#it could be sam loving cas; wanting so desperately to be able to love something pure. but cas just?? Doesnt like him back?? idk

[lzrusrising]

im having intense brainrot about unrequited samcas actually. fuck its so angsty,,, m rambling in the tags about it hold on

[trenchcoatimpala]

Don't Fade

More of the same. Read also on archive

Dean wasn’t going to admit that it was awkward. Cas had been back for three days and he hadn’t been able to say anything. He didn’t know what to say, or how to say it, or if he could even find the words to make sense of what was going on in his head. Cas was patient, he didn’t ask for anything, didn’t bring up that day and Dean didn’t know if he was disappointed about it or relieved. 

He’d hugged Cas within an inch of his newfound life when the ritual had worked and the angel had appeared before him and Sam in the library. He may have cried but Sam wouldn’t know that and Cas knew well enough not to mention it, and why shouldn’t he cry? When a guy confesses his love to you and then dies you’re allowed to cry when he comes back. 

The problem with it all was that Dean didn’t actually know how he felt about Cas. He knew he cared about him, deeply, more than he’d ever cared about anyone except for Sam, but he also knew that he didn’t love Cas like he loved Sam. He said he did. Always calling Cas brother and friend, but there was something scratching at the surface of those words, something unspoken that Dean tried to suck the air from so it withered and died and he could leave it buried. 

But it was like that feeling thrived on being smothered,it was even more desperate the longer he let it simmer, suffocating under dirt and grit as worms tried to eat it, but it only grew stronger. A pull in his heart that yanked him by a chain, dragging him up and down a proverbial road, and he couldn’t shake it, couldn’t drown it, couldn’t burn it to the ground, it clung to him like a parasite, and he should admit it was a welcome one, but he couldn’t. Admitting it made it real and if it was real he could lose it. He’d already lost Cas, too many times, and each time was as unbearable as the last, as if he was the one suffocating, buried in his own grave with panic brawling in his chest as he tried to dig himself out. 

And he knew what that was like. The first time Cas had touched him had been to put him back in his grave and since then Dean had been gravitating towards him, wanting that touch to consume him. He’d often found himself staring at the handprint on his shoulder in the days following Cas’ sacrifice. It was a faint outline now, weathered by time. And terror had crashed into him as he realized this time Cas being gone might be for real, and this would be the first place Castiel, Angel of the Lord had touched him, as well as the last, and the remnants of that first time were all but a few bumps on pink flesh, and the shadow of the last time was fading fast in crusted blood on a jacket he couldn’t bear to throw away. 

Tears had poured hot and unsteady down his cheeks as he looked at the handprint he’d bore for the past twelve years. He didn’t have anyone left to pray to or believe in, but in that moment, staring at the reflection of what he had left of his best friend, the words came out of him, a wretched sob curled up in a plea; the sister of a prayer: “Don’t fade.” 

“Please don’t fade, don’t go, you can’t leave me,” Dean begged. “Not all of you, please, this is all I have left.” 

Don’t fade.

Don’t fade.

Don’t fade.

He had chanted over and over again, and yeah, okay, maybe Dean did know how he felt about Cas, and maybe that was why it was so awkward to be around him. What if Cas had changed his mind in the empty? What if he didn’t love him anymore? What if he didn’t know how? What if Dean didn’t know how to let someone in like that? What if an angel and human couldn’t even be together? Was there some kind of law against it? There probably should be. But Dean also didn’t want to care about all that because for once in his life he had a shot at something that would make him happy and shouldn’t he take it? Didn’t he deserve it? After everything he’d been through, everywhere his body had been dragged across the Earth by an Archangel, all the times his psyche had been toyed with, didn’t he deserve to let himself love? 

“Dean?” 

Dean looked up to see Cas in his doorway and he realized he was sitting with his hand cradling his shoulder, the shoulder that was home to Cas’ burning touch. “Oh, uh, hey,” he said awkwardly, shifting on the bed. 

“Are you alright?” 

“Yeah, ‘course,” Dean replied, forcing a smile. 

Cas sighed, long suffering and sad. “Please don’t lie to me.” 

“Cas-” 

“No, Dean, if this is about what I said to you before I-” 

“Before you died?” Dean finished for him, standing up so he could confront the angel. “Yeah, you know what, Cas, it is about what you said. How could you say that to me?” 

“I didn’t think I would see you again,” Cas said quietly, barely managing to look at Dean. 

Dean turned away from him, anger burning suddenly in his veins. “Is that supposed to make it better? What, you don’t think I can handle you being in love with me, so you leave it to a deathbed confession so you don’t have to find out!?” 

“I knew you didn’t feel the same way,” Cas replied defensively. “I didn’t see any point in bringing it up to you sooner.” 

Dean couldn’t believe what he was hearing. “Wait, so you just decided for me how I felt?” The confusion on Cas’ face only spurred Dean on. “You’re an idiot,” he snapped. “You don’t even know- God, Cas, you drive me fucking insane!” 

“I don’t understand,” Cas said, tilting his head to survey Dean. 

“How I feel about you,” Dean began, trying to reign himself in, “Cas, man, there aren’t words.” He shrugged off his flannel and pushed up the sleeve of his shirt to reveal the handprint, “You gave me this, before we even properly met, and it’s all I had of you, every single time I lost you, it was the only thing I had left, and every day it gets harder and harder to see and you have no idea how much that hurts me. Because it’s like watching you fade away as if you never existed, as if we never had anything between us. And when you were gone I tried to remember what you sounded like, what it felt like when you healed me, how my name sounded when you said it, and I prayed for you back. I wanted it so badly I was dizzy with it. And now you’re here, and you dare to tell me you don’t think I love you back?”

Cas was staring at him, shock emanating from his very being. “I never thought- Dean, I don’t know what to say.” 

“I have a lot of issues, which you know,” Dean said as he drew closer to Cas, “and one of those issues is not being very good at saying how I feel, or letting myself want things, but I want you, Cas. I don’t know when it started but I do, and I don’t know who I am without that want.” Cas was close now, his eyes blown wide in surprise and lust. “Touch me,” Dean begged, his lips mere inches from Cas’, “touch me like it’s the first time.” 

Cas surged forward, one hand coming up to cup Dean’s cheek and the other to land on his shoulder. Fire surged through the contact and Dean felt the burn of Cas’ hand imprinting on his skin, refreshing a mark that had come to be Dean’s greatest companion, and the kiss that followed was a promise shaped in the hot brand of tongues sliding against tongues and prayers finally being answered.

tag list, ask to be added or removed

@undeadcas @tearsofgrace @hellerstiel @casgetoutofmyass0907 @wantstoflyafraidtofall @gayhuckleberryinatrenchcoat @thepixelagora@thelahatiel  @im-sam-fucking-winchester@piebook67 @bestiarum@theedeangirl@november5th@bixlasagna@ancient-fangirl@famouspsychicpizzabandit@you-cant-spell-subtext-without@bumbledumble1@cascigarette@addicted2demons @our-stars-graveside @fivefeetfangirl @evillittleguy

[queen-of-deans-booty]

The Werther Project: Part One

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Female!Reader

Word Count: ~2.5k

Warnings: canon angst and violence, extra angst

Summary: Dean's worst fears come to light when he and Sam mess with something that shouldn't have been messed with in the first place.

Season Ten Masterlist

Author’s Note: I do not own anything from Supernatural. All credit goes to their respective owners. I love seeing any and all comments <3

x

For the past week, Dean has been trying to practice using your magic. You haven't come back to the Bunker since you left the cabin in Des Moines, and he doesn't really care. You're not here which means he gets to practice without you knowing he has your magic. The best place to do that is in the backyard you made. No one is around to enjoy it so it's become a breeding ground for magic.

Dean looks around the destroyed backyard with a sigh. The basketball net is shredded, Sam's garden looks like a car ran right through it, and the wooden gazebo is in pieces on the ground. If Dean continues this way, he will destroy everything else. Dean creates a ball of blue magic between his hands and tries to hold it but it shoots out of his hand and to the ground. Instead of the ground absorbing it, it bounces back and hits him square in the face.

"Fuck!"

"I take it it's not going well?" Sam asks.

"I don't know how Y/N did this. It's so damn hard!"

Dean conjures a ball of magic again and tries to lift Maryann's playset up but all it does is explode next to the swings, causing bits of hard plastic to go everywhere.

"Great," Dean scoffs.

"Have you tried reading the journals and books about the Sapphire Witch?"

"Yeah, I did. Multiple times. It's completely useless because I don't understand how easily it came to them. God, I wish Y/N was here to help me," he sighs sadly.

"Well, I got a lead on the book." When Sam told Dean he didn't destroy the book, he was pissed but it's the only thing that is going to help you so he's grateful that it's still here. "I'm going to talk to Rowena. She might be able to help."

"I don't like bringing this to her."

"The only other person who can decode it is Y/N but she'll destroy it. So, Rowena is my plan."

"Just go," Dean sighs. "I'll try not to destroy much else."

When Dean is alone again, he thinks back to some of your most magical times, one of them being this backyard. Magic looks easy when you're the one who was doing it. If you can create twelve of you to fight Cas then he can do a simple levitation spell. He doesn't need to be an expert on this, just enough to take you down. He takes a deep breath and tries again.

Rowena agrees to meet Sam at a restaurant only because she wants something. Sam gets there first and takes a seat in the back. Rowena strolls in moments later all doled up like she's going someplace fancy.

"Samuel," she grins and sits across from him.

"Rowena. I know you know we have the book."

"Yes, I do, but my help does not come for free."

"As I suspected. What do you want?"

"There's only one thing you could possibly do for me that I can't, at least presently, do for myself. Kill my son. He's expecting it from me. He already has his stinking minions on high alert. If you're wondering how a mother can get to the point of wanting her own son--"

"No, I'm really not," Sam cuts her off. "I'll do it. I'll kill Crowley. First things first, can you read the book?

"Of course I can. Besides the Scarlet Witch, I'm likely the only witch alive who can understand such old, dark magic. Just not in its present form. Allowing me to look at this book is bold even for you. I'm your mortal enemy. I've tried to kill you, your witch, and your brother as recently as last month. You wouldn't have come to me if I wasn't your last resort. You're desperate. You can stop pretending you're not. Now, I can't read the book in its present form, but there is someone who could. Nadya. Grand Coven witch."

"Where do I find her?"

"You don't. She's dead. Long ago. Murdered for her life's work. Her decryption formulas and her codex are what you can find. Bring me Nadya's codex, and I'll break this text right open and give you your cure."

"Where do I look?"

"If I were you, I'd start at home. Who do you think murdered Nadya and stole the codex in the first place?"

"The Men of Letters. I'll be in touch."

Sam heads back to the Bunker only to find Dean asleep in his room. You're still nowhere to be found but he can't care about that. He knows how hard this has been for Dean so he has to find this cure as fast as he can. You're his best friend. He'd do anything for you. Plus, the longer you go without your soul, the more it's going to hurt when you finally do get it back. Sam finds a bunch of stuff in the storage room that he moves into the library. Inside one of the boxes is an audio tape reel. He doesn't want to wake Dean so he plugs headphones in and listens to it.

"Please, let's come to order. Men of Letters meeting minutes--May 16, 1956. On the matter of Cuthbert Sinclair's expulsion."

"This is hardly your first offense, Cuthbert. You've been cited for disciplinary infractions seven times in the course of your tenure. This enchanted vault of yours, this Werther box has a warding so potent it achieves a theoretical rate of, in your own words, ninety-eight percent lethality."

"Extreme measures were warranted. The Coven is desperate to get the codex back. The Werther box works," Cuthbert explains.

"All too well, I'd say. Working in secret, embarking on this project without oversight left two fellow Men of Letters vulnerable to your most potent magics. Fletcher and Martinez were members in good standing. Fletcher chanced upon the box and died in two hours. Martinez heroically tried to shut it down. We found him dead on the floor beside the box, his wrists cut," Markham says.

"I already apologized for that accident. I refuse to do so again. Why are you all so small-minded? Hmm? We were brought here to do great things, to take risks, and to bring the fight to the monsters of this world. Yet, to a man, you choose instead to molder in these stacks. You are not men. You are NOT men. You're librarians, nothing more."

"Before we rule on what is to be done with you, I'm prepared to give you a chance to secure our leniency. Tell us how to shut it down. The box is still in St. Louis with the codex. It's still a danger."

"Let me tell you what you can do with your leniency, Markham. You know, I saw the writing on the wall. I knew you cowards would shut this project down, which is why I built it the way I did. There is only one way to silence the Werther for good. Let's just say Martinez was on the right track. I doubt you lot have the guts but you're welcome to die trying."

A door slamming sounds and Sam can only imagine Cuthbert left the room.

"Markham, would you have us keep trying?" another man asks.

"The box is to be interred and guarded where it stands, in perpetuity. Bury it."

Sam turns off the tape and looks through the records where he finds the Men of Letters headquarters in St. Louis. He takes out his phone and calls Rowena. It takes three rings but she eventually answers it.

"I was in the middle of taking my nap, Samuel. I'm over three hundred years old. Beauty sleep isn't optional."

"I've been looking into the thing we discussed. I got a lead, but it's guarded by a violent enchantment. I need a spell to break the spell."

"The Cabirian invocation. Easy to obtain. Good all-purpose disenchantment."

"Great. Thanks."

Sam is about to hang up but Rowena speaks again.

"It's not recommended for amateurs. In inexperienced hands, the invocation has a way of fizzling out. I could come. You might need me."

"I'll take my chances. Thanks," Sam says and hangs up.

"What are you taking your chances on?" Dean asks when he walks into the library.

"I got a lead on the codex. Are you up for it?"

"Give me ten."

Sam and Dean travel to St. Louis and pull up to a run-down-looking house. The white paint is chipping on the outside of the house, the yard is overgrown with weeds, and there are piles of newspapers sitting on the front porch.

"So, you want to do this or shall I?"

"Wait here."

Sam gets out of the can and walks up the porch steps, careful for the one step that's bowing in. He doesn't think anyone is living in this place so he doesn't bother knocking. He tries to look into the window on the door but there is a curtain closed so he can't see much. He takes out his lock pick and tries to use it but the barrel of a gun comes out of the letter box and whoever is on the other side is pointing it at his pelvis.

"Bad idea."

"Whoa! I can explain!"

"Yeah, don't bother. You have three choices: get arrested, get your bits blown off, or get back."

"I think I'll get back."

"Attaboy."

He walks back to the car and looks at Dean with wide eyes.

"Yeah, she threatened to shoot me in the dick."

"Really?" Dean chuckles.

"Dude."

"Alright. From what I gathered from Google, this family moves into this long-vacant house. One week later, three of them were dead at their own hands. The whole family was wiped out except for the daughter, Suzie, whose house is still under her name. I'm figuring she's the one who nearly unmanned you back there."

"Yeah, well, this long-vacant home used to be a Men of Letters chapter house. Remember Magnus?"

"You mean the dickwad ex-Men of Letters that tried to make a zoo exhibit out of me and YN? Yeah."

"Before he was expelled, he built Werther, a magical box with a deadly alarm system. Werther is buried somewhere in this house. It was supposed to have been guarded, but I'm guessing that plan went out the window when Abaddon massacred the entire membership in '58. The house stayed in limbo until some lucky family bought it. Werther's a time bomb and it needs to be defused. Not only is this in our wheelhouse, it's our responsibility."

"Our responsibility?"

"We're Men of Letters. It's our legacy."

"Alright. Different plan. She's only seen you. You sneak in the back and find it while I distract her. Think you can manage that?"

"Yeah," Sam rolls his eyes.

Dean walks up the porch steps to the front door and knocks while Sam runs to the back without being seen. He looks down at the letterbox, remembers what Sam said, and covers his dick with his hands as if that will stop a bullet. The door opens and a woman steps out with a gun pointed right at Dean.

"What did I say?" Dean squeaks when he sees the gun and looks at her with wide eyes. She frowns when she sees it's not Sam and looks around. "You're not.... Fella tried to.... What do you want?"

Shit, say something. Anything. Anything will do. Just say words.

"You saw him? Oh, tell me you did. I'm sorry, but my name is Dwight Twilley. I'm with the neighborhood watch. We're looking into a few recent break-ins, and if you saw the guy it would be mighty helpful if you gave a description. If I could--if I could just have a minute of your time?"

Dean steps into her home and squeaks out the word "time" but clears his throat to keep his composure. She looks around and closes the door before joining Dean in the living room.

"Tall, white fella. Pretty hair."

"Right. It's a nice house you have here, uh..."

"Suzie."

"Suzie. Do you live here alone?"

"Just me and Gus."

"Gus?" Suzie raises her gun in response. The kettle begins whistling in the kitchen so Suzie walks over to it with Dean following her. "So, all alone in this big house, huh? Must get lonely even with Gus."

"Yeah, well I'm used to alone."

She pours herself two cups and puts two tea bags in them. She offers a cup to Dean but he shakes his head politely. With her back turned to him, Dean looks at the back door and sees Sam trying to break into the basement door. If he's going to hide something as big as a Werther box, it'll be in the basement. He gets the lock open and gives a thumbs up to Dean.

"No, thank you."

"Been alone here since, uh, '80? After my family died, my Aunt Pauline moved in. She took care of me and raised me for a few years."

Dean hears something move in the basement and he coughs loudly to cover up the noise.

"So, what happened to your aunt?"

"I told her not to go in the basement. No one goes in the basement."

"What's in the basement, Suzie?" She looks out the window with tears in her eyes. She turns back to the kitchen counter and grabs a knife. "Ma'am you okay?"

She immediately turns and points her gun at Dean who backs up in fear.

"Oh! Whoa! Suzie!"

"My social skills may be rusty but I'm no idiot. The doorbell hasn't rung in months, and two visitors in one hour? One breaking in, and the other asking all sorts of questions about..."

"I told you, I was from the neighborhood watch."

"Yeah, yeah, neighborhood watch. Right. Boy, have you seen this house? There's only one thing in here worth getting at, and it sure as hell ain't me. You came for the box. Whoever left that Godforsaken thing down there.... I knew someday, someone would come for it. I swore never to let that happen. He's downstairs isn't he?"

Well, the gig is up.

"He's my brother, and we're here to help you."

"You call him up here. Now! You call him up here! Now!"

"Sam! Sammy!" Dean yells. "She wants you up here, now!"

Suddenly, a loud boom sounds from the basement that terrifies Suzie.

