferring from school to school. Ignore them until they give up and go away.

Or, alternatively, have Dean Winchester throw a basketball at their face. That apparently worked, too.

In any case, after the incident in history, the rest of the day passed easily enough, until Cas found himself standing outside the school after final bell, just taking deep breaths of the fresh air and looking up at the sky—soaking in the fact that he was free, at least for the rest of the day.

“You going left or right?”

Cas blinked at the familiar voice and turned his attention to Dean, who had come up beside him while he was distracted with the general out-of-doors. He glanced toward the route he had to take to get home. “Right. Why?”

“Me too. I’ll walk with you.”

“Oh. Okay.” And then, “thanks.”

“Don’t gotta thank me. I’m walking that way anyway.” Dean nudged him to get him moving, and Cas headed off with the other boy by his side.

“No, I mean,” Cas waved one hand in an absent sort of gesture, “I mean for earlier. In the cafeteria. You really didn’t have to do that. And one of the girls I was talking to later said you don’t even usually go in the cafeteria, so I just… thanks. For going out of your way. I appreciate it.”

“You were gossiping about me?”

“I—” Cas began, then clapped his mouth shut again and shook his head in a quick negative. When he spoke up once more it was to mutter, “of course not.”

But Dean was already grinning, looking overly amused. “It’s fine, Cas, I’m used to being gossip fodder. What was she saying about me?”

“That all the girls here think you’re handsome.” Cas told him easily, but conveniently left out the part where he agreed with them. There was no sense in telling a guy he’d just met that he was already developing a crush on him, especially when he might be moving again any day. He really wasn’t sure he trusted his father’s promises that they were going to stay put this time. “And that no one knows where you disappear to at lunch time, apparently it’s a big mystery.”

Dean laughed. “Well you’ll know, starting tomorrow.” He pointed out, “you’re still gonna join me, right?”

Cas actually gave him a surprised look. “I didn’t think you actually—”

“—meant it?” Dean finished for him. His smile softened for just a second before returning to his previous jovial expression. “Mmm… I wouldn’t have offered if I didn’t mean it. And besides, you’re different from all those other assholes, I can tell.”

“I like to think I am, anyway.” Then, “you are, too.”

Dean grinned again. “I think we’re going to be friends, Cas, I really do.”

Cas offered up a smile of his own, “I’d like that, Dean.”

They walked together for a few blocks, until they got to James Street, at which point Cas paused and gestured down it. This was his turn off, he had to walk down James to get to King Street where he lived, and it was… well, the term “sketchy” came to mind. James Street was all run-down houses, broken fences, guard dogs and probably drug dealers. Dean looked down the street, giving it a thorough eyeballing, before declaring—

“Nope!” He gave Cas a little push toward the street, but then followed him, falling into step beside him as they headed down James. “No way are you walking down here by yourself, dude, that’s just asking to get axe-murdered. Or worse.”

“Worse than axe-murdered?”

“Oh, trust me there are so many worse things than being axe-murdered.”

Cas would have to take his word for it. He couldn’t personally think of any, but that didn’t mean they didn’t exist. For now he was just going over and over in his head how this guy he had just met was walking him all the way home through a dodgy part of town, even though he didn’t have to. His tiny, newborn crush on Dean Winchester was probably growing teeth already, and it hadn’t even been a day.

“When’s your birthday?”

“Huh?” Cas blinked back to reality at the question and actually had to fumble for a response before managing, “July.”

“January.” Dean was paying very close attention to their surroundings while also trying to maintain a conversation and that was obvious. “So I’m older.”

“Only by six months.” Cas pointed out.

“Still counts. Means you have to do what I say.” Dean grinned at him fleetingly, “those’re the rules!”

“I don’t like those rules.” The younger teen gave a token protest. “I think you made those rules up.”

“Possibly, but they’re important.”

“Why?”

“Could save your life one day.”

Cas laughed softly at that, but Dean didn’t, instead falling silent until they were past James Street and out of the sketchy area that Cas had very much walked through unescorted on his way to school that morning. Dean relaxed visibly as soon as they were back to “normal” neighborhoods, his steps easier and his shoulder slouching a little, where they had been tense and taut only a moment before.

Honestly, Cas wasn’t entirely sure what was up with Dean, but clearly something was going on inside his head. He would love to have picked Dean’s brain about it, but he really didn’t think Dean would be up for sharing. Maybe he had an incident in his past, something to do with a neighborhood like James that had him acting like he was now. Cas thought possibly once they got to know each other a little bit more, he might ask, but for now…

“I live on King.” He gestured down the street in question when they neared it, “I really can walk from here, I… um. But thanks. Again.”

Dean’s steps slowed to a stop and he glanced around, as if checking the surrounding neighborhood before deeming it safe. “Okay, Cas. I’ll see you tomorrow, right? Be careful walking that way on your way to school in the morning.”

“I will.” Cas gave him a little smile, “thanks, Dean. See you tomorrow.” Then he turned and headed across the street to King, where his father was likely waiting to hear a rundown of his day.

-- --

Lunch time the next day found Cas nervously waiting outside the gym, half expecting Dean not to show—that it had all been an elaborate prank.

Cas’s morning had gone alright, though, everyone seemed to be steering clear now that it had circulated that Dean Winchester was looking out for him. He wasn’t sure what, exactly, Dean had done to garner his reputation, but whatever it was it had been effective.

“Hey.” A hand clapped into his shoulder and when Cas glanced up, Dean was standing there, “c’mon.”

Cas just stared at him. “You actually came.”

“Well, yeah,” Dean gave him an odd look, then gestured for him to follow and headed into the gym. It was empty right now, except for them, and Cas trailed after Dean as they walked around the side of the bleachers—and Dean ducked into the back of them, then dropped down and settled with his back against the wall. He waved a hand for Cas to join him.

Cas clambered in behind the bleachers as well, taking a seat beside Dean and setting his backpack beside him. “This is where you spend lunch?”