"No... No! Get out! Get out! Out! Out! You bastards!" Suzie rushes Dean toward the front door with her gun trained in front of her. He stops by the front door and looks at her who has tears in her eyes. "You let it out!"

Both he and Suzie look toward the stairs where there is a bright green mist. It flies all around the duo before entering their bodies through their eyes. Both of their eyes are yellow-green as the mist takes control of their minds.

"Dean!" Dean blinks and his eyes return to normal. "Dean!" He sees the gu in Suzie's hands and puts his hands up as he joins his brother's side. "Hey, hey, hey. Take it easy."

"Do you have any idea what you've done?"

"Put the gun down. We can talk about this, okay?"

Something passes by the brothers from behind and Suzie's eyes go wide.

"What was that?" She looks at something between the brothers with fear in her eyes. "Oh, my God."

"What's wrong with her?"

"I don't know."

"Stay back. Stay back!"

"Go!" Sam and Dean jump out of the way just in time for Suzie to shoot her gun at her bookshelf. She must be seeing something that isn't there. "What are you doing, huh? You don't have a plan. You don't have a defense."

"No!" Suzie yells from her office door.

"Suzie!" Sam yells and leaves the living room to head to the office.

x

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[markofcastiel]

So just found a major Destiel parallel that kinda blew my mind

Besides Cas do you know who also says "I know what I want... but I can't have it" to Dean Winchester, also talking about how they want Dean in a romantic way?

Lisa Braeden!

In 6x04 Dean tells her "ask for something" and she says she can't ask for something because she already knows Dean can't give her what she wants - in her case, what she wants is for him to stop hunting to stay with her. But Sam is back and his mind is fucked so she already knows Dean will never be able to give her that. And Dean also knows that.

So when Cas says he already knows he can't have what he wants it's a huge parallel to Dean once again losing someone he loves for 'being unable' to give them what they need and want. But, in Castiel's case, the one thing he is asking for is to be loved back in a romantic way.

Maybe canon Dean never considered the possibility that Cas could ever love him in that way. Or maybe it wasn't the first time Dean has thought about it (about "experiencing new things... people... in different ways or maybe for the first time ever") but always thought he couldn't give Cas what he needed and wanted: someone soft, someone kind, and most of all is worthy™️ - all things I'm sure Dean Winchester doesn't think he is

But then Cas tells him that all he wants is to be loved, nothing else. it's that easy, that simple. Point A to point B. And, as if it wasn't enough, he reveals that he does think Dean is soft, and kind, and the Worthiest of The Worthy.

Now consider: if the 'ask' is so small and so easy, maybe Dean would be able to give that to Cas after all if he had time.

Hence Dean's little desperate "don't do this"

Because it's a 'not now', 'not like this'. Don't do this - don't tell me it's that simple when you're about to leave forever.

Anyway how the hell did we miss this parallel?

[jensensitive]

This was like an important scene for me when we wrote it. And when I say “we,” it was primarily– the story was broken between Ben Edlund and I. So um– if you uh, loved the script and loved the episode, you can blame– I’ll take the credit! If you hate the episode, it’s Ben Edlund’s fault [chuckles]. I think we’ll just um, we’ll leave it at that. Um, no, but Ben and– Ben and I really broke the episode together, and he did the lion’s share of designing this story and– and where it all goes.

So this little speech from Jensen, and this is a good place to talk about the skill and talent of Jensen Ackles, and how he as Dean is able to infuse such vulnerability into this character– as everyone well knows at this point– I mean I’m not breaking news. But if you just look at these moments– if you look how desperate he is to save everybody, to get through to Cas.

Like, the scene could just be– yelling at Cas and dressing him down, but Jensen and I talked about it, and we talked about like what are the other layers to bring to it? What are the layers of vulnerability? And one of the things that we talked about, and Jensen’s just so good about looking for these things. And–and what we talked about is– if you’ll remember the last time in that first Anna episode, how he wanted to be angel. He didn’t want all the pain and guilt of being human. He wanted to let go of pain and guilt. Because being human was so painful for him, because all the memories– he was in Hell. and-- and this scene, this little moment here, he’s saying he wants pain, and he wants guilt, and he’d rather have battling and fighting with Sam. He would rather have all of that, than to be in some paradise.

This– it’s not just about trying– yelling at Cas. It’s about being frightened, it’s about being desperate, but it’s also about a kind of redemption for Dean. It’s about his realization that he’d prefer being human. All the faults and foibles of being human, and he’d rather have that. And he’d rather take the imperfection– the messy, sloppy, confused– yknow, selfish, bewildering imperfection of being human than to be some cold, unfeeling angel, even if that means ending up in paradise and everything being perfect.

Perfect is cold and hateful. And humanity is messy and sloppy. And–and if we have a theme in this show it’s that– yknow, we’re a humanistic point of view. That being– that perfection sucks, and that what you want is to be the messy, sloppy, bewildering state of being human and having family, for as much as family is messy and muddy, that salvation is always in that. It’s always in sloppy humanity and messy family. And-- and that’s– that’s where hope and salvation lie. And when you turn away from family, that’s when the world will be destroyed. And when you turn towards family, that’s when the world can be saved. And that’s just something I– I don’t know– it’s– I don’t know– it’s just something I kind of I deeply feel, and– and– I think–

Yknow, there was a line that Bobby had that ending up getting cut, but “Family’s the one true thing in a world full of crap.” And that’s as good a– uh, it was a little– you don’t wanna get so on the nose with your theme, which is why we cut the line form the show, but that’s as good a way to state the primary thematic of this show as– as there is. That family’s the one true thing in a world full of crap. Um, also that destiny and god’s will is all a bunch of holy crap, which Dean said in the last [scene], that’s actually another good thematic of the show. We’re believers in free will.

Eric Kripke’s 4x22 Lucifer Rising commentary on the scene with Dean trying to get though to Cas [28:25 - 32:18]

[dean-winchester-is-a-warrior]

I Will Find You in the Dark Ch. 3

Series Summary: Dean and Julie's story continues through turbulent times in the Winchester's life. Can Dean and Julie survive through it all? Can their love survive?

Chapter Summary: Can Dean rescue Julie from being imprisoned in her own body?

Pairings: Dean x OFC (Julie) Established Relationship

Series Explicit 18 +/Warnings: Show level violence throughout. Smut throughout. More detailed chapter warnings.

Chapter Warnings: Show level violence, MOC!Dean, Smut, PinV, unprotected sex, slightly rough sex, oral (f receiving), angst, some almost fluff.

Word Count: 3,971

|| Series Masterlist ||

A/N:  The third chapter in the sequel to my fic, Green is My Favorite Color. I highly recommend that you read that one first, since there will be references made to it throughout this sequel. Also, I suggest you read the Dean and Julie Mini-Series I wrote as a bridge between that fic and this one. (The Mini-series’ title is a bit of a spoiler for the original series, so I won’t post it here, but it can all be found here.) I had a lot of fun writing that original series, and the mini-series, and certainly hope those who read and enjoyed those, enjoy this sequel. 💓

The beautiful dividers below and at the end were created by @talesmaniac89. 💗 Title card was created by me.

Masterlist || Tag Lists

Dean stood in the abandoned warehouse, listening to the distant dripping of a leaky pipe, and gritted his teeth; he hated this plan. There were just so many things that could go wrong.

When Abaddon showed up, they had to get her into the devil’s trap and then hold her there long enough for Crowley to exit his body and enter Sam, so that they had some extra demon muscle if they needed it. Then they needed the trap to hold her long enough that they could execute the spell to rip her out of Julie’s body and force her into Crowley’s, at which point she would no longer be in a devil’s trap - which meant that Dean would have to move immediately to kill her with the first blade and the mark. 

He really hated everything that could go wrong. But he reminded himself that Cas was only a prayer away if they needed him. He’d wanted to be at the warehouse with them, but they were worried that Abaddon would be able to sense him there. So, he was listening for their prayers.

As Sam set up the ingredients for the spell, hiding them behind a turned over desk so that Abaddon wouldn’t see them immediately and get suspicious, Dean had nothing to do but run over the plan again and again in his head. In the end it would all come down to him…and the strange mark he now had on his right forearm. He ran his hand over it; the symbol was hidden beneath his layers of clothing, but he swore sometimes he could feel it get hot on his skin.

The blade was hidden in his left, inside jacket pocket, so that he could quickly pull it out and use it to put an end to the Knight of Hell. When he’d first seen the blade, sitting amongst Magnus’ collection of magical artifacts, he wasn’t sure that the old Men of Letters alumnus knew what he was talking about. It just looked like a worthless bone.

But then he’d held it in his hand, and the mark had come to life, and something had rushed forth, coursing through his veins like a drumbeat, powerful and potent, but dark and spine-tingling. He’d felt exhilarated and horrified in equal measure, and when he’d used it to sever Magnus’ sadistic head from his body, it had felt as though the mark was screaming in victory. For a time, all he’d been able to hear was the rushing sound of blood in his veins, as his body craved violence, wanting to feed upon blood like something starving.

It was Sam’s voice that had brought him back to reality and he’d dropped the blade, dizzy with the fear of himself that followed.

As he felt the blade now, heavy in his pocket, he could feel the mark tingle with anticipation, and the feeling scared the shit out of him. He didn’t want to use it again, while at the same time, he was desperate to put his hand on it, to grip it tight and feel the rush course through him.

But it didn’t matter what he felt, or what he feared. This was their only shot at saving Julie and there was nothing he wouldn’t do to pull her out of the grasp of the demon who claimed her.

Sam approached, exhaling a deep breath. “I think we’re ready, Dean.”

The brothers both looked to where Crowley sat tied up on the floor. “I’m ready when you are, boys. The quicker we get this over with, the quicker I can get back to ruling my kingdom.”

Sam nodded, and Dean pulled out his phone and sent a text to the number Abaddon had given him.

The text read simply, “We’ve got him. 1476 Hennings St. W.”

And within a minute, Julie appeared in front of him. Even though he knew it wasn’t really her, his heart still leapt at the sight of her. It had been over a month since Abaddon had abducted her and he’d been terrified every day, thinking about what she was going through.

Abaddon’s calculating smile appeared on Julie’s face and Dean snapped his mind back to what had to happen.

“Hello boys.” Abaddon greeted them, walking slowly forward. 

They’d placed Crowley just on the other side of the devil’s trap they’d painted in blacklight paint on the filthy ground. They knew they couldn’t just hide the trap underneath something because she was too smart and would likely figure that out immediately. But they hoped with the invisible paint and the ground littered with dirt and debris, she wouldn't notice it, and just saunter towards the bait they left for her in the form of a trussed up Crowley.

She was less than two feet away from it, barely ten steps, when she stopped and smiled at them. “How nice it is to see you again.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Dean said impatiently. “Look, just take Crowley and give Julie back.” He pointed at Crowley, hoping she’d walk the few more steps forward, but she stayed where she was.

She smiled again, this time grinning widely and letting Julie’s one dimple in her right cheek pop out. “You boys are so cute when you try to fool me!” She lifted her hand and a quiet hum sounded as she pulled the shape of the devil’s trap up out of the ground, illuminating the blacklight paint without any trouble at all.

“Tsk, tsk, tsk.” She scolded. “I don’t appreciate tricks.” 

There was a moment’s pause when Dean felt something ominous stir in the air, just before he watched Abaddon snap his wife’s neck with a sickening crack. 

“No!” He screamed rushing towards her. What he intended to do, he had no idea, but it didn’t matter anyway, since Abaddon simply flung him back against the wall, as chaos exploded around him. He heard Sam call out for Cas, just before Abaddon threw him across the room to land with a thud on the concrete floor. 

Seconds later, the red demon smoke left Crowley’s body and entered Sam, immediately bouncing Sam back up on his feet just as Cas popped into sight. 

“Protect Sam!” Dean shouted to Cas from where he was pinned to the wall like a bug. “He’s gotta do the spell.”

Abaddon waved her hand towards Cas, sending out a blast of energy, meant to knock him back, but the angel stood his ground, pushing back against her with a bright white light, his eyes glowing blue like a flame. 

Crowley-Sam took the chance to rush forward and toss all the ingredients together. As he began chanting the latin incantation, Abaddon managed to at last knock Cas to the ground. She turned to attack Sam next, but she was too late; the spell was completed and a golden beam of light shot out from the bowl, through the air, and into Julie’s torso. 

Abaddon lurched to a stop. She made a motion like she was going to be sick, putting her hands on her stomach, and a tiny puff of demon smoke escaped her mouth, before she pulled it back in and lurched forward again, but the power of the spell was working, and slowly but surely the black demon smoke was leached out through her nose, eyes, and mouth, and seemed to tether itself to Crowley’s prone body. 

Dean dropped to the ground as Abaddon’s hold on him evaporated. He wrenched the first blade from his pocket, rushing forward to end her as soon as she was completely out of Julie’s body and in Crowley’s.

The thin, black, smoky chain linked Julie’s and Crowley’s bodies for a moment more before Julie’s body fell to the ground, motionless. Abaddon was now fully inside Crowley, and Dean rushed forward to stab her through the heart. But just as he reached her, he was again flung back, and pinned to the wall, watching helplessly as the first blade flew out of his hand and across the floor. 

Abaddon seemed a little wobbly on Crowley’s legs, but as she moved towards Dean, he could feel her phantom grip around his throat, slowly cutting off the air supply. The air around them crackled with power and a sudden rushing wind rattled through the warehouse, smashing the windows and busting light bulbs. 

As he tried desperately to get air, Dean looked across the room, to see Cas crouched over Julie’s body, blocking her from his view. The fear and rage welled up in Dean as he thought of Julie and what the monster in front of him had done to her; he could feel the mark get red hot on his arm and he let out a growl, as he reached towards the blade, willing it into his hand. 

As though it was suddenly attached to his hand by a rubber band, the blade whipped up off the ground and he caught it easily. He saw Abaddon’s shock on Crowley’s face as he pushed himself off the wall. The intense power she was pushing towards him suddenly felt like nothing more than a stiff breeze and he strode easily towards her, reaching her in only a few strides.

He surged forward, pushing the blade home, straight through her heart. Abaddon screamed in rage, and the orange, fiery light burned through her as she died, crashing to the ground. 

For the second time in his life, Dean felt power wash over him, beating hard and fast, pounding through him like an endless drumbeat, and the world went red. He fell to his knees, desperate for more, more blood, more screams of defeat, more death. He raised the blade high in the air before slamming it into Crowley’s body again and again. 

He saw nothing before him except the slicing of the bone through skin, blood spurting, bathing him in something warm and welcome. He heard nothing but the pounding of his own heart, the echoes of screaming, the death cries of all those who’d fallen beneath the strength of the blade for centuries, millenia. 

He might have stayed there forever, soaking himself in violence, if it wasn’t for a familiar voice calling his name.

“Dean!” 

Like a slammed door, something crashed closed in his mind, and the world around him returned, and he blinked up at Sam and Cas standing above him. He felt a soft hand on his shoulder and he turned to see Julie kneeling beside him, a look of fear and worry on her face.

“She’s dead, honey, she’s dead. She can’t hurt us anymore.” 

He looked down at the mess he was kneeling in, horror setting in as he dropped the blade and came back to himself. 

“Kindly get away from my body so I can try and repair some of the major damage you’ve inflicted on it.” It was Sam’s angry voice that issued Crowley’s demand.

But Dean was paying him no attention for the moment as he realized that Julie was beside him, alive and whole, and herself again.

“Jules?” He asked as he reached out a hand to touch her cheek. Seeing how much blood covered it, he pulled it back, not wanting to contaminate her with it. But Julie grabbed hold of his fist and raised his bloody knuckles to her lips.

Dean pulled her to him then, knowing he had no right, knowing he was covering her in the blood he’d spilled, but unable to stop himself from seeking her warmth and life. To have her back in his arms after so long was incredible, and to have her wrap her arms around his neck, and pull his head down to rest against her shoulder, felt like a sanctuary from the monster that he could still feel stirring in his heart.

***

Hours later, Julie sat alone in their bedroom. Dean was still putting away weapons and supplies. He’d told her it could wait, that he wanted to take care of her first, but she’d just kissed him softly and told him that all she wanted was a shower and sleep. So she sat now, wrapped in a towel, exhausted, but knowing beyond a doubt that she was never going to get to sleep.

Her mind was far too awake, too plagued with waking nightmares that she couldn’t get out of her head. She’d showered, scrubbed herself clean, but she still felt dirty on the inside, like there was still a parasite sucking away at her soul.

She heard soft boot treads coming down the hallway, just before Dean gently pushed open the bedroom door, obviously not wanting to wake her. When he saw her awake and sitting up, he walked through the door and closed it behind him, leaning back against it.

He wore only jeans and a black t-shirt, and he looked so beautiful it made her want to cry. She’d missed him so much while she was sitting as a prisoner in her own mind. Dean offered her a gentle smile, and Julie tried to pull the love and concern in that smile into her body to warm her. She was so cold.

“Hey.” She said quietly.

He walked further into the room and moved to sit beside her on the bed. “Hey, kid.” He responded, making her smile at the old, familiar nickname. 

He reached a hand out and tucked a piece of drying hair behind her ear. “You just gonna sit here in a towel all night? You must be freezing.” 

Julie shrugged. She was too cold on the inside to notice any chill outside. But she didn’t say that to Dean.

“I’ll put my pajamas on right away.”

Dean nodded and let his hand fall back to his lap. He looked deep in her eyes and Julie closed them, scared of what he might see there.

She felt him pick up her icy fingers and chafe them slightly between his hands. “How are you, Jules?”

A sardonic smile twisted her lips and she opened her eyes, looking down at their joined hands. “Not good, I guess.”

Dean squeezed her hand and she lifted her gaze up to where she could see the strange mark that was now branded on his arm. She reached out to trace her finger across the raised skin.

She felt Dean stiffen, and looked up at him. “Sorry, does it hurt?”

Dean shook his head. “No, it’s fine.”

She bit her bottom lip and thought back to the warehouse and waking up with Cas hovering over her, only to look beyond him and see Dean, furiously murdering Crowley. It had been a very strange moment to say the least. She hadn’t understood exactly what she was seeing, but she could feel that she was herself again, and she could see quite clearly that Dean was not.

The boys had explained on the way home, just how they’d defeated Abaddon. When they told her that Dean now carried the Mark of Cain, her stomach had turned over. She couldn’t imagine all the ramifications that would have, but she didn’t imagine any of them would be good.

She put her palm over the mark now, and frowned up at Dean. “So what happens with it now? How do you get rid of it?”

Dean shrugged and subtly tried to pull away from her, but she wouldn’t let go. “I don’t know. We’re looking into it. But,” he shrugged one shoulder again, “seems like it might come in handy to take down Metatron too. That little bastard has gotten way more powerful than he has any right to be.”

He finally succeeded in pulling his arm away from her and covered up the mark with his own big palm. “But none of that matters right now; all that matters is how you’re doing. You say ‘not good’, and well, yeah, I wouldn’t think so.” He paused for a moment. “Do you wanna talk about it?”

Julie shook her head vehemently. “No! Absolutely not.” She said, fear clouding her voice. “And I know that makes me a hypocrite, because I’m always after you to talk about things, but I just…” 

She shook her head again, and suddenly tears started falling. “I’m sorry.” She said through increasingly choked sobs.

“Hey, hey!” Dean said as he pulled her into the circle of his arms. He placed a kiss to the top of her head, running his hand through her still damp hair and pushing it off her shoulder. 

“Jules, sweetheart…” He cooed to her, his lips pressed to her forehead, “You have nothing to be sorry for. If you don’t want to talk about it, you don’t have to. I’ll be here whenever you’re ready.”

Trying to get a handle on her frayed emotions, Julie pulled back from him a little, sniffling softly. She shook her head. “I just wanna forget. I don’t want to relive it, I don’t wanna think about the things she did with my hands, I just…” 

She leaned back into him, pressing her forehead to his chest. “I just wanna forget.” She repeated.

 He was quiet for a moment, running his big hands over her bare shoulders, his chin resting on her head. His voice was almost a whisper when he spoke next. 

“That might be possible.”

Julie moved back and looked up at him with a frown. “What do you mean?”

Dean’s jaw was clenched and he ran his fingers gently across her forehead. “We can make you forget.”

When Julie just continued to frown at him, he explained. “Cas.” He gripped both her hands in his again, brushing his thumb across the back of one of them. “Angels can wipe memories.”

Realization dawned in Julie and a part of her heart rejoiced at the idea. She was seconds away from saying yes, from begging Dean to call Cas right then to come and wipe her mind clear of the pictures she couldn’t erase on her own. But a wiser voice came through telling her that it wasn’t the solution.

She shook her head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

A deep, double-lined crease appeared between Dean’s brows. “Why not? We’d just take away the bad memories, the things you don’t want to keep.”

But Julie was still shaking her head. “I think we’d probably take the memories away, sure, but the…the dark, the…trauma…I think it would stay. I don’t think that’s as easy to bleep out of existence.”

She closed her eyes. “No, the only way out is through. Just gonna take time.”

When she opened her eyes, Dean was nodding, but his eyes were sad. “Yeah, okay Jules, you’re right.” He took a deep, shuddering breath. “But, please, tell me what I can do to help.”

Julie knew what she wanted, but she was slightly shy to ask, it felt like a strange request given the circumstances. But she knew it would help, so she looked into Dean’s mesmerizing, bright green eyes and asked.

“Make love to me?”

She could see the surprise enter Dean’s gaze, followed quickly by simmering heat. She tried to explain.

“I just need something…soft, something pure and…and gentle.” She reached up and pressed her fingertips against his mouth. “Something that will warm me.”

Dean hesitated just a moment and then stood up, slowly shedding his boots, t-shirt, jeans and underwear. When he stood in front of her naked and stunningly beautiful, she felt tears prick the back of her eyes.

He pulled her to her feet, and unwrapped the towel from around her, raising goosebumps across her skin, but the heat in his eyes as he ran his gaze up and down her body warmed her quickly.

His hands were also warm as he turned her and pulled her back against him, letting her feel his hardening cock against her lower back. He pushed her hair to one side and began to press petal soft kisses along the side of her neck and over her shoulder, before pushing her hair back and starting down the other side.

His hands began to massage her shoulders and neck, and when she moaned at the incredible feeling, she felt him harden even more. She tilted her head forward and he took the chance to press his lips to the nape of her neck, his soft, warm breath stirring the little hairs there and causing a full-body shiver. 

“Still cold, sweetheart.” Dean asked, a smile in his voice, because he knew full well that wasn’t why she was shivering.

“Mmmm…” Julie groaned. “Getting warmer by the minute.”

“Good.” Dean responded, his voice deep and raspy with desire.

He walked her forward, and then pushed her to lay down on the bed. When she was on her back, sideways across the bed, Dean got down on his knees and pulled her forward so that her ass was at the edge of the bed.

He spread her legs wide, his strong hands holding them in place as he began licking and nibbling on her thighs, sucking bruises into her skin. As he got closer and closer to the very center of her, she could feel slick pooling beneath her as she dripped onto the sheets. She pushed her hands into his hair and tugged, trying to force him to quit his teasing, pulling him towards where she wanted him.

Finally he gave in and licked a wide stripe through her glistening folds and Julie cried out, bracing her heels against the bed frame and raising her hips, pushing herself harder against Dean’s mouth. He grunted and wrapped his arms around her upper thighs, holding her tight to his lips as he pulled her clit between his lips and sucked on it like a candy.

In seconds Julie was coming on his tongue, hands fisting in the sheets, her head pressed back, digging into the memory foam. “Dean!” She cried out, her toes curling and muscles straining.

Just as she was coming down, Dean set her feet on the ground and then flipped her over quickly so that she was bent over the bed, hands pushing against the mattress for stability as Dean slammed into her. She was surprised by the easy way he was manhandling her, crying out in pleasure as his cock hit deep inside her, before pulling out and slamming back, ramming against her cervix with every thrust. He was pounding into her so hard and fast, she would have fallen over if he didn’t have an iron grip on her hips.

There was a part of her mind that was reminding her that she’d asked for gentle, soft. This wasn’t what she’d been looking for, but the voice was quickly drowned out by the raging, keening need Dean was raising in her. 

She was screaming in pleasure with every thrust, falling over the edge two more times before he succumbed, spilling hot and thick inside her. His body jerked against hers harshly, his muscles spasming as he spurted every drop deep into her cunt, before falling against her back, breathing broken and raspy.

They soon fell onto the bed together, both too exhausted to speak. Dean pulled the blanket up over their naked, sweating bodies, and pressed his lips to the top of her head, as he wrapped his arm around her waist, pressing her back against him tightly. 

As exhaustion took over, the thought entered her mind that she’d wanted soft and tender, but what Dean had given her was sure to knock her out, granting her oblivion, and she was grateful for that. Just one thing worried her as she fell into the abyss of a dreamless sleep.

The sex had been incredible and earth-shattering, but she couldn’t deny that once again, Dean didn’t seem like himself; nor could she deny that, the change scared her a little.

1 - Jensen RPF + Any/All characters Jensen plays.

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3 - Any/All Fics (regardless of fandom/character.)

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[mittensmorgul]

Hi! What aspects of what we know about the prequel draw you to watch it? I am looking for a silver line in it that would motivate me to watch it because, as of now, I am very wary of the prequel. John and Mary as lead characters along with the final of SPN (heaven ending and they promised canon compliance) is not making me excited. This is not to rain on your parade, I am just looking for a better perspective! Robbie is a bonus but I'm a Casgirl and the prospect of Cas being in it seems dicey :(

Hi hi! I'm happy to help if I can, but I only know as much as any of us still, so I don't know how accurate some of this will be as we begin getting more information. But this is what I know:

-This will be set in the early 1970's. We'll learn more about Mary and her family, which honestly I've wanted to learn more about since 4.03, you know? She was raised hunting and was desperate to get out and live normal, but was clearly a competent and knowledgeable hunter. I would LOVE to know more about her and her family.

-we know it will incorporate the "love story" of John and Mary, and that as you pointed out, it will be canon compliant

-which means they will have to at least acknowledge what the cupid in 5.14 said about how difficult a match the two of them were to make... I am FASCINATED by what Heaven's involvement in their lives was before the events of 4.03.

-this was also the era during which John was in the Marine Corps. He fought in Vietnam. I'm super curious about whether he was protected in some way by having this "destiny" to father the fated vessels, and how that may have influenced his life in general.

-we might get more information about the state of Heaven/angels and Hell/demons prior to the beginning of the run up to the apocalypse. will there be shady stuff revealed about the goings-on there, or are they going to stick more to the mundane/normal hunter life of John and Mary? We just don't know, but this is something that I hope they do choose to explore a little bit.

-I don't know that this will have anything to do with the ending of the original Supernatural series. Unless it's stated up front that Dean is narrating this entire thing *from Heaven,* then I don't know how it would have any bearing on this series.

-I don't know that Cas *won't* ever be a character in this series, but it's not something I'm counting on, you know? He existed in that universe at the time the events will be taking place, but as far as we know outside of taking Dean back to 1973 to "stop it" in 4.03, he wasn't really involved in that era of events on Earth. Of course, he was able to time travel when he had his wings, but also he could've taken another vessel back at that time and interfered with things based on Heaven's orders (and if they were dead set on Cas looking like our Cas, they could present his vessel as Jimmy's father/Uncle/other ancestor and still use Misha as the actor... not saying that WILL happen, but that it COULD, but also i'm going into this not really expecting to see Cas at all, so any Cas we do see would feel like a bonus).

-Robbie Thompson. He's a treasure. He *cares* about canon. He knows the characters, and I trust his writing. He is NOT a John apologist (just the opposite, he has written some scathing critiques of Sam and Dean's childhood... I mean his FIRST episode of the series was Slash Fiction. Please look at his episode list and get a feel for how he sees canon...). And this time, rather than being a staff writer, he's running the show. That alone makes me eager to watch.

-Chaos Machine. A production company run by #1 Dean Stan Jensen Ackles, and #1 Cas Girl Danneel Ackles. But also a company whose first big hire was Renee Reiff, one of the founders of Out In Hollywood, and now the head of development. I'm...really not sure that any of these people are gonna side with folks that loved the series finale and thought it was perfect and a good ending for the characters... how people have gotten that impression from any of this, I just don't know. But I do not think this series is gonna be more of THAT.

-Based on the timing of everything, Jensen likely was in negotiations with WB for the rights to produce programming under the Supernatural banner before the original series was even done filming. We know he was Not A Fan of the ending, and that he has spoken diplomatically and carefully about it for the most part, but his discomfort with the ending is pretty clear. Not many people start a whole entire production company with a long game of eventually making a follow up to the original series.

-in the mean time, Jensen and Danneel are setting out to prove the SPN universe is in good hands. Because there ARE other stories in that universe I would love to hear. Not only Mary's story (because I am REALLY interested in seeing how she grew up and how Dean as narrator relates to that experience), but there are other stories in that universe that would be worth hearing too. The chances of them being able to TELL us those stories likely rest on the success of the Winchesters-- yes, even the potential for them EVER to be able to make an actual 15.20 redux, or a continuation of the original series at all, likely rests on the success of their first venture.

This is a thoughtful, creative bunch of people who WANT DESPERATELY to tell us more stories in the Supernatural Universe.

There are people who obviously will not care to watch, which is fine and good, but literally we do not know any more than what I stated above, and some of that is even speculation and guessing. I'm just exhausted by people who already believe they know what this show will be about and have decided to pre-hate it for their convenience.

Some parts of this fandom are just so fucking exhausting.

Will we love it? WHO KNOWS?! IT IS A MYSTERY! We don't even know who will be cast as Mary and John-- or anyone else in the series! We just do not know what the story is yet! Can we at least wait until then to decide to love or hate it?!

I'd love to at least give Jensen, Danneel, and Robbie the benefit of the doubt here...

[aoitrinity]

Why Do I Have to Feel Like a Fucking Conspiracy Theorist -- OR -- How I Find a Semblance of Peace on Sunday Night

I’m also going to start this out with a GIANT DISCLAIMER.

I am about to theorize about what may have happened to the SPN finale. I have absolutely no insider knowledge. I am merely speculating here based on the panels and a bunch of Twitter and Tumblr posts that I have been reading over the last few days. If you are not in a good place to read such things, TURN BACK PLEASE. Go take care of yourself and your mental health. You and your feelings are valid and deserve to be handled gently right now.

Additionally, if you are here to give me shit for being unhappy with the ending, please walk away as well. I am here to reach out and share my feelings with people who might be struggling to make sense of something that upset some of us in very deep-seated ways. I am not here to bother you or critique you or tell you that you’re lesser because you liked the ending. If you felt it was good, then go enjoy it.

Long-ass post beneath the cut, everyone.

Alrighty folks...I debated whether or not to do this because I have been spiraling down the hell that is the SPN finale since Thursday. The travesty of what happened to our show--to this beloved show that seemed to have been so perfectly and precisely written for at least four years that it had basically already paved its own tarmac on which to land its plane and we all thought we knew exactly what we were going to get. And then we didn’t. We had a nigh Cas-less and entirely Eileen-less ending. We had no goodbye between Cas and Jack. We had Dean dying young after finally finding his freedom, only to ascend to heaven with no one but Bobby. We had the weird, weird, weird incest-y death scene. We had the bridge crane shot thing because...sure. You do you, Robert Singer.

It was so terrible, so truly awful, and I couldn’t seem to square any of it with anything we had known going in. I tossed and turned and cried and didn’t eat or sleep all weekend. I spent hours just reloading tumblr and twitter, going to the Misha panel, reading and reading and listening and trying to figure out what the fucking hell is going on because I needed to know exactly where to direct my anger. And after a fuckton of talking with @winchester-reload, I think we have at least a very plausible theory about what happened here--I’m laying it out below as much for my own peace of mind as anything else, because otherwise all of these thoughts are going to continue to spin around in my head for weeks and I won’t be able to do jack shit.

Now to start off, unfortunately I do think Dean was slated to die from the beginning of this season. I don’t know WHY they thought that was the best way to go, and I wish they had listened to Jensen on this one. Part of me wonders if it was an order from on high based on the discussion between Becky and Chuck earlier this season--the writers knew it wasn’t a great choice, but they were trying to signal to us that we should feel free to write our own endings to the story because they’d be better (I can wax poetic on the signs of why many of the writers probably wanted Dean to live, but that’s another post). I’m not defending that choice by any means, just laying it out there that I think they didn’t necessarily all want to kill Dean like they did.

However, what I THINK I can explain now is what happened with Misha and why we got so jerked around with Cas’s story. Consider what we know (I can’t immediately source all of it, but I did my best):

At the end of episode 15x19, Lucifer has been returned to the Empty after being killed AGAIN. He talks with Cas. Maybe harasses him a bit about Dean, idk. But then...Jack shows up. New God Jack. And he picks up Cas and pulls him out of the Empty, leaving Lucifer behind, because seriously. Fuck that guy (also leaving behind his abusive father is character growth for Jack, so yay for that).

-Misha was contracted to film 15 episodes this season. He was only in 14.

-Misha told Michael Sheen he had to go back to film 1.5 episodes after the shutdown in March. (Starts at 6:13)

-Misha was in Vancouver during filming of the finale.

-Mark P said at Darklight Con that the last scene he filmed was with Alex and Misha (and Mark P was only in episode 19).

-Misha implied that he was present for various filming moments, including Dean’s death (start at 35:15), and said that it felt like a “mini-reunion.”

-Various sources have mentioned that Jimmy Novak was supposed to be in the finale.

-After episode 18, Stands tweeted a fan who was angered and hurt by Cas's death that they could talk about the “bury the gays” issue after the finale aired.

-In episode 19 we know there were takes of the parking lot scene where the only thing fans observing could hear was Dean yelling “CAS” at Chuck (fuck I can’t find this one right now, but it’s definitely out there)

-Also in episode 19, we had a very strange, awkward montage at the end of the episode.

-In episode 20, we know there were a FUCKTON of missing scenes

-We also had no opening montage, but three other separate montages.

-Carry on My Wayward Son was played TWICE, back-to-back at the end of the episode.

-Episode 20 was shorter than normal and had surprisingly little dialogue. The pacing was VERY strange.

-The cast and crew has been almost completely silent about the finale since it came out. When they have spoken, it has been with an awkward excuse of “Uh...COVID?”

-Samantha Ferris has specifically noted that, despite the Harvelle’s being back in play and a big heaven reunion having been planned pre-COVID, neither she nor Chad Lindberg received any such invitation to return.

-Cas and Dean POP Funko figures were pictured together in a replica of Harvelle’s in 15x04.

NOW with all of this in mind (and I’m probably missing some stuff too because there is so much--feel free to add on to that list), please bear with me because here is what I think we were SUPPOSED to get POST-COVID (after it was determined that the reunion couldn’t happen because of the virus):

In episode 20, we start with our NORMAL OPENING MONTAGE, like always. It traces everything that happened during the season. We are reminded of Cas. The confession. Rowena. Eileen. Jack. Billie, God, the Empty, all of it. 

Things then follow along in the episode where they did up until Dean dies and wakes up in heaven. After his conversation with Bobby, he drives off to find Cas (who, in the script, was listed as “Jimmy Novak” in order to protect against script leaks--who wouldn’t want to do their best to avoid spoilers about the finale with the wrapping of a fifteen-year show?). He does indeed find Cas. We get Dean’s end of the confession. Hell, maybe we even get a kiss. And then Dean sets up his new heaven home in the recreated Harvelle’s. Maybe Cas even fucking moves in. 

Years pass. We get Sam having his life on Earth (still can’t explain why they cut Eileen and couldn’t even have Sam signing vaguely to the blurry brunette in the background; if anyone wants to take that on, go for it). Eventually, Cas tells Dean that it’s almost Sam’s time. Dean takes Baby and goes to meet Sam at the bridge. The cover of Carry on My Wayward Son plays during this much shorter sequence. End of episode.

But that’s not what we got. Instead, much of what I just wrote about was excised from the episode. The remnants were stitched together after shooting had been wrapped. Filler was added in the form of montages and long, unnecessary extra shots to get the episode to something approaching a reasonable length. 

But why? Why would they spend all that time and money and quarantining on Misha, only to almost completely cut him out of the finale? I struggled with why the fuck the CW would want this mammoth show to go down as the greatest queerbait in TV history when they had the chance to do something truly beautiful and monumental with it? It couldn’t just be sheer homophobia, right? Well, I think that factored into it, my friends, but here is where my head is at right now.

It was about cold, hard cash.

Now I could be wrong, but this is what I’m thinking at the moment: Supernatural is going off of the air. Supernatural, the CW’s cash cow for fifteen years. Sure there is still money to be made on blu-rays and merchandise and cons...but they need people watching their shows. They need that sweet advertising revenue. And you know what show they have about to premiere? A show that could, potentially, bring with it a chunk of that SPN revenue?