“Yeah. It’s private. Quiet, usually.” Dean shrugged, “I don’t mind you being here, though.”

Cas blinked at that, not quite sure what to say. “I—thanks?”

Dean tossed him a grin. “You don’t have to thank me for everything, Cas.”

But it was the polite thing to do. Cas opened his mouth—then closed it again. After a moment he just shrugged almost awkwardly and dug in his backpack for his lunch, unwrapping his sandwich and beginning to eat. He was so severely unused to having friends that this was difficult for him—socializing. He didn’t really know how to do it.

“Hey, what’s your family like?” Cas glanced over when Dean spoke up. The other boy had his head leaned back against the wall, his hands laced over his stomach and his eyes were staring off somewhere into the middle-distance.

“My family?” Cas swallowed a bite of sandwich and resisted the urge to shrug again. “It’s just me and my Father. He adopted me when I was five, but I don’t remember anything before then. It’s always just been the two of us.”

Dean smiled a little and looked at him. “I’ve got me, and my Dad, and my annoying little brother. But we get by okay.”

So neither of them had Moms. That was interesting. Cas took another bite of his sandwich and asked, “how come you transferred here? Does your Dad move around a lot for work or something?”

“You could say that.” Dean agreed, “what about you?”

“Same.” The younger teen nodded, in-between bites of food, “my Father is a motivational speaker, and he does series of seminars all over the place. The last couple months we were in Kansas, and Oregon before that. Now we’re here.” Another bite of sandwich and he continued, a little muffled, “he says we’re going to stay here, though, now that I’m old enough to stay home on my own. He says he’ll start travelling for his work instead.” A shrug, “I don’t know if I believe him or not.”

“Your Dad lie to you often?”

Cas sighed. “No, it’s just… I think it’s a stretch. That he’s suddenly decided all this.”

“Mm.” Dean seemed sympathetic, though Cas wasn’t entirely sure why. “Sucks that it’s this school that you’d be stuck at, after everything.”

“That’s what I was thinking yesterday.” Cas admitted, balling up the wrap from his lunch and dropping it back in his bag. Then he hesitated before offering, “but then I met you, and… things got better.”

Dean grinned again. “Yeah. I think we’re gonna be good friends, Cas.”

Cas found himself smiling back—and then Dean lifted his arm to run his hand through his hair and Cas’s eyes caught on a tear in the cuff of his jacket. He tilted his head curiously. “What happened to your jacket?”

“Huh?” Dean lowered his arm to peer at the rip. He shrugged. “I don’t even know, honestly, half my stuff has holes in it and I never know where they came from.”

Cas was already digging through his backpack again, and this time came up with a spool of black thread and a needle, much to Dean’s obvious surprise. He waved one hand toward the older boy, “take it off and I’ll fix it for you.”

Of all the ways this lunch hour could have gone, this was not one Dean would have predicted. He looked at Cas almost blankly for a moment, then let his eyes flick down to the other teen’s backpack. It was covered in vibrant patches—a cartoon PB&J sandwich, a pizza box, an LGBTQ flag, angel wings, etc.—all obviously hand-sewn on. And oh. So sewing was a thing with Cas. Okay.

Dean pushed away from the wall just enough to shrug out of his jacket and handed it over, watching curiously as Cas measured out a length of thread, then snapped it off with his teeth, threading the needle and knotting the thread a second later. He was obviously practiced at this particular skill. So was Dean, but for different reasons.

A few minutes of concentration later and Cas was finished with repairing the rip in his jacket, knotting off the thread and snapping it with his teeth again, then tucking the needle and thread away before sheepishly handing the jacket back to Dean.

“It’s not perfect, but it’s much better, right?” He asked almost shyly.

Dean gave him a genuine, grateful smile. “Thanks, Cas. It’s great.”

Cas watched him pull his jacket back on, smiling himself now. “I like to sew. It gives me something to do with my hands when I’m feeling… I don’t know. Antsy, I suppose. Like some people play with pencils or fidget toys, I have a needle and thread…”

Dean was inspecting the newly-sewn spot on his cuff, and looked up with a grin, “I play with knives.” He informed Cas, only half-joking.

Cas, not knowing any better, laughed anyway. “Hey, Dean?”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks for… being nice to me. Thanks for this. For… being my friend.”

Dean almost told him he didn’t need to thank him again. Instead he just smiled, almost fond, and said, “you’re welcome, Cas.”

-- --

“What do you mean you’re not going to tell us where Dean Winchester spends lunch hour?”

This was from Charlie, who had one hand clasped to her chest and a positively shocked and scandalized look on her face. The entire thing was an act and Cas knew it, even having only known Charlie for two days. “Charlie.”

“What do you mean you’re not going to tell me where Dean Winchester spends lunch hour?”

“Aaaaaand there it is.” Jody drawled. Garth chuckled.

Cas just smiled apologetically. “It’s kind of a secret. I don’t think he wants people to know.”

Charlie pouted, “you just want him all to yourself, that’s what I think.”

Cas coughed and glanced down at the same time as Garth commented, “as if you care. You couldn’t be less interested in Dean Winchester if you tried, Charlie.”

“Not true!” Charlie insisted, “he is, indeed, a mystery that I am interested in solving! Just… not in, like, a romantic sense. Because ew.” Then she paused before adding, “I mean, objectively I can see where you would find him attractive, Cas, but just… no thanks.”

A soft laugh from Cas, faintly embarrassed. “Sorry, Charlie. I’m still not going to tell you.”

The girl heaved a suffering sigh. “You disappoint me, Castiel Novak.”

Again. “Sorry, Charlie.”

“You are not.”

He wasn’t even a little.

-- --

It became habit that Cas met Dean outside the gym every day at lunch and they spent lunch hour behind the bleachers, talking and laughing and becoming better friends, Cas’s minor crush on Dean growing into a huge monster of one very quickly.

Dean never had anything to eat at lunch and it hadn’t gone unnoticed by Cas, though he had thus far neglected to say anything. But the longer he knew Dean and the more time he spent with the other boy the more it bothered him. He wasn’t bringing anything from home, obviously, and never bought anything from the cafeteria, he just sat through lunch hour watching everyone else eat and going hungry himself, scribbling in a battered notebook that he carried in his inside jacket pocket.

And that didn’t sit right with Cas because some days it was obvious Dean was hungry from the way he watched Cas eat out of the corner of his eye. But why he never had food was probably a sensitive subject and Cas didn’t feel he had the right to ask.

He could, however, do something about it.

So the next time Dean plunked himself down on the ground behind the gym bleachers at lunch time, Cas sat down next to him, then swung his backpack around and fished out not one but two sandwiches, each individually wrapped in cling-film. He blinked at Dean and held one out. “Here.”

Dean just stared at him. “Dude, what are you doing?”

“Feeding you.” Cas stated matter-of-factly, and when Dean didn’t immediately take the offered sandwich, he just set it in the older boy’s lap and returned to his bag, digging out two apples and setting one next to Dean’s sandwich. This was followed by a pair of bottles of water. Then he shrugged. “Someone has to do it.”

“But—I—you—this is—”

Cas could sense where this was going. He headed it off at the pass. “It’s not charity, if that’s what you’re worried about. It’s as easy to make two sandwiches as it is to make one.” He was already unwrapping his own sandwich, and paused to glance sideways at Dean before taking a bite; “we’re friends and friends help each other out, right?”

“We are, yeah…” Dean continued looking at him rather oddly while he started to eat, like he was having trouble with the idea of someone doing something so nice for him and not wanting anything in return. Eventually, though, he glanced away, as if suddenly shy, and carefully picked up his own sandwich, unwrapping it and taking a huge bite right off the bat. He was obviously starving. Once that was chewed and swallowed, he cleared his throat and offered, “uh… thanks, Cas.”

Cas shrugged again but gave him a smile. “As long as you don’t mind peanut butter and jelly, I don’t mind sharing with you.”

“…I am not eating the apple. Apples belong in pies.”

The next day Cas started bringing him a fruit cup instead. “It’s close to pie.”

“It’s not even.”

Despite his protests, Dean ate it anyway.

-- --

On top of eating lunch together, it had also quickly become habit for Dean to walk Cas home—mostly because he was very suspicious of James Street and that neighborhood in general, and he didn’t want his only friend to be snatched up by some monster, or even a common-place serial killer. A life of being a Hunter’s son had made him more than a little paranoid when it came to things like that.

Usually Cas made it outside first, and just waited around by one of the retaining walls until Dean emerged from the school a few minutes later, at which point they set out. Cas kept telling Dean he really didn’t need to walk him home, and Dean kept doing it anyway.

Because aside from his paranoia, he really did like Cas, and enjoy spending time with him, possibly too much, really—but walking Cas home also got him away from the crappy motel and his annoying little brother for just a little while longer, which was always a bonus. He was a Hunter, and he had a job to do, his dad drilled that into him all the damn time, but he was also not-quite eighteen and needed distraction every now-and-then.

“You’re quiet.” Dean was always quiet when they were walking down James Street. Cas always tried anyway. “What are you thinking about?”

“I’m thinking it’s going to rain.”

Cas glanced up. It was severely overcast, with storm clouds overhead and the humidity was through the roof. Dean was probably right. “Yeah, probably.” He agreed. “Hey, do you want to walk all the way to my house today? I could introduce you to my Father, if he’s in. We could hang out.”

Dean flashed him a little smile. “I can’t. I’ve gotta get home to Sammy.”

‘Sammy’ was Dean’s younger brother, thirteen from what Dean had told him, and attending Bedwin Junior High. Bedwin was Caspar’s affiliated Junior High, so if they were around long enough, Sammy—Sam—would go to Caspar as well. Dean seemed to feel that they wouldn’t be around that long, though, which was… disappointing. Upsetting, even.

Cas was used to moving around, himself, and in the beginning he had been young and hadn’t known better, he had made friends wherever he went, and then inevitably had to leave them behind. When he got a little older, he started purposefully avoiding making friends, so he wouldn’t have to deal with the pain of losing them.

Now, at Caspar, he had dropped his guard again, and even if his father kept his word and they didn’t move again, and he was able to stay friends with Charlie, Jody and Garth, Dean… he and his brother were in the same boat as Cas had been in previously. So, Cas had gotten to be friends with Dean without even meaning to, gotten close to him, developed a huge crush on him—though he never let it show—and Dean could be leaving any day. It was only a matter of time, really.

Cas had thought that he had hardened himself to the reality of losing friends, considering how he’d grown up, but the thought of Dean taking off just… put a lump in the pit of his stomach. He really had it bad for the older boy, had since Day One, probably, Charlie was right about that much.

But Dean was funny and smart and so attractive, so of course—

Something heavy slammed into Cas’s back right at that moment, the blow cushioned only by the fact that he was wearing his backpack, and Cas yelped out a startled noise even as he tumbled to the ground, landing roughly on the hard pavement.

Whatever had crashed into him was still on top of him—a person, he thought—and scrabbling at him, one hand holding him down by the chest while the other grabbed at his hair and shoved his head to the side. Then they lunged forward and bit into his neck—Cas gave a sharp cry—and abruptly Dean’s voice shouted something unintelligible and he yanked the person off, flinging them away.

When Cas looked up, the person who had attacked him was standing a few feet away, wiping at his mouth and spitting. Dean was between him and Cas and had a huge buck knife in one hand (where had that come from?), holding it at the ready. When the stranger stopped gagging and lunged toward Dean, Dean braced himself and full-body tackled the man, knife flashing—first silver and then red—as he stabbed it into the man over and over again.

After that onslaught, though, and despite being stabbed several times, the stranger wrenched himself away and took off, fleeing into the oncoming storm.