Walker.

And if any of you know anything about the original Walker Texas Ranger, you know that the show was predominantly a show about a very heterosexual white man being very excessively heterosexual. And for SOME REASON over the years, many of the execs at the CW still seem to think that this show, Supernatural, is really attractive to a lot of middle-American white men...whom they desperately want to watch this new show with this guy from Supernatural that they already know.

Now here’s where COVID fucked us. I think Destiel was greenlit by TPTB, at least in SOME form, before COVID. But then the pandemic happened, and they panicked. They got the cut of the last two episodes and watched them in their original, probably queer form. And then, the execs at CW looked at the economy. They looked at their cash cow, about to make its journey to the great beyond. And they looked at this new little calf Walker that they were so desperately worried about. And they made a choice.

They decided that it would be too risky to take the step with Destiel. They were worried about frightening off their ever-so-valuable hetero male demographic with the possibility that a traditionally masculine man in his 40s could be in love with another man in an overt way. It was homophobia mixed with greed, spun up by fear for their revenues because of COVID.

So they called in Singer, possibly Dabb, although I wouldn’t be surprised if they went straight to Singer. They told them that Destiel had to go: executive orders. And the only way to make it go in a way that removed any trace of what had been there was to rewrite what happened to Cas and cut him out from the last two episodes entirely. It was too late to reshoot anything. They had to just cut and stitch and fill with bullshit montages. 

They removed the scene at the end of 19, probably because Cas and Lucifer discussed Dean. All that was left of Misha there was his voice on that fake phone call. They may have cut other things too, but I would bet my life that they cut a scene from the end of the episode and replaced it with that very strange montage. Then they moved onto 20. They cut out every scene with Cas. And left in only two platonic mentions of him, neither made by Dean. They tried to imply that Cas might show up in Dean’s heaven at some point, but that was as far as the editors could go in the time they had. They filled in with montages, awkwardly long shots, anything they could do to fill all of those missing scenes.

And they even had to take the opening montage, because literally everything in it pointed to Cas being there at the end of it all. They wouldn’t be able to leave out his scenes, they were too critical to the season. They couldn’t cut his confession without raising eyebrows. So they cut the whole thing and moved “Carry On My Wayward Son” to one of the newly-added driving montages at the end. Which is why we awkwardly had both songs play back-to-back--again, such a strange choice unless they were out of options and couldn’t exactly buy rights to a new track or compose anything else.

And so we were left with the shadow of the finale that we deserved, that Cas and Dean deserved. We were left without resolution or happiness or words. Bobo told us the most important thing about happiness is just “saying it” and our characters were silenced without anyone ever knowing the truth.

I think the writers might have known and been given the new party line that “Misha never filmed, he couldn’t, sorry, it was COVID, no one’s fault!” But I don’t think most of the cast even knew it had happened until they watched the finale on Thursday with us (though they might have been confused why the bit from 15x19 was sliced, they could reasonably have assumed it was a time thing and also BL episodes don’t make sense anyway). Why do I say that?

Well, first of all, Misha started sending out a bunch of excited texts to fans with some old BTS pictures about an hour before the show started airing on EST. He also wanted his children to see the episode, his YOUNG children. Why would he show them such a traumatic episode if their Dad wasn’t in it? What if it was because he wanted them to witness what was going to be a monumental moment in queer television history that their DAD got to be a part of? And then that was all dashed.

Which is why I think the cast and crew went almost completely radio silent the next day. I don’t think they knew. And based on how they have been acting on social media since then, I think many of them are absolutely furious, but they have been silenced because of NDAs, because they want to find work again in a cutthroat industry, because they don’t want to bring down the hellfire of Warner Brothers Entertainment upon themselves. So the most we have gotten is a little acknowledgement from the MERCHANDISING COMPANY trying to validate our pain (god bless Shirts, she is a LIFESAVER) and a response to my salty tweet about keeping good stuff in the closet from Adam Williams (the VFX coordinator) that seemed to acknowledge the validity of my complaint.

Then there was a scramble behind the scenes, I would bet my life. Talking points were fed to the boys who had panels today, to CE, to all the cast and crew:

Toe the party line. Misha never filmed. This was always about COVID. Do not mention Destiel. Do not mention Dean’s feelings for Cas. Do not promote the Castiel Project or anything that validates the idea that this was anything less than a superb ending.

And that is why we have heard so little from the cast on this front, and what we have heard has been muddled and contradictory. That is why the writers are saying nothing. That is why we have been left adrift.

Now before I close this out, I do want to say that I really, genuinely do not think this was on the writers at all. I feel like they tried to give us the best ending that they could, in a writers room that we know is notorious for splitting along party lines about the overall story (BL and Singer, who have always been about the brothers and their man-pain vs. Dabb and the rest who always seemed to want more for them and for Cas). I think they did everything in their power to at least end with Dean and Cas happy together. If they could give us nothing else, they wanted to give us that. And then the network took it from them. From us. From everyone.

For the sake of fucking money. 

And the WORST PART OF IT ALL, for me, is that in the wake of this disaster, the fans have been left to try and figure out what happened. We have had to wade through a mire of conflicting information in the midst of all of our collective anger and grief over this garbage ending of a show many of us have loved and even relied on for YEARS, all the while wondering if we’re just fucking crazy, if we have all fallen collectively into the hole of conspiracy theories. That hurts ESPECIALLY badly because we have taken so many hits over the years from other groups on social media saying we were crazy for seeing things that weren’t there (especially Destiel), for writing meta and analyzing tropes and believing the evidence of our eyes and ears. The network has made us relive that entire nightmare WHILE processing our grief for a show we wanted so badly to celebrate and which instead we now have to mourn.

So again guys, I cannot prove that this is exactly what happened at all; this is simply my idea of what may have happened. But right now, it’s the most sense I can make from this mess, and to be honest, the act of typing it out has helped me enormously in my processing of it all. I feel like I can see more clearly, like I know where to target my outrage and where to direct empathy. I feel like just fucking maybe, I might be able to do my job tomorrow without bursting into tears at random moments. 

I really hope that this post has helped some of you to, in some small way, process this too. We get through this the way that Misha told us at his panel this morning, the way the writers have told us to do all season long...we throw out the story God gave us and we make it better. We write our characters the happy endings they deserve. 

We save them.

One last thing--if you have not already, please consider channeling your rage into a donation to one of the five causes our fandom has put together to pay tribute to our beloved show and to mourn the ending it should have had:

-The Castiel Project

-Dean Winchester is Love

-Sam Winchester Project

-The National Association of the Deaf

-The Jack Kline Project

[sortasirius]

“Despair” and Dean and Cas

Well well well, winning is my favorite thing.

As usual, this is going to be as long as hell. And fair warning, it’s extremely emotional.

So here it is, the thing that we have been barrelling towards for years, literally years.

Just want to point out this.  Also, I will NEVER allow someone to speak negatively about this writing group, EVER.

Team Free Dads starting off the episode is so sweet, so scary.  Cas’ calming, Dean’s fear, Sam’s desperation, really just hammering home how much they love Jack, how his pain is pain for them, how losing him is unbearable.

“I can’t stop this.  I’m coming apart.  I don’t want to hurt you.  Don’t let me hurt you.”

Oof.  If you’ve ever question whether Jack is a Winchester, this line should shut that shit down for you.

When I tell you I was PISSED when Billie sent Jack to the Empty to EXPLODE?????  PAIN.

“Yeah the Empty can’t come to earth, not without being summoned.”

Hello Bobo, clue number 1.

The fact that they only had Jack in limbo for like five seconds was great for my heart health, thank u very much Bobo.

Also Dean wielding Death’s scythe?????? KING?????

Man, Sam and Dean’s growth.  The way that they’re able to, idk, actually speak on how they feel without death looming or fear or pain.  It’s just a conversation, just an honest conversation of Dean admitting his mistakes, admitting how he felt.  Admitting that he fucked up, and Sam forgiving him for it.

CHARLIE AND HER GF CHARLIE AND HER GF CHARLIE AND HER GF

Also...hunters and their “dates.”  Two hunters who are happily together, who are happily fighting monsters.  Hm.  Sounds like a Saileen/Destiel parallel to me boys.

You ever wish Cas would look and the mirror and take the great advice he gives others?  Because I do.  He’s always tried to be “useful” for Sam and Dean, for Jack, always tried to make sure that he’s useful enough that they keep him around.  But what he doesn’t understand, what he’s never understood, is that they need him because of who he is, not because of what he contributes.

Remind y’all of anything?

And here we have Clue Number 2

And then, Sam’s realization.  Eileen.

Did I begin full tilt screaming no in my apartment when he said her name?  Who’s to say?

How can a lock screen cause me this much pain????

Okay but: Charlie loses Stevie, Sam loses Eileen.  Clue Number 3.

I feel like I don’t talk enough about how much Sam loves Eileen.  About how obvious it is that they are endgame, about how happy he is when he talks about her.  This just feels like a blow to the stomach, but we’ve barely even started.

Sam immediately shifting into protective leader mode?  He is the love of my life.

Dean’s simple nod, like it’s a given?  Enough to do me in right there.

This is another episode where it’s just so clear that Sam is the leader of the North American hunters.  Everyone knows him, everyone is willing to follow him.  He’s knowledgeable and kind and fair and just and an incredibly capable fighter.  Once again, I don’t believe his work on earth is done.

Can we also please talk about how FRIGHTENING IT WAS for Jack to kill that plant???  I don’t really have much of a comment on it because I was literally just like ?????

With Billie saying that it’s Chuck, the way that people were dusted, very similar to Becky and Amara, I honestly wouldn’t be surprised, especially with Donna getting taken off the board.  It’s like I said last week, I don’t buy that he’s taken himself off the board, he’s too invested in the unraveling of this story to take a step back.  He’s gotta break them before he can defeat them, that’s the only way.

And here we go, into one of the most painful and surreal things I will ever write about.

Dean’s speech.  His guilt, his regret.  The shame of not only trapping himself, but the pain, the horror of trapping Cas.

“I just lead us into another trap.  All because I, I couldn’t hurt Chuck.  Because I was angry and because I just needed something to kill, and because that’s all I know how to do.”

“Dean-”

“It was Chuck all along.  We never should have left Sam and Jack, we should be there with them now.  Everybody’s gonna die, Cas.  Everybody.  I can’t stop it.”

His narrative arc.  Tied up in a bow.

“She’s gonna get through that door.”

“I know.”

“And she’s gonna kill you and then she’s gonna kill me.  I’m sorry.”

Cas smiles.

Cas knows.  He knows what’ll get them out of this, and he knows that he would do anything in this Universe for Dean Winchester. The human man he fell for.

“When Jack was dying, I made a deal to save him.”

“You what?”

“The price was my life.  When I experienced a moment of true happiness, the Empty would be summoned and it would take me forever.”

“Why are you telling me this now?”

“I always wondered, ever since I took that burden, that curse, I’ve wondered what it could be, what my true happiness could even look like.  I never found an answer, because the one thing I want, it’s something I know I can’t have. 

“But I think I know, I think I know now...happiness isn’t in the having, it’s in just being.  It’s in just saying it.”

“What are you talking about, man?”

The most selfless thing Cas does in this, and he does a lot of selfless things, is to tell Dean Winchester how impossibly good he is.  To tell him that he is worthy, to tell him that he is adored.

“I know, I know how you see yourself, Dean.  You see yourself the same way our enemies see you.  You’re destructive and you’re angry and you’re broken and you’re daddy’s blunt instrument.  And you think that hate and anger, that’s what drives you, that’s who you are.  It’s not.  And everyone who knows you sees it, and everything you have ever done, the good and the bad, you have done for love.  You raise your little brother for love, you fought for this whole world for love.  That is who you are.

“You’re the most caring man on earth.  You are the most selfless, loving human being I will ever know.  You know, ever since we met, ever since I pulled you outta Hell...knowing you has changed me.

“Because you cared, I cared.  I cared about you, I cared about Sam, I cared about Jack, I cared about the whole world because of you. 

“You changed me, Dean.”

“Why does this sound like a goodbye?”

Dean’s greatest fear. His fear of those loving him leaving him. The terror of being alone.

“Because it is.

The head shake.  Don’t love me.  Don’t love me if it means you’ll leave me, don’t love me, everyone I love leaves me.  Don’t leave me.  Don’t love me.  Don’t leave me.

“Don’t do this, Cas.”

Just like I always thought.  One last look at Dean before the Empty takes him.

“Cas-”

“Goodbye Dean.”

And Dean is left, broken on the floor, unable to answer Sam’s calls, unable to do anything.  It doesn’t matter to him that Chuck has wiped everyone out, it doesn’t matter to him that Sam and Jack might need him.  It doesn’t matter.  It doesn’t matter, because the thing that mattered still hangs on his lips, still waiting to be said, and now he won’t get another chance to say it.

The fact that I am writing this, even with all my spec, with all my analysis of the writers’ room, of their text, of the way Dabb and co had approached this story, nothing could have ever prepared me for this.  Nothing could have prepared me for a three and a half minute, uninterrupted scene where Cas confesses not only that he loves Dean, but that he has always loved him.

I talk a lot about how these writers don’t get the credit they deserve.  Unfortunately, from most of this fandom, they never will.  We will likely never know the fights with the network they had, the steps backward they had to take, the way they had to beg and fight and claw to get this on the screen.  But they did it.  They did it for these characters, they did it for this dinosaur of a show, and yeah, they did it for us.

It was not easy, I can promise you, to get this greenlit.  They had to fight for this, they likely had to call in favors and make threats and quite literally put their careers on the line (you may scoff at that, but WB is a BIG company, especially in the TV/movie world) for this story.  This story of Dean and Cas, the man dragged out of Hell and the angel who fell for him.

I have tons more to say, and will likely have several more posts about this, but I want to leave all my babes who are worried that that was the end for Dean and Cas with some takeaways.

Sam is missing Eileen.  Dean is missing Cas.  That is no longer a fun subtextual parallel, that is it for them.  Their respective endgames are missing, and they will not know their peace until they get them back.  Chuck will not win.  That’s not the story being told, and right now?  He’s winning.  He’s broken them, left them with nothing, left them with an empty world and a hole in each of their hearts where their person (or angel) used to be.

Our show is going to end with “contentment.”  “Contentment” isn’t from Sam and Dean being filled with grief and hitting the open road.  It isn’t Sam getting Eileen back and leaving Dean with no one.  “Contentment” is Sam and Eileen, Dean and Cas.  Together.

[spnbangbang]

Title: Right In Front of His Salad

Author: redamber79 

Artist: casarts

Primary Ship: Destiel

Other Ships: mentioned Sam/Eileen

Length: 9650

Warnings: no archive warnings apply

Tags: Post canon fix-it, Mutual Pining, Switching, Sex Toys, Anal Sex, Rimming, Felching, Public Sex, Love Confessions, Sneaky Cas, Food Kink, Interrupting Moose.

Posting Date: August 22, 2022

Summary:

Now permanently human, Cas is back from the Empty, but Dean is still avoiding talking about how he feels. Cas is in love, frustrated, and incredibly horny. He uses his strategic mind to bring Dean around with the help of new, flattering and suggestive clothes. When that fails, a desperate call for help, leading to Dean finding him in a most compromising position, does the job.

But Sammy has the worst timing ever.

Excerpt:

Cas was back.

Dean had never been so happy, so relieved, or so scared in his life.

Cas had died for him. Not just for him. For everyone that Dean and Sam and Jack saved when they defeated Chuck. Cas had died, and the Empty took him, because he loved Dean. He said that was his happiness. How was he supposed to live up to that? What if… what if Jack–Dean loved the kid, but–what if he messed something up, and the Empty came for Cas again? If Cas had been happy just sayin' it, Dean couldn't risk telling him he felt the same. The Empty would feel that and take him away again.

Dean wouldn't survive that.

No. No, it was better this way, Cas was alive this way, even if he didn't know Dean loved him back. He'd still be happy, right?

***

Cas was not happy.

He was grateful to be alive, of course. He was out of the clutches of the Shadow and back in the bunker with Dean, Sam, and Eileen. That should have made him ecstatic. But Jack had told him he'd pulled him out and put the Shadow to sleep as a thank you to Dean, to heal his heart, to grant him a gift for saving the world. Eileen had been returned to Sam, and Dean… Dean wanted Cas back more than anything. More than he wanted to live, himself. Dean had been spiralling.

Dean's longing and grief and pain and love had brought Cas back, despite Jack's new stance on being hands off. Jack had given Cas a choice. Regain his power, be an angel again and help rebuild Heaven, and wait for Dean there. Or, become irrevocably human, and be with Dean sooner.

It had been, as Dean would call it, a no-brainer.

Only now, the stubborn, infuriating man refused to talk to Cas. Oh, he'd welcomed Cas home with a smile and an embrace that had made Cas' human heart pound, the familiar weight of his arms around Cas' body stirring love and desire in Cas' newly mortal body. Cas nearly kissed him then, but no, Dean slipped from his arms, wearing a pensive expression, then clapped him on the shoulder.

"Good to have you back, pal," Dean had said, a false cheer ringing in his voice, and Cas could all but see the hunter building up a wall between them.

Every attempt Cas had made to talk to Dean had been met with a fake smile and a change of subject, until Cas was ready to pull out his hair in frustration. He'd always been able to feel Dean's longing; he didn't think that could have changed so quickly. Dean wasn't fickle.

No… This was Dean deciding for everyone that he'd make the sacrifice.

So Cas'd have to show him. Creatively. And given that one of the side effects of his new humanity was a libido like he'd never imagined, Cas had a few ideas.

[babesonly]

fic recs 2.0!

hello kings (gn) ive got significantly more fic than last time which means this is gonna be a little more organized than the last post bc it is much longer <3 categories in order are non casefic canonverse, casefic/roadtrip fic, finale fixits, endverse, non supernatural aus, and then non destiel ones. titles will be in bold for my favs! also within each category they’re in order from shortest to longest

Canonverse

I’m a tulip in a cup by godtiering (1.2k)

I worry that I never really came back from hell. I wonder why, if I got remade by heaven, I’m still the same screwed up kid that I always was.

Sometimes I worry I’m not into women at all.

"Guess not,” he looks at his shoes.

a REALLY good fic that’s basically just a look inside dean’s head during my bloody valentine do not read this looking for a fun time but please do read it

on vessels by flightsofangels (1.9k)

“You know,” Cas mutters into Dean’s bare skin. “When I was still… an angel, I used to dream that I would take you as my vessel.”

hello consumehimnatural fans!!!!! read newt’s fic right now its incredible

dean winchester is not a nicholas sparks protagonist by microcomets (1.9k)

Dean fell in love with Cas the way you fall asleep--slowly, and then all at once. Or some other hackneyed and trite bullshit. God, this is embarrassing.

dean is in LOVE. he’s also a disaster who keeps staring at cas’ hands. sigh

Stay by aeli_kindara (2.5k)

Coda to 13.06 (Tombstone). In which Castiel reckons with the aftermath of Dean's grief.

hello fellow widow arc fans <3 click here to see cas find out abt the events of advanced thanatology !

walking on a string by swordfishtrombones (2.7k)

Between the doomed offensive at the Firmament and the impending retreat from the ravaged northeast border, Castiel left camp long enough to answer one of Dean Winchester's prayers.

S6 DEAN IS A WAR WIFE. been really into early seasons deancas lately and this one is very good. god

the flesh of the mighty by Mudprophet (2.7k)

Ezekiel 39:17 "you shall eat the flesh of the mighty and drink the blood of the princes of the earth."

MY GOD. anyone who saw the @autisticandroids​ purgatory cannibalism talk and was interested read this right now. also anyone who enjoyed nbc hannibal OR raw (2016). if romantic cannibalism is remotely aligned with your interests read this right now. god

Sam Winchester, Ally At Law by alittleduck (3.3k)

Sam was pretty sure he could read every single gay friendly guide to coming out or supporting queer family members ever written and literally none of them would even imply that arguing with gay people that they were actually just homophobic constituted as "ally behavior". However, Sam was equally sure that none of those book authors had found themselves accidentally watching their brother get pounded by an Angel of the Lord at 9 am on Tuesday, so Sam was pretty sure he might actually still have the higher ground. Now, if only Jack would stop trying to bond with Dean using gay slurs long enough for Sam to convince everyone of that, he might just be able to cobble together some remnant of sanity or, failing that, dignity.

Or, the one where Sam desperately wants to invent PFLAG but Dean won't stop teaching Jack gay slurs

JACK VOICE HEY COCKSUCKERS. 

hummed low by microcomets (3.3k)

Dean pulls the Impala over at a cider barn about thirty miles out; doesn't really think about it, just sees the hokey orange lettering off the roadside and lets his hands guide the Impala off the interstate with gravel spitting under the wheels.

they get a nice day out together and dean has a gay crisis and it’s written beautifully mwah

Vena Amoris and Other Old-Fashioned Bullshit by pyrebi (3.9k)

In which angelic marriage bonds are apparently stupidly easy to trigger, Cas wages multidimensional war in Heaven, Dean can't catch a break like ever, Sam rather enjoys being a dick, love saves the day, and nobody consummates anything.

sometimes i think about this fic and it hits that at this point dean and cas would have been married for more than a year. cas my beloved...

an exploration of gender; angelic by sometimeswelose (4k)

Castiel's true form is made of electromagnetic radiation. He has spent the majority of his life, if you really want to add it all up and average the whole thing out, as a wavelength of celestial intent.

The thing about being made of light: it's light in the physics sense of the word. Castiel's waves are gamma, x-ray, micro, and radio. He's visible light too, of course, a visible light so intense that it is blinding to most humans.

hello trans cas community <3 he’s literally trans he was assigned genderless and then went hm actually i will be a man! love of my life

Some Boys are Sleeping Alone by prosopopeya (4.2k)

This isn't something that's okay, not for him, but it chases him through the years until it turns into something he can't -- doesn't want to deny. 

ohhh deans tenuous relationship with his sexuality my beloved...

love. worship. consummation. consumption. by redeyedwrath (4.3k)

ConsumehimNatural (copyright marcusantonius) the Series!

These are all snapshots centered around the idea of you know. Hunger in Supernatural. Both carnal hunger and other kinds. Fics are shown in semi-chronological order but this series is generally nebulously early seasons.

for ANYONE who is a consumehimnaturual this is required reading it is INCREDIBLE and gorgeous and very visceral and i am so very obsessed with it. thank you redeyedwrath for enabling my brainrot

the reach of human sense by perilously (4.5k)

“You know what Jimmy Novak looked like. You think he was beautiful—gorgeous, hot, all of it. It’s him. Not me. This isn’t my face.”

“But,” Dean says. He doesn’t know where he’s going with it. Just that Cas’ face is right there, brows drawn together and cheekbones gleaming in the lamplight. It’s a face that’s made his heart skip probably a couple hundred beats collectively since they met.

And it used to belong to someone else.

this one is just very nice <3 cas gets uncomfortable w dean calling him attractive since dean has never seen his trueform and they work it out

Down in the River by Ias (4.7k)

Alone in Purgatory and hunted by Leviathans, Castiel finds himself praying to the one person who can't hear him.

cas i love you <3 cas alone in purgatory praying to dean bc dean is the only thing he still worships i love you so much

Creature of Habit by trinityofone (5.1k)

The more you love someone, the more you want to kill them. Or: How Cas developed some bad habits, and Dean coped surprisingly well.

written in s5 when cas was depowered and completely nails the later seasons bitchy husbands dynamic it’s very good and fun <3

sink by crackers4jenn (5.4k)

"Where to?" A 9.06 coda.

very bittersweet very well written and also canon compliant so do not go into this one looking for a happy ending but i DO recommend it it’s very good

Sensational by castiowl (6.1k)

“When I first came to earth, it was advised that we temper the senses bound to our vessels. They were a distraction, we were told. An antiquated form of experiencing existence that would hinder our ability to complete our missions, whatever that may be. My true form can better facilitate these experiences. What you would recognize as heightened senses of sight and sound, among other things.”

Or, how Dean helps Cas experience all five human senses for the first time in one night.

early seasons deancas man. i love the sound part i love dean being so worried about doing a good job with this. god. read this please

Something to Protect by Sass_Master (6.2k)

Dean’s violent reaction to being unexpectedly woken has become something of a running joke among them, but Castiel can’t help but look past it to the underlying cause. It makes him ache to think that Dean feels so unsafe, so persecuted, before he’s even fully conscious.

Secretly, Castiel has been determined to work on that, to ease Dean into awareness in a less jarring way, smooth away one of the many stresses that follow him even in sleep. Now’s as good a time as any to try.

oh to sleep more soundly in the presence of someone you love...this fic is very nice i enjoyed it a lot

all this and heaven too by ftmsteverogers (7k)

“Hey,” Dean said. “I’m not ashamed of you, okay?”

Cas raised skeptical eyes to meet his.

“I mean it,” Dean insisted.

“I understand you mean it,” Cas said. “But I don’t think it’s any better if you’re only ashamed of yourself.”

hello trans dean community here is 7k of trans dean having to deal with his internalized homophobia now that he’s sleeping with cas <3 it is SO good

The wilderness. by orange_crushed (8k)

He takes a shower and the pressure is not especially good, but it doesn’t matter. It’s warm and he stands under the spray a long time. Human skin, he knows, constantly renews itself, shedding the dead cells of the epidermis. He wonders how long it will take until he is an entirely new person, until every cell on his surface is a new one. He looks at his hands under the water. It might take less than a month.

this might be the only post 9x03 fic on here with a happy ending actually? plenty of good melancholy leading up to it though <3 canon divergent after 9x03 though which means no 9x06 fanfiction gap but it is absolutely worth reading

till the juice runs by deathbanjo (8.4k)

Apparently whoever drew up the venn diagram of Dean’s sex life decided the circle labelled ‘good sex’ and the one labelled ‘sex with men’ should be kept far apart.

hello this one is SO funny dean finally gets comfortable enough with his bisexuality to start having sex with men and it goes so very bad every time so sorry about your shitty choices beloved </3

First Date by aeli_kindara (8.9k)

“We should go on a date. You and me.”

Castiel wishes he could see Dean’s face. He wishes he had any idea what to say.

“I’m asking you out, Cas.”

this one is very sweet i liked it a lot <3 good refreshing little fic where they just get to have a nice evening together

Entertaining Strangers by cadignan (9k)

Dean settles on to his side, lying in the bed facing Castiel. “So you had sex without me and you bit all my moves. I think I deserve to hear about it, at least. What was her name?”

op im in love with you. premise is established relationship deancas and cas mentions he did have sex before dean and not only that it was a threesome. good for him <3 this fic is cas describing the story of what led up to the threesome and what happened during it while dean interrupts regularly. incredible

the shape you take by noviembre (10k)

“What?” Dean says, fake-offended. “I’d be hot as a girl, you know I would.”

And this is when he really, really should have stopped talking. When he shouldn't have whipped back around and asked, “Cas, if I was a woman, you’d fuck me, right?”

Because if he hadn’t said that, then he wouldn’t have had to deal with this:

Cas, meeting his eyes, forehead wrinkles all smoothed out like there’s nothing to be confused about anymore. Cas with something at the corner of his mouth that might barely be called a smile.

Cas saying, calmly and without hesitation, “Yes, Dean.”

--

Dean Winchester fucks around and, with the inadvertent help of some witches, Finds Out.

dean winchester your gender is diabolical. this fic is insane and its the only thing that matters actually. dean fully convinced its normal and straight to think about being a woman so you can fuck your male friend. incredible. op im proposing to you

Sinnerman by a_good_soldier (10k)

Dean listens to Nina Simone, reads Anne Carson, and makes out with a dude (sort of).

yall want to read about dean realizing he’s in love with a man as a direct result of learning to better respect women right?

you’re fooling yourself by cowboydeanwinchester (13k)

Dean Winchester and Castiel retire from hunting to raise baby Jack. Dean struggles to allow himself the things he truly wants.

Jack is two, Castiel and Dean are idiots, and Sam's gotta solve everyone's problems.

love a married couple who doesn’t know they’re married <3 everyone say thank you sam for bullying dean 

The Girlfriend Experience by rageprufrock (15k)

While it's not like Dean hasn't had a couple of truly regrettable hit-and-runs in his sexual history, this is probably the saddest fucking thing that has ever happened to him.

a classic for good fucking reason. we’ve all talked about dean thinking holding hands is too gay after having just had gay sex but my personal favorite was sam accusing dean of cheating on cas because dean bought condoms. incredible

No Kingdom To Come by domesticadventures (16k)

“We should fuck,” Dean says.

Cas looks up from where he sits on his bed, hair still damp from the shower, frowning as he places a finger on the page of his book to mark where he left off.

There are a million things Cas could say here; Dean has rehearsed them. After lunch, his restlessness had given way to a vague panic, a dread that matched his every step and crept along with him from room to room. Eventually, he had returned to his bedroom and spent the rest of the afternoon pacing back and forth, playing out all the possible scenarios. When Cas asks him Why? or Are you being serious? or when he sighs and says, in that way he has, Dean, he knows exactly what he’s going to do. He’s going to shrug casually, like he isn’t invested in the answer, like he isn’t desperate for an outlet, and say, Why not? He’s going to raise an eyebrow and say, What, are you not interested? He’s going to crowd into Cas’ personal space, he’s going to shove himself right up in there and whisper Cas against his ear.

Instead, Cas says, carefully, “Okay.”

literally the only quarantine fic i’ve ever bothered to read in any fandom and completely worth it it’s SO good. they become fwb and dean has an existential crisis and he keeps bringing up meaninglessness and death during sex

Bodies by Speary (18k)

It was a secret they never acknowledged even with each other. It would change everything, end everything if either of them ever dropped the act. So they became very good at acting, at keeping up the lie that gave them what they wanted. Even if that lie involved constantly seeking out temporary, consenting female vessels, Cas would do it. He told himself it was worth it for Dean. He just hoped that he could stop wanting more, or maybe one day Dean might stop pretending that he wasn't really sleeping with Cas every time.

i don’t even have anything to add tbh if that summary did not immediately make you click we are very different this fic is incredible. god. fellas do you ever make yourself a woman so you can fuck the man you love without him having to talk about it or confront his sexuality

it’s such a mystery (the way you know me) by fleeceframe (20k)

So the man crouching in front of Castiel is named Dean. He wonders if that’s supposed to mean something to him.

“Cas must’ve got hit with something earlier. He just dropped like a sack of fucking potatoes a minute ago. By the time I was checking on him, he had already woken up again, but now he doesn’t fucking know who we are.”

“I’m right here you know,” Castiel says testily.

Sam’s eyes are wide even as his eyebrows are furrowed, and he looks between Dean and Castiel again.

“What do you remember, Cas?”

“Firstly, that I’m not Cas. I don’t know who Cas is, but it’s not me. I don’t know who either of you are, either."

or the one where castiel is hit with a memory curse that makes him forget the winchester brothers and is stunned to find out he has a family... also why can't he stop thinking about dean?

BEST amnesia fic oh my god. cas my beloved you deserve the world. everyone read this that is not a request.

More Than Ever by Sass_Master (20k)

Dean’s getting some pancakes together for breakfast when Cas saunters in after a run.

He’s trying to focus on whisking batter, unfairly distracted by Cas a few feet away, breathing heavily and shining with perspiration. Dean’s been painfully aware for a long time that Cas is pretty easy on the eyes, but he’s used to seeing Cas buttoned-up and unflappable, looking straight-laced in a stiff oxford and an unflattering trenchcoat.

Now Cas is sweating, Dean’s borrowed t-shirt clinging to his skin, flushed from exertion and Dean really can’t deal with that in his kitchen right now.

this entire series is really good i enjoyed it a lot, i’m just putting this one specifically on the list bc the rest of the series is very explicit and this is really good as a standalone for anyone who wouldn’t be into the rest of the series!!

Being Dean Winchester by Anonymous (20k)

"You should show me some respect. I dragged you out of hell. I can throw you back in."

Who the fuck was this bitchy "warrior of God" doing talking to him like that? Fuck Cas-tee-el and his dumbass trench coat and abrasive motherfucking attitude.

Dean was done with this shit.

***

Wherein a monster of the week steals the essence of Castiel's vessel, so he must use Dean, recently raised from hell, as a vessel instead.

it is at this point i realize that there are more fics than i expected there to be on this list that involves a threesome with only two people/using the presence of a female body to act like what’s happening is heterosexual. deangirlism is a disease 

I Shall Not Want by domesticadventures (20k)

His grace is burning out, and the wasteland it leaves inside him becomes an echo chamber for all the memories, all the fear and doubt and self-loathing he's collected over the years. Things said and done hound him on endless repeat until he's convinced they’ll break through his skin and fill the silence of the bunker.

His head is killing him, and he sits hunched over an open book, not really reading, just digging his fingers into his skull and praying nothing slips through the cracks.

this one is GORGEOUS i love it so so much. dean and cas are both struggling so much to get by and they’re trying to support each other but fucking it up and they have to grow together and learn to cope with the fact that this is where their lives are and they fall in love i need everyone to read this

To Boldly Go by 8daysuntiltheapocalypseiguess (24k)

Title: Just One of Those Things Author: Impala67 Series: TOS Rating: M Summary: Four years into their five-year mission, and all the planets start to look the same.

In which Dean is not Gene Roddenberry, but he does write Star Trek fanfiction.

mx winchester writing star trek fanfiction to process his own trauma <3 this is a wip but it’s SO good and i also have not consumed a single piece of star trek media so it IS definitely readable to anyone who isn’t a star trek fan. please read this

where the weeds take root by deathbanjo (30k)

“Are you happy? Y’know. Just—being here,” Dean says, gesturing to the yard with his beer bottle. “Being with—I mean, you used to fight in celestial wars and—and save the world. Now you’re growing vegetables and talking about chickens.”

this is on here just for the 1.5 people who were putting off this one like i did for no reason. it’s extremely good and it is just gentle. i enjoyed it a lot

Heroes for Ghosts by pantheon_of_discord (42k)

After Sam and Dean are arrested, Castiel is left alone and scrambling to find them. He knows they’re locked away in a government facility, and he’s still able to hear their prayers, but no matter how he tries Castiel can’t seem to track them. He chases leads and even attempts to hunt on his own, but Mary is AWOL, Crowley refuses to help, and Castiel’s options are running out.

Weeks pass, Castiel’s hope dwindles, and through it all Dean prays, keeping them connected. His voice is comforting, frustrating, and occasionally annoying, but in his solitude Castiel comes to cherish it. But then one day, without warning, Dean stops praying, and Castiel is forced to confront some uncomfortable truths about his feelings.

yall ever wonder what it would’ve been like if the sam and dean arrest storyline in s12 was interesting? yeah <3

Teaching Poetry to Fish by aeli_kindara (52k)

In which Castiel teaches poetry to fish. Also, himself. Also, eventually, Dean.

(A series-long story, diverging slightly from canon after S14.)

cas learning about humanity through poetry before dean and thats what led to him developing enough emotion to be lobotomized....cas i love you so much

Emergence by ellispark (58k)

Something’s been missing from Dean’s life for the past three years, a void left after a hunt gone terribly wrong. He often feels a sense of longing with no discernible cause, a need to talk to someone who isn’t there.

A call from an acquaintance leads Dean to James Novak, a man who disappeared more than a decade ago, and suddenly Dean gets the feeling he’s found what he’s been missing. But James isn’t really James — he’s the angel Castiel, who’s wanted by angels, demons and hunters alike. And he may be at the center of the storm that wrecked Dean’s life all those years ago.

another cool amnesia fic!! for unknown reasons everyone forgot cas three years ago but cas didn’t forget anything. cas deserves so much love and support. god

a turn of the earth by microcomets (95k)

Dean’s your typical half-orphaned, monster-killing 22-year-old until a trenchcoated stranger crashes into his back windshield one September night, claiming he’s an angel that knows him from the future and that he’s on the run.

Frigging fantastic.

(Or, in which Castiel gets stuck in Dean’s timeline preseries and Dean kind of hates it—until he doesn’t.)

cas getting to meet and fall in love with pre hell dean just as much as he loves the dean he already knows oh my GOD. i love this fic so much. turn of the earth my beloved

Crossing Lines by sometimeswelose (122k)

Two Deans, one Cas - it's not as sexy as it sounds

Or

An ethics lesson from Hell

Or

The one where Dean from the past meets Dean in the present. They're not sure they like each other very much.

deans intense self hatred vs cas’ unwavering love for every version of dean oh my GOD also this is a wip fair warning but it’s so worth waiting for updates i’m having such a great time with this one i cannot wait to see how it gets ended

Plot Holes by saltyfeathers (160k)

Of course it wasn’t over after the apocalypse.