Dean stood where he was for a moment, heaving, before wiping the knife on his jeans and tucking it into the back of his waistband, where Cas assumed it had come from to begin with. Then he hurried back over to Cas and crouched down, hands hovering uselessly. “Shit, Cas, are you okay?”

Cas brought one hand up to the side of his neck where he had been bitten, wiping there before dropping it again to look almost blankly at the blood on his palm. That was about when it started to rain. Dean reached to help him up, and together they got Cas back to his feet. He actually didn’t feel too bad, all things considered.

Dean was already checking out his neck, ignoring the fact that rain was pouring down on them now. “It doesn’t look too bad. It didn’t get you too deep. Could’ve ripped your throat out, you’re lucky.”

“It—what—he bit me—and—you stabbed him and he didn’t even—"

“Cas,” Dean looked him in the eye, deadly serious, and told him firmly, “that was a vampire.”

[thegeminisage]

oooh envesseled, please!!

HI wow thank you for asking, because i love talking about this, and i promise no one is obligated to read the whole answer lol. envesseled (partially, but only partially, up on ao3...) is part of cambionverse, which is a sort of spin-off about some EXTREMELY minor characters in s*pernatural that my buddy @callowyn and i have been chipping away at since 2011 or so.

for anyone with a passing familiarity with the show: we were so sure they were going to kill lisa braeden at the end of season 6 (can you blame us?), we whipped up a little scenario where her son ben was partially raised by sam, dean, and bobby instead...until sam and dean go mysteriously missing, a la john winchester, and now ben has to go and look for them the same way they once searched for their own dad.

but since supernatural has those big 3 characters (sam dean cas) and ben is our dean-character (he is sort of like a dean who broke the cycle of abuse and is also a huge lovable dork), we also needed a sam-character and a cas-character. for our sam we picked jesse (a one-episode wonder, the antichrist kid who turned cas into an action figure), and claire novak, the daughter of acstiel's vessel, who at that point was also a one-episode wonder and also had a collective total of less than 50 words of dialogue. we made her up on our own, essentially. jesse struggles with anxiety and controlling his demonic half and trusting hunters/himself after doing so has burned him in the past (or...gotten other people burned, i guess), and claire struggles with trusting anyone at all and the total emotional unavailability/other after-effects that come from being possessed by something with a thousand eyes at age 11.

in the first two "big" stories (one for jesse, one for ben, though there's a shit ton of additional content) they battle meg (my beloved, don't worry, she'll NEVER die), find the missing sam and dean, resolve various other personal traumas, be mentally ill together, and flirt ever closer to a three-person situationship that would make dean actively long for death if he ever found out about it. meanwhile cally and i kind of throw tomatoes at various things in the show proper that annoyed us, such as how much they hate women, how often they forget their own canon, or the double standard of sometimes letting monsters live when they're dangerous and sometimes killing them when they've done nothing wrong.

envesseled is the third "big" story, for claire, and it takes a significant turn because at the very beginning of it, while she and ben are in the middle of a huge argument, he dies (fridged a la MARY winchester), debatably because of something claire did, and the only way to resurrect him is to ask castiel for help. except he can't help because his various misadventures have left him broken into a thousand pieces and his current jimmy-vessel has no soul to put them back together. and so she's still dealing with this castiel trauma, and the grief/guilt over ben, and the grief /guilt over her dad she never processed, while going around collecting all the broken pieces of castiel in her own body so he can envessel HER (hence the title), bring ben back to life--except the catch is the more grace she takes into her body, the sicker she gets, so it's a question of whether or not she has enough time to finish collecting the pieces, and whether or not she can actually bear to be in castiel's presence and also say yes to him in order to allow him to do this.

as one might guess from the summary it is. an INCREDIBLY niche fanfic series with like a dozen fans worldwide, though i am proud to say pretty much everyone who's tried it has liked it, probably because it's diverged so heavily at this point it aaalmost reads like original fiction. like, i wish there were words to convey how deeply you do not need to have seen the show to read it. we are still writing "envesseled" which is why it's on the wip list (it is fighting with us SO MUCH) but we really really really hope we get it finished in time for "cambion day," which is march 29 (jesse's birthday). i tried very, very hard to find an excerpt from what we haven't posted that isn't full of giant spoilers, but i can't, so i'll post an excerpt from what we have on ao3 instead that i really like. this happens right after claire absorbs the first of many of castiel's broken pieces and is kind of a microcosm of the dynamic in general:

Castiel stands, not far enough away, watching her like a crow inspecting carrion. "How do you feel?" Claire takes a deep breath, assessing. There's no apparent difference between the new grace and the old—after all, both are pieces of the same angel—but she feels their presence more keenly, a stronger heat than the one she's been accustomed to for so many years. Apparently she's more sensitive to the powers of the Antichrist, too. "I've stopped feeling like there's a stab wound in my side, if that's what you mean." "Hm." Two fingers brush across her forehead. Claire's entire body thrums, and then she's grabbing Castiel's wrist, crushing it in her grip as she pulls his hand away. "Don't touch me." Her heartbeat is wild, squeezing the bones under her hand with all her strength, knowing she can't damage him but too angry to care. "Don't you ever touch me." Castiel holds motionless in a way no human could ever achieve, lights flickering over his head. "Let go of me, then." He could break free of her grasp with a fraction of effort, but it's still satisfying to throw his hand aside. Claire catches Jesse's eyes, and sees just a moment of ink-black there before he blinks and the light fixtures stop shaking. "Very well," says Castiel, after a long tense silence. He leaves the kitchen, giving Claire a wide berth, and moves to stand in the center of the dusty library. "Try this one."

let people send you an ask with the WIP title that most intrigues them, and then post a little snippet or tell them something about it!