There was season six. Then there was season seven. Against all expectations, there was season eight. There were the alphas and purgatory, and then the Leviathans, and then the angels fell. Enter season nine. Loose threads Metatron, Abaddon, and Crowley have to be tied up. Sam, Dean, and Cas have to try to tie them while at the same time dealing with their evolving relationships and newfound graceless states.

Amidst all the chaos, someone has started publishing the Supernatural novels again. Convinced there’s something amiss in the pages, Charlie starts her own quest to suss out the truth behind the Winchester Gospels.

With the help of various faces, old and new, they must now not only deal with the typical runs of demons and recently fallen angels, but also reconcile the battles raging inside themselves, as the fate of the world, once again, quite literally lays in the palm of their hands.

saltyfeathers said i WILL make the plot holes in this show mean something because the showrunners are sure as shit never gonna adress them ! and i thank them for it bc this was a really cool read

Casefic/Roadtrip Fic

Deprived Of Every Planet by KelpietheThundergod (9k)

Dean's breathing is audible in the scant space between them, irregular. The motel room is dark, pale blue shadows falling in through the gaps in the blinds. Throwing a pattern of uneven white stripes over the bunched up covers. Over Dean's fingers twisted in the sheets. One half of him in shadow, softened by the dark. The heat of his skin. The tremble of him under Castiel's touch.

He caresses a hand over Dean's chest, slowly. Dean's mouth falls open, his body arching into Castiel's touch. Castiel stops over Dean's heart. Through the fever of his desire, he rejoices about the wonder of experiencing another's heartbeat through one's own senses.

Dean gasps, but then he turns his face away and towards the dark. Eyes closed tight and brows furrowed like something is hurting him.

Castiel stills.

“Dean?”

the case is background on this one but it Does take place over the course of a case so im putting it here. god touchstarved dean trying so hard to work through his shit for cas head in my hands i love this fic so much

before and after breakfast by spocklee (10k)

The monster of the week is a ghost who hates meat, alcohol, and feeling yourself. Guess who it is during the commercials.

chapter 2 of this one.....god. dean and cas you are both so unwell <3 i love everything abt this fic everyone read it now

we shovel all the ashes out by xylodemon (15k)

Dean’s always known things were headed this way. He just figured getting dragged under would be cleaner and easier than jumping in feet-first.

fics that make you go Oh they love each other...also there’s lesbians in it literally what else could you want.

thunder road by dothraki_shieldmaiden (20k)

After Chuck is defeated and the Winchesters settle into life without God, Dean Winchester is bored.

OR: Dean and Cas take a road trip and figure out some stuff along the way.

this fic is just like. it’s kind! this fic is kind it’s just a pleasant experience and i enjoyed it thoroughly. they’re in love and it’s good

Suck It, Judy Garland by GlitterDwarf, midrashic (20k)

It had to be St. Louis. Or, the one where Sam and Cas get fake married for a case, and Dean loses his mind.

actually im gonna defend dean here imagine youre dean and cas gives what definitely sounded like a deathbed love confession while making eye contact with you and then immediately afterwards fake dates your brother. who among us would not have been a bitch about this

best friends without benefits by lizbobjones (20k)

It’s nearing three a.m. and they’ve been on the road a long time. Sam’s been asleep in the back seat since eleven. Giving up and handing the wheel over to Cas and letting the guy who doesn’t sleep drive had seemed like a good idea.

the premise of this fic is so funny. cas voice dean you want to fuck me so bad it makes you look stupid. everyone read this

the taste of gravel in the mouth by deathbanjo (22k)

This is what Cas gave up Heaven for: greasy diner food, shitty motel rooms with even shittier cable, long car rides spent in complete silence except for the same six tapes playing over and over again, and a burnt-out husk of a man who can barely hold a conversation anymore.

alt version of getting rid of the mark of cain, the darkness never happens. this one is VERY heavy but it’s so good and it has a hopeful ending. ive read this one twice and loved it both times

Someone Who’s Feeling For Me by ellispark (45k)

Dean sees her for the first time in nearly six years in some no-name town in Idaho, and it's panic at first sight.

Lisa Braeden, the one woman Dean ever actually had a shot at a real life with, back from where he buried her in his mind. And her hand is on Cas's arm like it's no big deal, like it belongs there. Cas, Dean's dorky, sweet, badass, angelic best friend, and he's just standing there next to Lisa and not moving her hand away.

Dean feels the jealousy rising, and it's not directed where he expected it to be. Because it takes this exact moment for Dean to realize he's in love with his best friend. He's in love with his best friend, and Lisa is looking at Cas like he's the best thing since automatic rifles, and Dean is utterly fucked.

hello op please contact me. please contact me and let me see the inside of your brain. this fic was an unparalleled experience and everyone should also go through it. i love it so very much

Bumper Cars by mansikka (111k)

Two teenagers are missing from an abandoned carnival, and there’s enough to raise suspicion that their disappearance involves a ghost. Dean, Sam, and Cas arrive in town to investigate, though what they find leads them away from those teenagers, and on the trail of a ghost story that churns up things from their past.

Can newly-human Cas, and Dean, with the help of shipper!Sam, work out the mystery behind the abandoned carnival and its ghost, and along the way, figure out the riddle that is them?

one of my absolute fav case fics it forces dean to confront some aspects of johns parenting and work through some shit and also him and cas fall in love and it’s really well done. love this one a lot <3

Finale Fix-its/Finale Denial

Sorry Jimmy by K_K_TiBal (2.1k)

Based on the tumblr textpost:

jellydeans: so are cas and jimmy novak just up in heaven existing at the same time katebushstandean: #jimmy moves to heaven timbuku so that dean stops trying to make out with him every time they run into each other at the heaven grocery store

this one is just extremely funny. local midwestern heterosexual man is forced to play relationship counselor to the dumbest gay people in existence because one of them wore his face

Dean Winchester Really Needs To Make Some Gay Friends by AreYouReady (2.2k)

“Like, I’m trying to think if I’ve had, I don’t know, crushes. If I ever had a gay thing before you came along and just didn’t notice,” Dean said.

Cas suddenly looked down, and away from Dean. If Dean didn’t know better, he would swear Cas looked guilty.

“What is it, Cas?”

“You have had several… gay things before.” Cas still wouldn’t look at him.

“What? When? How come you know this better than I do?”

There was no way the answer to this question wasn’t funny as hell.

dean learning about gay ppl via the memories of dean smith...incredible.

tiny difference (between ending and starting to begin) by sunforgrace (2.4k)

Sometimes Dean catches Cas staring at the sky.

It doesn’t happen often. Not when Dean’s around to tell, anyway. But often enough that he starts to notice.

Eventually Dean starts to recognize the pattern.

Cas just doesn’t watch the sky. He watches the birds.

Chuck is gone, Cas is human, and the world is safe. In the quiet aftermath Dean and Castiel find each other again.

i really don’t have much to say abt this one it is just very good and they love each other so much

Bring Home by cenotaphy (3.8k)

Dean's phone doesn't ring on the drive back to the Bunker, but that's okay. Because—well, maybe Cas lost his cell, what with getting shuffled back and forth between a cosmic void dimension and all. And anyway, Dean doesn't want this conversation to happen over the phone, he wants to—he wants to talk to Cas face-to-face. They should talk face-to-face.

Dean will tell him—

Dean doesn't know what he'll tell Cas. Dean is, in fact, terrified by how utterly and completely he does not know what he'll say to Cas.

cas being forced to face the consequences of sending the risky text that was despair <3

dean’s coworkers vs the heteronormative agenda by cowboydeanwinchester (4.1k)

Dean started working at a local auto repair shop in Lebanon, Kansas about a year ago. His coworkers don't know much about him. Except that he has a wife. Or maybe he doesn't. But he has a kid. Who is either a toddler or a high schooler. Who is either named Jack or Sammy. He also might have a best friend named Cas, but that also might be his wife.

Truth is nobody knows what to make of Dean.

obsessed w people not knowing a single fucking thing about dean because he talks so much and never explains anything. this fic is SO funny

Enhanced Extraction Techniques by goldenraeofsun (5.8k)

The Empty takes Meg’s shape, Samandriel’s, Duma’s, every one of the thousands of angels Cas killed up in heaven. But in the middle of lecturing Cas in the form of Balthazar, it explodes in a burst of light and sound.

Dean Winchester stands in the aftermath.

the empty playing mind games on an awake cas bc it can’t put him to sleep is a thing i like a lot and this is very very good 

Speak Silence No More by rea_sunshine (8.1k)

When Dean imagined this moment, it went like this:

Dean bursts into the Empty—guns blazing, chin high, righteous anger coursing through him. No matter what form his plans and fantasies and whiskey-drunk-whispered-promises took, he is always, always successful. When he imagined it, he was finally the hero Cas deserved.

The reality of the moment is this:

It’s fucking cold.

dean and cas STILL managing to not communicate with each other properly after the confession is so funny to me and this fic does it really well. also i like that a human being in the empty, where humans do NOT belong, had some like. consequences

my heart is a compass by lagaudiere (10k)

“There you are,” the Empty says, in Dean’s voice. It’s cold, like Dean’s eyes are cold, his expression set in contempt. It’s the expression Cas feared, he realizes, all the times he thought about saying it. Revulsion. It makes him feel sick in the way that goes beyond physical, here where there is nothing physical left.

The moment before it happened had been so sweet it covered up all the hurt. For years, Cas had been holding back those words, biting down on his tongue to keep from saying them. And now he had said it, and he knew that it was good, knew that it was worth it. But on the other side there is only this.

--

In the Empty, Cas dreams of his regrets, until someone comes looking for him.

one of thee best dean rescues cas from the empty fics out there i love the way his memories are written i love how many of them were ones that this fic came up with to give me new things to have brainworms over instead of just making me more fixated on He Watched Him Rake Leaves than i already am

killing time by orestespdf (11k)

It's been four years since Dean saved Cas from the Empty and confessed his feelings in return, and in their Vermont lakehouse, the retired couple is now learning how to heal. One morning, Dean gives Cas a haircut.

(A character study of Castiel.)

perfect fic perfect fic no notes no complaints they love each other so much and now dean is giving cas a haircut and they’re spending the day together. god.

and every time we kiss, i swear i can fly by knameless (14k)

Every time, Dean tells himself it’s the last.

--

aka, twelve times dean and cas kiss.

a just boy best friends kiss for every season <3 mwah

for which no words exist by MediaWhore (14k)

'a prayer for which no words exist' // richard siken

"Dear Cas who art in my bathtub, give me the strength to be honest about how I feel. For your sake and for mine. Forgive me all the times I wasn’t in the past, all the words I should have said but didn’t. And please stay. Please stay with me when all is said and done. Amen. "

Dean rescues a newly human Cas from the Empty. That's the easy step.

mediawhore i am in LOVE with you oh my god this fic. this fic. dean taking care of cas after rescuing him dean wrapping cas in a blanket oh my GOD

swimming with the fish pond fish by februyuri (17k)

Some time between Dean bleeding out on a makeshift hook in a barn in Ohio and Sam making marshmallows on his funeral pyre, Dean was brought back to life. By Castiel. Again. Dean agreed to it if only to give Jack time to work out the glitches up top. So, now Dean’s back in the land of the living and things are ... actually good, for once.

Or, as good as they can be when demons are attacking Earth, Dean’s failing to get over why he died in the first place, and Cas is suddenly, inexplicably taking every opportunity to casually tell Dean that he loves him.

this is a wip! but it is so good and so worth the read i love it a lot and am very excited for the last chapter. it IS pretty heavy though dean has a LOT to work through

looking like a true survivor (feeling like a little kid) by courfeyrac (20k)

"Jack’s a clever kid—has been ever since he was born, maybe even before that—but Dean’s pretty sure he hasn’t figured out where they’re going yet. And Dean’s… Dean’s excited about it. He remembers planning surprises for Sammy when they were little—saving up quarters and sneaking off to the arcade the year he turned seven, or slipping a book Dean had seen Sammy admiring into his jacket before sprinting out of the store the year he turned twelve. There was only so much Dean could give him back then, hindered by lack of finances and transportation and a father who paid attention. Now, though, Dean’s got a wallet full of cash, a tank full of gas, and the freedom to give his kid the kind of birthday he deserves."

Or, it's Jack's fourth birthday, and the kid wants to go to Build-A-Bear.

EVERYONE READ THIS RIGHT NOW. that is not a request this fic undid me. oh my god. oh my god. they’re a family and they’re going to build a bear and they love each other. oh my god. also no it isn’t a baby jack fic he is 4 and he is also alcal

what’s missing is found (our souls can exhale now) by sobsicles (27k)

It's not the first time Claire has ever gone missing. It is, however, the first time Kaia panics about it. Dean's dragged into the mess, but he soon finds that it's the best thing that could have happened to him.

~~~

"But have you ever just met someone and maybe it wasn't from the first moment, maybe it was after all these other moments that meant more than you ever expected them to, and it seems like your soul just—just—" Kaia makes a helpless gesture with her hands, pushing out, and she breathes out loudly. "Like it can finally exhale. And that person isn't guaranteed to make you happy, but they're—they're important. You just know it, you can't even escape it, you can't let them go. Ever met someone like that, Dean?"

"I—" Dean halts, his mouth hanging open. He's looking at Kaia, who's looking at him, and his heart is fluttering in his throat like a caged bird aching to soar again. His mind threatens to spiral out of control, but he focuses, swallowing hard. "Yeah. Um. I—yeah, I have."

deancas AND dreamhunter we love to see it also dean DOES smoke weed with kaia and apologizes for pulling a gun on her what more could you want in a fic

Command Me To Be Well by prospopeya (28k)

Dean did a lot of thinking about when and how he would get Cas back. Months of it, actually, stretching into a year, because while Sam and Eileen were settling into their new lives, Dean was stuck. He was stuck in a faraway corner of the bunker, dark and empty and hollow, ringing with the sound of a vibrating phone.

So when he falls to his knees in that same room, exhausted, hurting, breathless, and he feels a hand on his shoulder and looks up to see Cas, he realizes that he doesn't have a single clue about what to do now. Getting Cas out had been easy--actually, it'd been the opposite of that--but the planning of it, the methodical desperation of one attempt after the other had been a familiar rhythm. It'd been soothing almost, solid, something to focus on that wasn't Cas's eyes, watery and jubilant in a way Dean hadn't ever seen that up close on anyone, let alone Cas.

And now Cas is pulling him to his feet, and Dean's stumbling, and he instinctually grabs Cas's arm, and his hand lights up with a fire that he isn't prepared for.

"Hello, Dean."

oh post despair lack of communication....oh dean refusing to work through his feelings...this fic is incredible i love it everyone who enjoys dean doing everything in his power to avoid talking about feelings up to and including having sex with the guy who’s in love with him multiple times should read this

break the skin (to break the barriers) by sobsicles (29k)

The first time she meets him, he's nothing more than an almost-missed appointment.

SOBSICLES TATTOO FIC MY BELOVED. dean grieving and getting tattoos and it turns into tattoo therapy. im SO in love with mitzi it’s insane. requires some suspension of disbelief for how long a tattoo takes but it’s an incredible fic and an unparalleled experience. sobsicles does not miss

ascend by quiettewandering (53k)

Something in the world is wrong.

Demon activity is rising where mysterious black substance oozes and unusual ecological events are shaking the world. Dean, grief hanging on his shoulders, restlessly searches for answers that might lead him to the Empty… and to Cas.

But what Chuck wrote can’t be undone. The narrative thread pulls Dean along, forcing him to comply. Because once a story already has an ending, it can’t be rewritten.

Or can it?

SUPER cool concept i liked this a lot i’m pretty sure everyone’s read it already but just in case someone hasn’t you absolutely should

oh sooner or later it all comes down to faith by sobsicles (62k)

Getting used to Heaven is something of a marvel. It ain't perfect, and Dean thinks he'd hate it if it was, which is probably why it isn't.

~~~

"You don't understand," Dean whispers, exhaling shakily. "I know you don't, because even I don't. The instant you were gone, I wanted you back. Cas, I wanted you back. I wanted—I wanted—"

Cas stares at him, searching his face. After a moment, his own face falls slack, eyes widening just so. "Oh," he breathes out.

Dean wants to be furious that Cas has figured it out before he has—whatever it is—but he's not even that surprised. Cas knows him too well, always has, even more than Dean knows himself. He's been kicking Dean in the goddamn teeth with how deeply he understands him, even about the things Dean doesn't, ever since they first met. You don't think you deserve to be saved, that's what Cas had said. All bundled up in impossibilities and power, this being that looked at Dean Winchester and knew every single inch of him, as if he had a right to each part.

"What?" Dean grits out.

"I love you, too."

the ONLY heaven fic. i do not read heaven fics bc i refuse to budge in my finale denialism i refuse to read fic where it is accepted that dean dies. i was hesitant to read this but god im glad i did it was so good. literally the best possible outcome of dean dying

Endverse

final fantasy. by orange_crushed (1.9k)

“If I’d actually been born human, would I have gotten sick like everyone else? Would I be running around gnawing on the neighbors?” Castiel tilts his head up and even from here Dean can see the black ring of his pupils, wide and dark as dead stars. He’s high as fuck and he’s been loading the guns for forty-five minutes. He stares into the space where Dean is. He smiles and shows his teeth. “Maybe you’d have already put a bullet in my head.”

"This is why you don’t lead storytime anymore," Dean says. "This kind of shit."

endverse last night on earth fics are something that can be so personal actually. god

The Last Song by Moorishflower (3.5k)

The very last song is the Song of Solomon, and Castiel sings it only for Dean. Set in "The End."

this is like. pre endverse and the tone is so like. wistful? is the best word ive got? it’s gorgeous i love it but fair warning there is graphic description of like. viscera and infected wounds

to think that we could stay the same by cipherwriter (6.5k)

cas has all he needs; himself, his creation, and enough power to continue this cycle for a long time. he's fine. dean wants to take care of him anyway.

oh my GOD this one is good it’s based off the thing of how originally endverse cas was supposed to be just sitting in a room killing and resurrecting the same cockroach over and over. very bittersweet at some points i love it a lot, do not read it if youre looking for something happy though lmao

the first church at the end of the world by withbloodstainedclothingon (11k)

The angels don’t eat the brain. Only Croats do that.

this one is fucked but it’s incredible it contains very heavy and violent subject matter and cas is an Actual cult leader he doesn’t just have orgies it is SO well done and i had a great time reading it i recommend it very highly if the warnings sound like something you can stomach

Down to Agincourt by seperis (1.1 million. i know. yes it’s a wip)

There is no such thing as a guarantee when it comes to war.

The outcome's known. Why try? Return your rusty sword to battered sheath, bow your head and bend your stubborn knee. Why take the field when you cannot win the war? But Harry -- he went down to Agincourt.

PLEASE. i know the length is intimidating i KNOW it’s a very long fic but please. please read down to agincourt i am begging you. head in my HANDS this series is incredible.

Non Supernatural AUS

Long-Term Relationship by bendingsignpost (2.7k)

Castiel says, budging over to make room for Dean on the couch, “I thought we should have a serious talk about our relationship.”

Reflexively, Dean laughs.

Castiel does not.

“Uh, Cas... you know we’re not dating, right?”

look man it’s bendingsignpost okay. it’s bendingsignpost it’s good and it’s sweet and you should read it

One White Lie by komodobits (11k)

Castiel takes a deep breath and rings the doorbell. He doesn’t need to run through what he’s going to say – he’s already planned and edited and rehearsed it a thousand times. He is going to ask Dean Winchester out to dinner. If it’s not too forward, he’ll say, perfectly charming. You see, I’ve seen you around the neighbourhood and you always seem so earnest and I’d really like to get to know you bette— The door swings open, and Castiel panics.

He intends to excuse himself. He means to apologise and come back some other time. However, in a moment of blind fear, what comes out of his mouth instead are the words, “Could you spare a moment for Jesus Christ?”

do you ever pretend to be a jehovahs witness for months to hang out with the guy you like because you fucked up asking him out? yeah.

separate ways and sleeping dogs by sobsicles (53k)