[sloppyneedybmxboy]

fav supernatural episodes

3x03 rabbits foot bella episode 3x08 supernatural christmas super wincest so sweet so sad 3x10 dream a little dream of me, bobby i just love you 3x11 mystery spot, like groundhog day with dean dying a lot SO ANGST between sam and dean 3x12 jus in bello, super tense dude they're in a demon siege goood ep 3x13 ghostfacers, so so funny so spoofy

(*꒦ິ꒳꒦ີ)

4x01 dean comes back from hell whole thing shot like gay porn i love it 4x03 and 02 not my fav episodes ever but incredibly gay destiel scenes at night 4x06 anxious dean 4x07 awesome ep. castiel meets sammie. DESTIEL scenes like the bench scene ZOMG 4x09 just a great ep loads of drama. anna !

4x10 good for drama. anna kisses dean and cas is like :o 4x15 uhh the reapers have been kindapped. castiel and also alistair and pamela. its a fun time (sort of ) 4x16 ON THE HEAD OF A PIN. my favest episode so far, so much drama. dean angst! torturing alistair! bloody cas. cas at deans bedside . i was getting too close to the humans in my charge etc etc 4x18 chuck, good ep ft dean praying to cas for first time

4x20 tense. not the best ep ever but ft jimmy novak aka cas' vessel and funny just for the complete lack of sexual tension between dean and jimmy without cas inside him and dean's confusion

4x21 oop. sam getting demon blood detoxed. angst and greatly enjoyable

4x22 best epppp so good so good. so fun always good to rewatch. much destiel

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧

5x02 "i rebelled i did it all for you" destiel speech um also awesome ep war comes to small town etc rufus ellen involved very ethel cain 5x03 dean and cas go on a case together for the first time! very gay¬! 5x04 endverse cas and dean, apocalypse, gayness 5x06 good ep with the kid antichrsit it just pisses me offf 5x07 old dean, so funny, bobby angst, loves it 5x08 changing channels! it truly has it all. gabriel, cas, funny sam dean stuff, dr sexy …. 5x10 cas and jo and ellen and dean and bobby and stuff aaaa my heart. they tracked lucifer down. sexy cas scenes 5x11 a true fever dream of an episode … the boys admit themselves to a mental asylum … I don't know if this deserves to be on this list but it was kinda funny idk. minus points for no cas. 5x13 worth it only for the cas!whump scenes hurtcas ! he sends them back in time to fix things with john and mary 5x14 MY BLOODY VALENTINE! consumehimnatural destiel my beloved 5x16 worth it for the cas losing his faith in his father/god plotline. angst cas 5x17 DRUNK BITCH CAS ep.! always good fun to watch him be mean to sam. dean's like WHAAAA? one of my fav eps 5x18 "last time someone looked at my like that, I got laid" DESTIEL ALLEYWAY FIGHT SCENE, angst!dean, so many good scenes !!! one of my fav eps 5x20 wonderful crowley ep, really funny antagonistic & good gay times 5x21 cas in hospital! cas saves the day! not the best plot wise but plenty of fun and crowley involved too so all the boys :D

(☆▽☆)

6x01 NOT the best episode at ALL but really fun to watch in terms of dean gender studies. dean living normcore life with ben and lisa 6x03 CAS IS ON ONE! "we do have a more profound bond" very funny iconic destiel lines, balthazar included

6x04 BOBBY POV EP! YAY! supa funny silly lighthearted I loves it 6x05 Twilight/vampire. I am hesitant to put this one on the list but it is homoerotic vampires dean gender studies moments so I think it has to be here. minus points for soulless sam and samuel cos they sukk 6x06 ICONIC destiel whiskey pouring scene.Rest of the ep is fairly skippable. I sometimes slow this scene down to x0.25 and watch it because there's so much being said nonverbally thru their body language and eyes so watch careffffully. much to unpack, ripe for analysis. sad!Cas

6x09 dean fight the fairies episode. so much fun 6x10 meg! crowley! cas! the boys! they're all fighting. supa funny cas/crowley bits and cas sexual awakening 6x15 HOLA MISHAMIGOS! meta ep. so funny so silly so light

6x18 this ep truly has it all ONE OF MY FAV OF ALL TIME dean gender silly dress up cowboy, b plot is gay cas and bobby getting angel fisted umm 6x19-22 obvs THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING ARC !!!

7x01 GODSTIEL ARC 7x02 godstiel arc continued. for first 10 mins or something 7x06 -7x12 ok so these are by far not my fav episodes but. there's something to say for them. I thought season 7 was gonna be balls without cas but there's something quite Classic Supernatural going on in these eps which is comforting and/or dean gender studies and/or dean pining for cas which makes them good actually. ft frank & some garth . ALSO bobby being a dad and bobby death sequence eps 9/10 7x17 CAS RETURNS! Emmanual!Cas awesome destiel scenes like the trenchcoat bit ….. 7x18 party on garth. truly an incredible episode. garth-centric 7x20 CHARLIE CHARLIE CHARLIE! 1st charlie ep leviathian heist style plot quite fun and silly 7x21 crazy cas! off his rocker cas! cas and dean play a boardgame! cas is so charmingly aloof and offhand! "when castiel first laid hands on you in hell he was LOST!!!" ft. kevin tran 7x23 weird boy bestfriends behaviour … also "i'd rather have you, cursed or not" destiel scenes ft. the Iconic castiel crowley meg dean love triangle

8x01 unbelievably gay purgatory flashback episode. deranged dean. big gay benny! very queer coded. really fun !!! one of my favs ft kevin 8x02 "too much heart was always castiel's problem" OK? ft kevin tran and his MUM. also pining recently returned from purgatory dean. overall fun ep 8x05 dean x benny ep so Very gay ….. some purg flashback and destiel parallels …. 8x06 garth therapises the Boys! it's always a good time when it's a garth ep ok

[duckprintspress]

Hi there, i'm not sure this is in your wheel house, and I hate to waste your time, but I had a question and wonder if you might be able to offer advice (no worries if you can't or don't want to). i write a lot of fan fiction, but also have lots of idea about non-fan fiction stories. when i've tried to write them, however, I find the idea of getting a whole story out to be sufficiently intimidating that i've never been able to do it (there are probably other reasons for this of course, too). i love the A03 capability of posting one chapter (which can be super short) at a time; it's a real impetus to keep going without having to complete an entire work up front, esp if the feedback along the way is encouraging. what is your take on getting an original fiction story out in a03, but then trying to get it published elsewhere afterwards (taking it down from a03 at that point if necessary)? is that something feasible to try to do?

or perhaps you have other recs? (I don't think my original stories (unlike my fan fic) is likely to be focused on LGBTQIA+ relationships or issues, and i'm straight, so i suspect it's not what your publishing house is focusing on)

thank you so much for even reading this message.

Howdy anon! So there's a few things brought up in this message, and I'll try to answer each.

First: yes, we love offering advice and getting asks! Srsly, you and everyone, don't hesitate to drop stuff like this in our inbox, I love answering them, and if I (hi, I'm @unforth, meatspace name Claire, pen name/editing name Nina, and I own the Press and run our social media accounts) don't know the answer, I can kick 'um to the DPP server and get more folks to weigh in!

Second: yeah, motivation is a constant challenge, and what works is always going to be different for everyone. Those comments each chapter can be all that keeps me going on a long fanfic sometimes (and even they're not enough sometimes, oops, shovels a bunch of unfinished wip under the carpet behind themself)

Specifically, you ask: what is your take on getting an original fiction story out in a03, but then trying to get it published elsewhere afterwards (taking it down from a03 at that point if necessary)?

So, works are absolutely converted from AO3 stories to published stories. I can think of a half-dozen examples off the top of my head (one of the most recent being Even Though I Knew the End by C. L. Polk, which started as a Dean Winchester/Jimmy Novak fic). However, I'd point out that original fiction gets very VERY low engagement on AO3. Most of the conversions I know of are people taking fanfiction and either scrubbing the barcodes (as in, swapping character names and removing/replacing canon references) or completely rewriting it. If the feel you're struggling with is "I want to get fanfic-like engagement but on a completely original work" I think you'd struggle to get that on AO3; virtually no one I know who has posted original works on AO3 has gotten that engagement on those works.

Publishing it as original fiction that you don't substantially change for publication will also weaken your ability to get it published. It'll guarantee that you can only apply with it to places that allow/do reprints, because you've already "used" the First Worldwide Publication Rights that most publishers will want for an original thing - because you already published it. So even if you remove it, the cat is already out of the bag on "first," and that will limit your options - another reason to do it as fanfic that you then rewrite. It's relatively hard to find places that will publish works, especially long works, that the First rights are already off the table (though we're one example of a place that will, we've published things that are up on AO3, and allowed the unedited versions to remain on AO3 when we've done so. For example, several of @tryslora's stories. We've also allowed the opposite; there's at least one original work on AO3 that started as a DPP exclusive for Patreon, and when the rights reverted back to the author, they chose to post it to AO3 with our blessing).

Of course, you can bypass these issues by self-publishing. Then what you keep and what you change, whether you keep it on AO3 or remove it, etc., is up to you, because you're the boss. Self-pubbing puts a lot more of the work on your shoulders tho - editing, cover art, marketing, typesetting, etc., all of it becomes your responsibility.

But: yes, taking works from AO3 to original fic publishing is feasible and is a thing that happens all the time. Depending on how you're publishing it and/or how extensively you rewrite it, you may not even have to take it down, but it would depend. Certainly, for most trad pub/big publishing houses, they would expect you to take it down.

Re: your last point about working with us, we require exactly zero disclosures from our contributors about their sexual or gender orientation. Our only requirement is that authors have posted fanfiction on a public, accessible fanfiction website. To the best of my knowledge, the vast majority of the people we work with are LGBTQIA+, but I also know for sure we've worked with at least one person who was cis and het. There are probably more. It's honestly none of my business. We've also published plenty with no LGBTQIA+ component. The way we work, we accept authors, and once we've got the author, we publish what they want to write, we're not particularly interested in policing that. Things without LGBTQIA+ don't tend to sell as well, because of the interests of our customers, but we'll put it out anyway *shrug*. I'd guess around a quarter of our catalogue has no explicit LGBTQIA+ rep, maybe a bit less.

Anyway! Hi, I'm wordy. TL:DR is: you can absolutely try to motivate yourself to write original fic by publishing it to AO3, but engagement is likely to be low, and doing so will make it harder to publish. If you feel you need the motivation that posting chapter-by-chapter gets you, it'd be better to write it as fanfiction with the intention of rewriting it later, as this will improve engagement without doing as much damage to your ability to publish it later.

and if you wanted to write with us, you'd be welcome; we recruit authors through our anthologies, and I expect our next open call to be sometime over the late spring or summer. We only juuuust started talking potential themes a few days ago.

Hope this helps!

-unforth

[obsessionnostalgia]

Claire Novak fic recs: yeah, I was trying to reblog something every time I found a new one but its too disorganized so now it lives here. You have a Claire Novak rec? i want to read it.

Where the Heart Is by goldenraeofsun

Features a time-traveling Claire hanging out with Sam and Dean circa season 7. There's angst. There's Claire hooking up with a diner waitress. There's Claire having self-worth issues. There's Claire making fun of Dean to his face. All the good stuff.

Like a Duck, He Fits the Bill by golbygloom

Claire Novak and her budding attachment to the guy who isn't her dad but wears his face. The angst of having to get out of your own way to make connections with others.

Let Me Come Home by prosopopeya

Deancas-centric but Claire Novak is a POV character, struggling in foster care and the uncertainty of whether her uncle (Cas) will get his shit together in order to take her in. The Claire and Dean parallels are strong.

Rec from kerryweaverlesbian:

no such thing as a unique experience by @astralpenguin

A 15 year old Claire meets the (now older) little girl who was possessed by Lilith for a long time. Neither of them realise this element of connection for quite some time. Tons of empathy and understanding. These two feel so much like complex teenage girls, and also the dramatic irony is incredibly fun. One of the best fics I've read all year

Rec from carhengeapocalypse:

Another rhinestoneangels (@pinknatural ) fic fatherisms

Claire is a baby when Jimmy agreed to be Castiel's vessel and Dean steps in to help take care of her. The timeline jumps around and the story is told in snippets and it's very good

as if death itself was undone by microcomets

Claire confronts a human Castiel in a grocery store.

Claire heaves a deep, bone-weary sigh. “Here I am, consoling an ex-angel using my dead father as a meat-puppet on his self-esteem issues. I should write a book or something.”

everlasting by entropic_saudade

Claire wants to have a permanent mark of her and Kaia’s love. In order to do the stabbing safely, she helps Dean bring Cas back from the Empty so he can heal her.

gifts given & words unspoken by rhinestoneangels

Short: Dean and Claire make cookies after Castiel brings her back to the bunker, injured. Some implications at this point, Claire is more family to Dean than Mary. Set in season 12.

coming out by dicklessthewonderclown

Short, Dean POV conversation on a drive with Claire where she comes out as wanting to date Kaia and also admits (by accident) that Dean is a kind of sort of maybe father figure to her.

A Christmas Miracle (for someone else) by bitterred

Set post-canon, mirroring all the "Cas is dead and Dean is depressed" fics, Claire Novak finds a cat during the holiday season.

i'm sorry i'm the one you love (no one will ever love me like you again) by monsterfatigue

Kind of weird that Claire decided she was in love with Kaia even though they had barely known each other. After Kaia comes back from the Bad Place, nothing is simple. Claire isn't sure why she thought it would be.

This Is A Love That Lasts Forever by HeddersTheOwl

Another fic where Claire being friendly with the angel that wears her dad's face is complicated.

"You look too much like him. It's not fair. You're not him." 

meteor site (our hearts collision) by sobsicles

Claire has religious trauma laced with homophobia. Kaia doesn't want to be anyone's nightmare.

the way a dad should by fleeceframe

Dean and Claire are driving back to Jody's when Claire needs to stop because her period has started. (Side note: i was SURE that part of the reasoning for carrying tampons/pads in the impala was going to be partially related to the fact that they're sometimes good for wound care, in that the products are designed not to grow bacteria.)

i don’t know nothing (and that’s fine) by halfwheeze

Claire Novak meets Magda Peterson, the psychic girl from 12.4 American Nightmare, and likes her so much it makes Claire look stupid. Look at that, they have matching religious trauma: "When Castiel-" she pauses, remembering that his name isn't carved into the internal dialogue of every girl with religious trauma from here to Texas, "the Winchesters' angel, I don't know if he was with them when they got you- when he came to Earth, he needed a vessel. A human strong enough to hold an angel, with strong enough faith to allow them in and allow them to stay." That's what the Winchester Gospels said about them anyway. Castiel just said that they needed to believe. They were special. Believers. Bullshit. "When Castiel came to Earth, he took my father. And then, when my father told him he couldn't stay anymore, Castiel approached me. Being a vessel, it's passed down in the family line. The blood. The body. All they need is the body. And I was a kid. He might as well have been God. So I said yes. And my father took him back. If you think about it, it's my fault that my dad is dead."

Bartenders Love Me by clusterjam

Claire Novak doing her Dean-coded thing: hustling in a bar, flirting with the bartender, and oh yeah: angst about whether her dad would approve of her.

Subject: Dean Winchester Is Dead by angelszn

There aren't enough fics about Claire finding out Dean (or Cas) are dead. Dean Winchester is dead. Dean Winchester is dead, and Claire got the news in an email of all things. As if the gravity can be contained in the tiny black letters on the screen. It didn’t even seem possible. 

patricide of the lowest order by angelszn

This one's dark (Major Character Death tagged) -- Castiel killed Claire's father, after all, and what is Supernatural but a series of revenge plots?

two steps on the water by orpheuscas

Claire in the aftermath of being cured of werewolfism. Heavy dose of "Dean is basically Claire's dad now" included.

she'll say she got the map from me by 13zepptraxx

Hey you know that episode where Dean goes back in time and hangs out with his mom? He tells her, "No matter what you hear, or what you see. Promise me you won’t get out of bed." but then an angel wipes her memory? What if Claire went back in time after Dean died because she was sick with grief and basically did the same thing?

[watchingspnagain]

Rewatching The Rapture

Welcome to “It’s Not Like He Boiled *Her* Arm, Jeez: A Supernatural Rewatch Blog” with Lor and Mace!

Up today, s4e20: The Rapture.

Cas appears to Dean in a (lovely, peaceful) dream and gives him a note asking him to meet him at a warehouse. When the boys show up at the warehouse, something angelic has clearly gone down, and they find Cas—but not. It’s Jimmy Novak, the man Cas was using as a vessel. Cas is mysteriously back in heaven. After a good deal of objection and argument from the boys, Jimmy returns home to his family (who think he walked out and disappeared on them a year ago, probably as part of a psychotic break). We see several flashbacks of Jimmy when Cas first began to speak to him, as well as Jimmy’s tortured attempt to rejoin his family. Meanwhile, demons are up to shit, threatening Jimmy and his family. When Cas returns to find Jimmy wounded, he possesses Jimmy’s daughter Claire instead. Cas assures Jimmy that he has done well and will be rewarded in heaven, but Jimmy insists that Cas not subject Claire to the rigors and pains of possession, and Cas agrees to possess Jimmy once again. Cas then reveals to Dean that his trip to heaven has cured him of his doubts and that he serves heaven… not Dean. The boys return to Bobby’s, being all fraught with one another about Sam’s recent confession to Dean that he’s been drinking demon blood. Bobby and Dean trick Sam into the panic room and lock him in, hoping to force him to detox from the blood.

Below is a log of our real-time reactions as we watched. Remember that there may be spoilers for any part of SPN’s 15-season run here. Note also that the nature of our conversation is adult and thus it may contain adult language and themes.

[and we begin:]

Lor:

omg. He deserves to sit by a quiet lake and fish

Mace:

Misha looks so young and gorgeous

Lor:

he DOES

Lor:

the way you know IMMEDIATELY it's not Cas

Mace:

is he…doing a higher-than-his-real-voice voice?

Mace:

or has his voice lowered a bit with age, I wonder

Lor:

yeah I'm not sure. he is for sure doing a higher than Cas voice

Lor:

aw Dean doesn't like that Cas isn't in there anymore. like not just that he doesn't know where Cas is, but like, that is supposed to be Cas and it's NOT

Mace:

YEP

Mace:

I wonder, if Cas never returned at this point, would Dean and Jimmy have gotten together?

Lor:

naah

Lor:

he's too... vanilla

Mace:

but he’s also HOT

Lor:

that IS true

Mace:

and Cas isn’t exactly spicy

Lor:

he WOULD have a lot of fun undoing that aaaaall the way up tie

Lor:

Cas's Dom brow begs to differ

Mace:

may i remind you that those eyebrows belong, in fact, to Jimmy

Lor:

but he doesn't DEPLOY them

Mace:

oookay

Lor:

omg he's just little

Mace:

Oh Sammy

Mace:

we gots to get you off the juice, man

Lor:

right?

Lor:

"was it a refreshing Coke?" Dean, you little shit, I love you

Mace:

snork

Mace:

HANDS

Lor:

YES

Lor:

oooh, I forgot Jimmy cooks. maybe they WOULD get together

Lor:

but he'd have to stop putting his arm in boiling water. Dean's little caretaker heart couldn't take it

Mace:

okay, i relent. Dom Cas just made Jimmy boil his own fucking hand

Lor:

HAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHA

Lor:

MACE

Lor:

we just flipflopped

Mace:

oh gross. HER again

Mace:

WE DID

Lor:

ug Anna

Mace:

well, no, actually. I never stopped liking the idea of Dean and Jimmy

Mace:

Jimmy Dean sausage, baby

Lor:

HAHAHAHAHAHA omg dude

Mace:

(oh I just grossed myself out. apologies)

Lor:

(lololololol)

Lor:

oh Jimmy you're gonna be in so much trouble

Mace:

he is SO pretty

Lor:

omg LOOKIT him just lounged there in his t-shirt

Mace:

YAS

Lor:

I mean, if he took the pills, he'd still hear Cas....

Mace:

omg what an idiot. don’t leave him! who tf cares if he takes meds HE’S FLIPPING HOT

Lor:

HAAAAAHAHAHAHAHA

Lor:

and he's not dangerous?

Mace:

well, a little dangerous would be okay...

Lor:

lol

Mace:

ooof that closeup of his LIPS

Lor:

it's like he's all INNOCENT

Lor:

omg the HEAD TILT

Mace:

YES

Mace:

“like what?” like boning? I’d be ready for boning

Lor:

HAAAAAHAHAHAHAHA

Lor:

Amelia kind of annoys me

Mace:

oh LOOKIT HIM with the daughter

Mace:

yeah me too

Mace:

they all drink milk SO WHOLESOME

Lor:

I get her need to protect herself and especially Claire, but her lack of compassion with her husband who she thinks is having a mental break makes me nuts

Lor:

RIGHT?

Mace:

omg the tears in his eyes HE IS SO GOOD

Mace:

YEP

Lor:

omg the way his voice breaks when he says he's not gonna say grace

Mace:

YES

Mace:

Oh Jimmy

Lor:

right?

Lor:

feeling kinda stupid now, AREN'T WE, Amelia?

Mace:

look, Amelia, THAT’s how you support your spouse

Lor:

LOLOLOL

Lor:

"I'm sorry we were" poor Dean just wants to keep people out of this shit

Mace:

yeah

Lor:

jeez Sammy

Mace:

he’s got the DTs leave him be

Lor:

oh fine

Lor:

oh Sammy

Mace:

right? poor tiger

Lor:

Amelia's not here anymore

Mace:

snork

Lor:

heckle and jeckle lol

Mace:

snork!

Mace:

omg Dean’s face when Jimmy gets shot

Lor:

right?

Mace:

yeeeah, they SO wouldn’t get together…

Lor:

picture the look I am giving you

Mace:

aw, loving adoration. thanks, friend.

Lor:

LOLOLOLOLOLOL

Mace:

yes, I AM so smart and pretty

Mace:

omg Sammy

Lor:

you ARE

Lor:

ooof Sam

Lor:

and Dean's face

Mace:

YES

Lor:

and Cas!Claire all with the judgement

Mace:

YEP

Mace:

Misha is SO GOOD

Lor:

RIGHT?

Lor:

there are individual performances of all three of them that were absolutely emmy worthy

Mace:

Dean’s all “hello, boyfriend."

Mace:

YES

Lor:

YEP

Lor:

"and I certainly don't serve you"

Mace:

ooooh playing hard to get

Mace:

SMART

Lor:

whatever you gotta tell yourself, hon

Lor:

HAAAHAHAHA

Lor:

oh man, Dean's in a snit. brother's an addict, boyfriend's pretending he doesn't care

Mace:

Sammy. Read the car. Dean has other troubles right now. Boyfriend is playing hard to get.

Lor:

"mostly I'm just tired, man." oooof

Lor:

LOL

Mace:

yeah

Mace:

“shag ass"

Lor:

RIGHT?

Mace:

I ADORE that expression

Lor:

YES

Mace:

BOBBY NO

Mace:

At least put me in there with him, dude

Lor:

oooooo Dean and Bobby setting him up offscreen

Lor:

HA!