Dean is three years sober when Cas comes back into town.

~~~

For a moment, they just stare at each other. Dean, once again, has to swallow the urge to offer to swallow something else. It's very hard to resist the gut-wrenching pull of want that hooks in his chest whenever he looks at Cas. And to think, he used to have him, used to be able to act on that want.

God, he's so fucking stupid.

Well, there's no point in kicking himself three years later for shit he can't change. He'll just sit right here and pretend that his fingers aren't twitching with the urge to reach out and touch. He can't do that anymore, and it's his own damn fault.

"Three years ago," Cas prompts.

Dean huffs a weak laugh. "Yeah. Eventful."

this fic hit me SO hard emotionally oh my god. don’t have much to say bc most of my thoughts on this fic are very personal but my god read this please

Everyone’s a Critic by Englandwouldfall (109k)

The one where uninspired chef Dean Winchester has a one night stand with the male (!) food critic who described the flavour of his garlic bread as 'closeted' and accidentally ends up dating him to try and prove that he's a kick ass chef, thank you very much.

(He may have a point about the 'closeted' thing).

this one is SO fun. dating the food critic who called your garlic bread closeted and lying about your career because you’re embarrassed and you want to redeem your food in his eyes but then you fall in love with him

Non Destiel Centric

gender? you mean that thing i have that pisses people off? by bigender dean winchester (homosexualitie) (946 words)

sam and dean paint each other's nails and dean abuses the technicalities of her gender. what more could you want? 

HELLO HE/SHE DEAN COMMUNITY oh my god the pure rush of euphoria reading this. oh my god. oh my god. 

the quiet road to a distant city by rottingbrains (1.2k)

Sam stares out the windshield again. They’re approaching a city, and she can see the lights in the distance. She’s past the danger zone, and she feels like the world around her reflects that in some way she can’t put into words- as if God is telling her that it’s okay. She did the right thing, and soon she will be past the lonely unknown and into the warm, forgiving light of acceptance. Or something. Come to think of it, the lights only look warm from far away, and she knows that the actual city will seem far less welcoming. Still. Best not to imagine the worst when it’s already going well.

required reading for transfem lesbian sam fans. fics that live in your ribcage to make your heart feel good

Four People Ruby Seduced & One She Actually Fell For (Or: Ruby's Epic Love Affair with Humanity in General and Sam in Specific) by tuesday (3.7k)

In which Ruby has a lot of sex, is not any kind of therapist that would be legal, and helps a few people out for her own reasons. (S4/S5 AU)

for everyone out there who enjoys ruby being a girlboss <3

Fractured Link by Trell (orphan_account) (5.5k)

Meg goes on, resolute despite the way Dean flinches, "He likes me. He likes me a lot, and I like him back, and that's probably good enough for both of us. But fuck me for saying so, Dean-o, he loves you, probably more than anything else on his daddy's green Earth, and you need to man up and give back what Clarence over there has been devoting to you for years."

this is meg/dean/cas which is not smth i really seek out but this was extremely good. set in s7 so it’s meg and dean and honey cas and it’s a lot of dean figuring his shit out and trying to forgive cas and i love meg a lot in this

[trenchcoatimpala]

Atonement

The air was colder. Dean didn’t mind. He liked the feeling of the wind biting at his skin, like a starved animal gnawing on a bone. It was no less than he deserved. He wasn’t exactly the poster boy for good decisions, but he really fucked up this time. There was a feeling in his gut, like he’d swallowed lead, and he felt lightheaded; nauseous. It wasn’t like he hadn’t screwed up before, but this time was just… different. 

Cas was God-knows-where and Dean missed him, Goddammit. He missed him and he was stupid because he couldn’t ever ask for what he wanted knowing that if he did he would never stop. He hadn’t expected to get as drunk as he had, just like he hadn’t expected the blue-eyed stranger with dark brown hair to eye him up. 

Dean was pretty good at keeping his attraction to men on the down low. Or at least, he thought he was. But when that man had approached him, Dean’s aching heart had reached for him and that was it. He was stupid for feeling guilty about hooking up with some random guy in some random bar off some random highway, but he did. 

It wasn’t like he and Cas were together, in fact Cas probably wouldn't even bat an eye at Dean’s actions. But it still felt like cheating. Dean hadn’t been with a guy since Sam was at Stanford, way before he even knew Cas. He’d had his fair share of hookups with women, hell he’d fucking lived with Lisa, but this time, because it was a guy, it was different. It was like he fucked up something he didn’t even know he was waiting to have. He wasn’t saving himself for Cas or anything, obviously that bridge was well and crossed, but since meeting Cas he hadn’t wanted to be with another guy. Now that he had it felt like he was getting over Cas. 

He didn’t want to get over Cas.

He didn’t want to go back to letting some schmuck in a bar bat their eyes at him and have him on his knees in the bathroom ten minutes later. That wasn’t the kind of guy he was. Not anymore, anyway. And that wasn’t what tonight was either, but he could see himself falling back into the pit, if only to keep himself from climbing out, because it was safer that way.

What he felt for Cas, he’d never felt for anyone before. It scared him as much as it excited him. For so long he’d thought he was broken, that he was never going to be able to love someone, but then Cas walked into his life in a shower of sparks and now… well, now he was in fucking love. And he fucked it up by being a desperate drunk looking for any kind of contact with another nameless drunk in another nameless bar. Whoopdee fucking do. 

So yeah, he deserved the fucking cold. He deserved to have forgotten his jacket on the backseat of his chair in that stupid bar. He deserved for Cas to personally smite him for breaking whatever the fuck they had in the first place. Because after what he did, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to look at Cas again without shame boiling in his blood. 

Cas wouldn’t know. There was no way he could. He didn’t do that mind meld thing unless Dean let him. But the guilt would probably eat at him, and he’d be able to endure it for a while, possibly years, but eventually he wouldn’t be able to do it anymore. 

He felt dirty, like he’d just gone ten rounds in some trucker's backseat instead of the comfort of a random guy’s apartment. Maybe that was it. The fact that he’d let the guy bring him to his apartment, let him take him apart slowly, like they were actually… something. And he’d been eager to do it, so eager he forgot his fucking jacket. It didn’t feel like a hookup with a stranger, it felt familiar. Dean had killed lots of things, been face to face with Gods and demons and the full wrath of Heaven, but none of that had him trembling in fear like this. 

Dean would never see the guy again, but he was certain he would never forget him either. The blue-eyed man who had looked at him kindly, who had loved him tenderly, who wasn’t Cas, would plague him for the rest of his pitiful life. And there it was, under the fear was revelation. He’d wanted the first person to look at him like he was worth something, to touch him without recoiling like they’d been burned, to see him not as something to be fixed but as something to be cradled gently, knowing that his box was just marked ‘fragile, handle with care’’, to be Cas. 

The man in that bar had shown him more tenderness than Dean had ever thought he’d deserved, and certainly more than he’d ever gotten from a one night stand. That was what was eating at him. He’d allowed someone else to start to stitch him back together, to close the gaping holes in his ravaged mind, to make him feel like more than just a warm body that was the latest in a long line. 

It was supposed to be Cas, only Cas. He wasn’t supposed to let anyone else in. He’d failed. And letting the bitter December air claw away parts of his barely protected core was the least he could do to atone for giving away the one thing he wasn’t supposed to let anyone but Cas have.

tag list, ask to be added or removed

@undeadcas @tearsofgrace @hellerstiel @casgetoutofmyass0907 @wantstoflyafraidtofall @gayhuckleberryinatrenchcoat @thepixelagora  @thelahatiel  @im-sam-fucking-winchester @piebook67 @bestiarum @theedeangirl @november5th @bixlasagna @ancient-fangirl @famouspsychicpizzabandit @you-cant-spell-subtext-without @bumbledumble1 @cascigarette @addicted2demons @our-stars-graveside

[babygirlwolverine]

For day 4 of @drgarth and @starrynightdeancas (that’s me) B&B Holiday Advent Calendar Event

Take a Family Photo // Ugly Christmas Sweaters // “We Wish You a Merry Christmas”

Dean looked down at the last sweater on the table in a mixture of horror and dismay. “No. There’s no way I’m putting that monstrosity on,” he said, poking at a sleeve that was striped with bright red and green patterns.

“Yes you are, Dean,” Cas said, the plastic light bulbs hanging from his sweater clacking as he picked up the Christmas sweater and held it out to Dean. “Jack desperately wanted to do this. Are you really going to go to his room right now, where he’s putting on a little Santa hat, and tell him no? Are you trying to break my child’s heart?”

“Oh my God,” Dean said, throwing his head back and casting his eyes up to the ceiling. “You’re really laying it on thick today, aren’t you? Where’d you learn to guilt trip like that?” he huffed, reaching out and snatching the hideously ugly sweater from Cas’ hands.

Cas just grinned at him, sly and teasing, and God, Dean shouldn’t be so gone on the angel, he really shouldn’t. But instead of hurling the sweater in Cas’ face, Dean slipped an arm around Cas’ waist and pulled him into a kiss. “You’re lucky I love you,” Dean murmured against his mouth.

“So you’ll wear the sweater for the family photo?” Cas asked, leaning back slightly with a little smirk on his lips.

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll wear the tacky reindeer sweater,” he mumbled, once again cursing himself for his tendency to do anything that made his family happy. “Only because if I have to see you pout and Jack pout, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to survive.”

Cas laughed, happy and infectious, and just as Dean leaned in to feel that laugh pressed against his mouth, Jack came bounding into the room with Sam and Eileen right behind him.

“It’s family picture time!” Jack cheered, bouncing over to Cas before readjusting his Santa hat before it slipped off his head. “Dean, are you wearing your sweater?”

“Putting it on right now, Kiddo,” Dean said, a smile tugging at his lips as he looked at Jack. With his ugly sweater and velvet Santa hat, the kid looked ridiculous and yet happier than Dean had ever seen him. If it kept that smile on Jack’s face, then yeah, Dean could handle the embarrassment of wearing a reindeer sweater with little lights between the antlers for a family picture. Especially if Sam was also wearing the same ugly sweater.

Tugging off his flannel and pulling the sweater over his tshirt, Jack cheered happily and announced something about putting on Christmas music before disappearing from the room.

“I look ridiculous,” Dean muttered, dropping his head onto Cas’ shoulder.

With a smile, Cas leaned in and pressed a quick little kiss to Dean’s cheek. “I think you look attractive.”

“Says the guy who walks around in a trenchcoat every day,” Dean teased lightly.

“You love my trenchcoat,” Cas shot back, hands snaking around Dean’s waist until they were tucked into their own little embrace.

Dean hummed, admitting defeat. “Yeah, I do,” he replied, attempting to kiss Cas again. But just as he leaned in, music began to play and the first chords of ‘We Wish You a Merry Christmas’ floated into the room.

“Now it’s perfect,” Jack said, appearing at Dean’s side with a grin. “Picture time!”

Disentangling himself from Cas’ warmth, Dean reached out to ruffle Jack’s hair and set the Santa hat more evenly on top of his head. “Yeah, Jack, it’s picture time.”

Gathering around the tree in the middle of the War Room, they all huddled in close as the old fashioned camera Sam had found clicked and a light flashed; taking the perfect picture of their little found family.

[whelvenwings]

Up to Date?

Length: ~5k Tags: Canon Divergent, Y yo a ti Cas timeline, Misunderstandings

It's three months after Castiel was brought back from the Empty after confessing his love to Dean, and things are awkward between them. They haven't talked about it. Castiel can feel how much Dean wants to, but he won't let himself, and Castiel can only wait. But one night, with Castiel halfway across the world, he gets a text from Dean that might change everything - even if Dean didn't quite mean it to.

Castiel

It was just awkward. Castiel couldn’t deny it. Things between himself and Dean were definitely awkward.

Three months back on Earth, safe from the Empty with a little help from the Winchesters and from Jack – but Castiel and Dean still hadn’t talked about it. The things that Castiel had said – and what Dean had said in return.

I love you. Me too, Cas.

Castiel knew he should have expected this, the awkwardness. Hadn’t he known Dean long enough, at this point, to be able to predict him? And there was nothing more predictable than Dean not wanting to talk about something.

Still, it hurt. There had been that shining moment of happiness, if a word as soft as happiness was even the right way to describe the feeling of absolute blazing corrosive joy that Castiel had felt when Dean had told him that his feelings were reciprocated. And now, there was just… silence.

It was awkward.

And Castiel didn’t know what to do. Was Dean waiting for him to say something? But Castiel had already said it all. It was Dean who’d only managed to choke out a few words, Dean who must have more to say. And yet he said nothing. Days were slipping past full of staring and loaded sentences and quietness.

The fact that it was all so familiar didn’t make it any better. Castiel wanted something different. It had been different before they’d said anything out loud, but – but there had been something about hearing Dean say those words, me too, Cas, that had changed everything.

He didn’t need much. Nothing grand or unusual, only something to ease the tension. Even if it was just an expression on Dean’s face that acknowledged what had passed between them, instead of pushing it away.

But Dean… Castiel knew it was different for him. There were things that Dean didn’t allow himself, for a tangle of reasons that Castiel only barely understood. Dean didn’t let himself touch. Dean didn’t let himself speak. Dean didn’t let himself look.

But Dean wanted to.

Castiel knew Dean wanted to. So many aching years that Dean had longed for him, and Castiel had been able to feel it like a prayer – and not some soft and murmured thing, a prayer of an older kind, something raw and wordless and desperate. Something on its knees. Castiel could feel the yearning in Dean. It would have been so simple for Castiel to offer touch, but Dean hadn’t ever really let him. And Dean still wasn’t letting him.

And Castiel could still feel the longing.

When they were together, and when they were several thousand miles apart, too. It was there. Never any quieter or gentler, not even from far away. It always touched the same place in Castiel’s grace that it had done from the start. And the feeling of it was just the same, too, like being doused in oil and dropped into flames that reached and hoped and hungered.

Beautiful fire. A beautiful prayer. Castiel wanted to answer it. Dean behaved as though he didn’t know it was there.

The tension in the bunker had become too much, last night, and Castiel had abruptly left with just a quick text to Dean.

> I’m going to look for the artifact Sam read about in Seoul. It shouldn’t be left unguarded.

The artifact was probably just a trinket, if Castiel was being honest with himself, and its significance paled in comparison to everything they’d been through, but it was a reason to get away from everything and give himself a break. It would have only taken Castiel moments to find the artifact if he’d wanted, but he drew it out. He walked rather than flying, pacing the streets of Seoul, following up on the leads that Sam had found. His grace hummed and sighed against Dean’s prayer.

He hoped that when he returned, something might be different. That he and Dean could talk. Maybe even – as he walked down a side-street with neon lights that glowed through the drizzling rain, Castiel allowed himself a wry little smile. Maybe even do something together. Go somewhere. Go on a date.

A date. To a human the word would probably sound little, and normal, and silly for an angel to be thinking about. But to Castiel, it just sounded like something new.

And it was so easy, somehow, to picture Dean coming into the bunker's kitchen, pointing at Castiel semi-aggressively, and saying, so. You, me, date. Up for it?

Would that be how Dean would phrase it? Castiel tried it a few different ways in his head. Down for it? How about it? You in? Each time, the Dean in Castiel's mind looked almost angry as he waited for an answer. Each time, Dean's face softened when Castiel said, yes.

So easy to imagine. So out of reach. Castiel walked on through Seoul, the rain starting to thrum down harder.

–––––

Dean

It was awkward.

Dean knew it was awkward, and he wasn’t thinking about it – he wasn’t. Except when Cas did stupid shit like ditching the bunker without warning, leaving just some handwritten note like a kid sneaking out of his tent at summer camp, it made it kind of harder to ignore.

Staring down at the note in the bunker’s library, Dean pressed his lips together and read it over again, his eyes scanning the words while his brain paid no attention to them, lost in thought.

There was something so ridiculous about it all. The moment between them, the – whatever it had been, when they’d admitted their crap to each other – it felt so overblown to look back on. Sure, Cas had had to summon the Empty, he’d had to get all deep just to save Dean’s hide. But Dean… what he’d said had just been stupid. No point to it. Dean cringed when he thought about it.

Me too, Cas.

The words were so little like something Dean would ever say that they might as well have been in a foreign language. Me too, Cas? That kind of thing didn’t have to be said. Because obviously, him too. But what were they supposed to do about it? Buy each other flowers? Feed each other chocolates? God forbid – hold hands?

Dean felt a little hot rush in his chest just thinking about it, and an accompanying stab of guilt. What were they, seventeen? They were old. Too old for flowers and chocolates. Too old for holding hands. And too old for this weird tension between them, Jesus. Who got nervous and tongue-tied and awkward around a crush at Dean’s age?

Who called it a crush at Dean’s age?

Dean, sat in the library at the bunker, dropped the note Cas had left and picked up his phone. Practicalities. Just focus on the practicalities. He should at least make sure Sam had kept Cas up to date with the latest research about the artifact that might be hidden in Seoul.

Dean tapped on the screen of his phone for a few seconds, holding it a little further away from his eyes than he used to have to do. He read over what he’d typed once, and then hit send.

–––––

Castiel

Castiel’s phone hummed.

With a little clench in his gut, Castiel stepped under the cover of a dark doorway to get out of the rain, and pulled it out of his pocket. Dean’s name was on the screen, obviously. There was the usual leap of excitement, tinged with a familiar sinking feeling in his chest. Dean would probably be angry with him for leaving.

With a stoic line to his jaw, Castiel opened the text, knowing it couldn’t be anything good.

> So. You up to date?

Castiel stared down at his phone.

No… no. He couldn’t have read that right. He blinked, and tried it again.

It still said the same thing.

You up to date?

Dean had just asked Castiel if he was… up to date? If he… wanted to date?

However many times Castiel reread the text, it said the same thing. Castiel stood absolutely still, his eyes puzzling out the letters of Dean’s message again and again.

It was – it was just the way Castiel had imagined it, if not word perfect. The brusque tone, the question. Castiel, half in shadow in a porch in rainy Seoul, stared down at his phone as if it had just promised him the moon.

Dean had just asked Castiel if he was up for dating.

Via text. Obviously. Maybe all this time, it had just been that trying to talk face-to-face had been too much. Maybe Castiel should have left for halfway across the world months ago.

Castiel could feel his heart pounding. He couldn’t stop himself reading Dean’s question, over and over again.

–––––

Dean

When the text from Cas finally came back, Dean snatched up his phone. It wasn’t that he’d been sitting and staring at it, waiting for a reply – he’d just got a little lost in thought, was all, wondering where Cas was and why he wasn’t answering sooner.

The text, though, when Dean read it, put a frown on his face.

> I’m so glad you asked. Yes, I would love to.

Wait. What? Dean checked over what he’d said himself in his first text, just to be sure he hadn’t made some kind of a typo. Nope, he’d definitely just asked if Cas was up to date with the artifact.

So, Cas would love to… what?

Cas was glad he’d asked about what?

None of it sounded like the answer to a simple question about research on an artifact, at all. Maybe Cas was just in the middle of something, and misread Dean’s text. Not something that had ever happened before, but still. Whatever.

Dean circled his thumbs over the keyboard on his screen, and then typed a reply.

< Love to do what

Keep it simple, he figured.

He sat puzzling over Cas’ first message as he waited for a reply. So glad you asked. What did that even mean? Was Cas ever particularly glad when Dean asked anything?

The reply came back quickly, this time.

> Anything you want to do. :) Maybe just going to a bar?

Dean squinted down at his phone.

Anything he wanted to do about what? A bar?

Was he losing it? Dean reread the text over and then over again, and looked back up their conversation to try to make Cas’ reply make sense. The emoticon was typical enough, even though Dean hadn’t seen a smiley one in a while. The way it made his chest squeeze was ridiculous. It was just a smile. And it just followed the words, anything you want to do.

Before he could let his mind run too far with what exactly that could mean, Dean texted back in confusion,

< You want to go to a bar?

There was something about this conversation that was making his heart beat harder. Come on, he told it. What, you can face down the end of the world more than once and a little text conversation still has you like this?

Ignoring his solid logic, Dean’s heart only raced faster when Cas texted back,

> Yes, of course. Unless you think it’s a bad idea?

So… Cas wanted to go to a bar? With Dean?

That was – well, it wasn’t that strange on Dean’s personal spectrum of strange to not strange these days. Fighting Death and God and God’s sister and all the rest of it kind of put a bunch of other strange crap way down the list. But this was still… weird. Not bad weird, necessarily.

But how had they got here, why were they talking about this? What kind of a bar, why? Dean had just wanted to check up on Cas in a few brief words and suddenly they were making evening plans? Cas was making no sense. Was he doing it on purpose? Dean read the whole conversation over again, and pulled a face of utter and annoyed confusion for the benefit of no one, and shook his head.

He thought about it, and licked his lips, and shook his head again.

And then thought some more, and made a hand gesture, as if asking of no one, what the fuck.

He texted out,

< What do u mean

He stared down at the text for a second, and then deleted it, and tried instead,

< Why are we talking about this

He didn’t even read that one over again before deleting it. He made another face, and then quickly typed and sent,

< But you’re in Seoul

However they’d arrived at the idea of going to a bar, it didn’t particularly matter when Castiel was thousands of miles away. Had deliberately ditched, in fact, which was more of an obstacle to them having a nice evening out tonight than the distance between them, but Dean wasn’t going to say that directly.

> Only for a short while longer. I’ve almost completed the search for the artifact. Then I’ll come back :)

Another damn smiley face, another little lift in Dean’s chest. Look at him. Fully grown, and soft over the idea of his best friend looking forward to spending an evening together. Yikes.

Practicalities. Dean fired off another text.

< Okay... you just wanna talk or what

If Cas was going to try to insist that they talk about stuff, well – the drinks would probably be a good place to start, but Dean would need to psych himself up to the idea of trying to explain anything at all that had happened between them. Me too, Cas. He kept hearing himself say it and wanting to bury his head in his hands. What had he been thinking. What had Cas been thinking, when he’d decided on Dean. That had to earn the award for the worst fucking choice in the history of the world.

Dean’s phone buzzed in his hands.

> I think talking is what people usually do on a date. But we don’t have to if you don’t want to.

Dean’s eyes went wide.

–––––

Castiel

Across the world, in the porch in Seoul, Castiel watched as Dean’s little typing bubble with three dot dot dots appeared, and disappeared, and reappeared.

He tried to quiet the excitement in his chest, tried to remind himself that Dean had just implied fairly heavily that he wouldn’t want to talk on their date – which wasn’t unexpected for Dean, but it did leave Castiel wondering what else Dean might want to do.

A thought occurred to Castiel about something they might be able to do without talking, and he swallowed, and felt his hopes fly higher.

Or perhaps Dean just wanted to sit together in silence. That would be alright, too. Companionship in the quiet. When he thought about it, Castiel knew it would be more than enough just to sit by Dean in a bar and drink together, knowing that they were both choosing to be there. Even if they didn’t say a single word the whole evening, even if Dean didn’t so much as look at him the whole night. They could spend the date speechlessly. But it would be a date. It would be an acknowledgement. Maybe it would ease a little of the longing that Castiel felt and felt and felt from Dean, burning.

Finally, a text from Dean came in.

> Wait what

Wait, what?

Castiel felt his heart sink.

There was something wrong. That tone, just two stark words – something wasn’t right. Castiel scrolled back up their conversation. Had he accidentally said something rude? He couldn’t find it, reading the texts over and then over again. He’d used emoticons to show that he was happy. Had they seemed sarcastic?

Did it seem as though Castiel didn’t really want to go on a date? Or that he wouldn’t really be content for them to not talk on the date? Hurriedly, Castiel began typing again.

< I mean it. We don’t have to say anything. I just want to be there with you.

It was the kind of text that Castiel would ordinarily type out and then delete because it was too forthright, too emotional, too much for Dean – but this time, he just hit send before he could think about it. Worse than Dean being grossed out by Castiel openly having feelings was the idea of Dean not knowing that Castiel really did feel those things.

There was a long silence. Castiel stood still, waiting for Dean.

How many times had he stood, quiet, expectant, wanting Dean to be ready, hoping he would be ready, prepared to wait for an eternity until he was? In the span of Castiel’s own lifetime, he’d waited just a blink of an eye. But somehow this blink had been torturously slow. A torture Castiel would have fought to the death before trading.

Castiel’s phone hummed.

> You really want to go on a date

Castiel stared down at the screen. He couldn’t tell if the tone was judgemental or vulnerable. He blinked, and thought hard – and then, with a little shake of his head and hard press of his lips, he made a choice.

Quite suddenly, the street in Seoul was empty.

–––––

Dean

Dean almost fell out of his chair when Cas appeared opposite him in the bunker.

“Shit!” Dean swore, grabbing the table in front of him with one hand. He watched as Cas tilted his head just slightly sideways at Dean’s other hand, instinctively on the butt of his gun.

He eased his hold.

“Could’ve killed you,” Dean mumbled. Cas smiled wryly.

“You could have tried,” he said.

Dean swallowed. Right. Angel powers were all the way back up, these days.

“You’re back,” he said blankly, just to say something, because immediately leaving the room didn’t seem like it would be a good idea – however much the nervousness in his brain was insisting that this conversation wasn’t going to go well, and he needed to bail.

“Yes.” Cas lifted his phone up to face Dean, so that Dean could read their conversation on the screen. Dean glanced over it. It was strange seeing his own words on the left side of the screen, almost embarrassing. “What does this mean?” Cas asked.

Dean got to his feet, feeling too low down still in his chair.

“Uh…” He watched Cas warily, while trying to keep his tone light. “You tell me, Cas.”

“No,” Cas said firmly. “You asked me if I really wanted to go on a date.”

“Yeah,” Dean said.

Cas stared at him, clearly expecting more. Dean tried waiting him out for a few seconds in silence, hoping Cas would say something else, but Cas had that determined look in his eye that told Dean he was going to have to be the one to say something.

“What about it?” Dean said.

“What does the question mean?” Cas asked.

“Well, Cas, it’s kind of all right there. In the message.”

“You just asked if I really want to go on a date,” Cas said again.

“Yeah,” Dean said. “So, do you?”

It was all wrong. His tone was all wrong. It was aggressive, and blunt. He sounded outright angry at the idea that Cas might actually want to go on a date, and that tone didn’t even vaguely map over the ridiculous leap in his chest at the idea of a date together.

But somehow, Cas’ shoulders were dropping, and his face was relaxing, as though – as though that was what he’d been expecting to hear. Or even what he’d been hoping to hear.

“Yes,” Cas said.

Dean felt his mouth fall slightly open and his eyes go wide, and he looked away.

He could feel his breath suddenly coming a little short. He tried to stand very still and be very quiet so that Cas wouldn’t see what that one-word answer had meant. How much it had shaken Dean.

It was only when he heard the yes that he realised just how little he’d expected to ever hear it.

Cas wanted to date. The hot rush in Dean’s chest was back, and the accompanying punch of guilt readied itself… but held back. Because Cas had said yes.

He’d said yes.

“Is that a surprise?” Cas said, his tone dry but not unkind. Dean swallowed, and managed a smile when he looked back over.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Oh.” Cas looked confused. “But… I told you…”

“I know.” Dean shrugged. “I didn’t know if you’d wanna do any of that crap, though. Human stuff.”

He saw something clear on Cas’ face, as though something that had been weighing on him had suddenly been lifted.

“Ah,” he said. “Well… I do. Want to.”

Dean nodded, once, a little sharply. God, he had no idea how to do this. And it didn’t help that he could feel things moving inside him, shifting, like walls crumbling, like stuff he’d smothered finally elbowing its way up to be felt – a blazing feeling, a hurting feeling, a wanting. Somehow both familiar and terrifying.

“Okay,” Dean managed aloud.

“As long as you still want to,” Cas said.

Still? Had Dean ever actually told Cas that he wanted to go on a date? Maybe he’d just been that obvious. Or maybe Cas had actually been able to guess what Dean wanted from the way Dean had said me too, Cas, even though Dean hadn’t been able to guess what Cas wanted in spite of literally being told I love you.

“Do you?” Cas asked, when Dean was silent for a second too long.

That wanting feeling, that hot tense ache that almost had Dean’s teeth gritting against it at this point, it was demanding a yes. It was saying go, go over there, what are you waiting for now? But Dean swallowed it. He couldn’t just have that. He couldn’t. Could he?

“Well,” he said. “I dunno. I mean. We are kinda old for it. Aren’t we?”

Dean watched Castiel consider it, his heart thudding.

“I’m fairly old,” Castiel said, “yes. But I think I’m still allowed to try new things.”

“New things,” Dean echoed.

“Yes.”

“Like… dating.”

“Yes,” Castiel said. “If you want to.”

“And like…” Dean went to say something else, and then stipped himself. Too many things all rushing to the front at once. Too many possibilities. Too many things that he’d given up thinking he could ever have. Too many things he’d told himself it was right that he didn’t have, because it’d be embarrassing if he did.

But now, here was Castiel, standing in front of him and saying he wanted to go on a date. Watching Dean quietly, waiting for him to finish what he’d started to say.

“Like…” Dean said, and then stopped again, and shook his head. “I don’t know, Cas. I’m not… you know.”

“You don’t want to?” Castiel said, the question spoken so neutrally that Dean knew it came with effort – Castiel’s muscles had to be heaving with holding that door open for Dean to leave through, if he wanted. But Castiel was still holding the door. Still saying, if you don’t want to, you don’t have to.

“No, I – yeah. I mean, I – yeah, I want to,” Dean said, saying the last part to the floor. His chest felt as though it was going to crack open. He wanted walk around the table between him and Cas, and drop to his knees, and just ask Cas with his eyes to touch him, anywhere, anyhow, gentle or not. “Just… I mean, look at us. Are we really gonna fit with any of that crap?”

He couldn’t imagine them trying to do the usual sweet romantic stuff. Dates and gifts and cards and flowers. So stupid after everything they’d been through, like sticking heart-shaped bows on the muzzles of two rusting guns.

“What kind of crap?” Castiel asked.

“You know. The whole schtick. Lovey-dovey crap.” Dean mumbled it, aware that even in describing it he sounded ridiculous. Lovey-dovey? Christ.

“I thought we could just try things out,” Castiel said. “And see if we can do them our way.”

“But what if it doesn’t work,” Dean said, making an attempt not to sound too wretched. He watched Castiel, waiting for him to give up, to say this was already too much work, that it wasn’t worth it, and they should just carry on going as they had been.

“Then we try something else,” Castiel said.

“Right,” Dean said, with an almost-laugh. “And we just do that over and over, huh.”

“If you’d like.”

“You’d seriously be okay with just keeping on trying forever?” He said it as if it were a joke.

“Yes,” Castiel said. “Of course.”

Dean went quiet. The expanse of the table between them was far, much too far. He stuck his hands in his pockets and nodded, because he didn’t know what else to do.

Cas saying that he’d keep trying forever was absurd. What was even more absurd was that Dean actually believed him. Cas had that look on his face, the one that allowed no argument, not angry or proud, just – sure. Certain.

If nothing they did together felt right, Cas would stick by him and keep trying new things. Forever.

Dean felt a part of himself breathe out, and with it went the last of the wall. Now Dean was immolating, standing still in the library of the bunker, just burning and burning with wanting to be touched by Cas, and –

As Dean watched, Cas’ jaw was tightening, as though he too were holding himself back against what he needed.

They stared at each other over the table. You first, Dean begged him silently. Please, just come here, just come here.

Cas’ blue eyes were locked with his, trying to say something Dean couldn’t hear.

“Cas,” Dean said, into the silence.

Cas watched him, waiting.

Dean’s mind was a blank. He didn’t know how to take this feeling, this all-encompassing burning wanting yearning feeling, and turn it into words. He didn’t know how to ask for what he wanted without accidentally putting it out of his own reach in the asking. He didn’t know how to want in the way that received, only in the way that was hopeless.

And Cas only looked at him and waited.

Dean opened his mouth.

“I don’t know,” he said. Cas’ expression flickered, but he didn’t move. “I – you – Cas, Jesus, I don’t know how to do this.”

“Do you want me to go?”

“No,” Dean said quickly, immediately.

“Do you want me to stay here?”

“Yeah. I mean…” Dean swallowed. “No.”

Now Cas looked confused.

“Do you want me to…” Cas paused, puzzling it out. Dean watched him thinking, if I shouldn’t go, and I shouldn’t stay, then…?

“Cas,” Dean said, “come here.”

Cas blinked, and Dean watched the slope of his shoulders change, watched the way Cas’ eyes lightened with a sudden hope. He watched Cas take a step around the table, and then another, slowly, as though afraid to scare Dean off.

Dean couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t speak. His hands were too big. He’d just asked Cas to come to him, and Cas was coming to him.

He couldn’t wait any longer. Dean moved, quickly, decisively, making for Cas as Cas came towards him, needing to be close and needing it now, and then – and then they were in front of each other in the bunker library, they were right in front of each other, standing with their hands by their sides and looking at each other. And all Dean could think as he looked at Cas was,

This is so heavy, it’s too much, it means too much.

And all Dean’s furiously thudding heart wanted was touch, anyway, no matter what it meant.

Cas reached up a hand, and gently – so gently – put it against Dean’s cheek.

Dean held his head up for a long moment, trying to keep himself together, keep it all in, be still, be silent. He gritted his teeth against the feeling in his chest, against the blazing of his happiness –

And then, he let go.

He closed his eyes, and breathed out. And leaned into the touch.

“I love you,” he heard Cas say.

“You shouldn’t.”

“I love you,” Cas said again, more determinedly, and Dean felt Cas’ forehead press to his own.

The touch of him was better than absolution. It was beautiful. It was perfect. Dean could feel the love of it running through him, easing the rusted gritty parts of him that had thought all this beyond him, and he wanted to gasp through the feeling of it like he was swimming through cold water. If he’d tried ten minutes ago to imagine Cas saying I love you to him again, Dean would have imagined it so sweet and unlike them. But this, this was happening. Cas’ forehead against Dean’s. Cas’ voice saying those words, I love you. And it felt real.

It felt like him, Dean, and it felt like Cas. This was who they were. This was how they loved each other.

“Me too,” Dean said. “Me too, Cas.”

He leaned forwards, and kissed Cas.

They didn’t go to the bar, in the end. They found they had enough to do without going out.

–––––

Dean

The next morning, in the kitchen, Dean turned to Cas and said casually,

“By the way, you never actually said. Are you up to date with the new research on the artifact? We should probably still try to find the damn thing.”

“Am I up to…”

Dean watched as Cas’ expression changed. It went from slight confusion, to sudden horror – and finally settled on a kind of dry acceptance.

“What?” Dean asked.

Cas came to stand by Dean, and because he could, Dean leaned forwards and kissed him again. His heart raced as he did it. Cas kissed him back, and Dean felt as though gravity probably shouldn’t be holding him down at this point.

“I, um,” Cas said. “When you texted me yesterday… I thought when you asked me that, you were asking me on a date.”

Dean’s brain took a second to catch up – and then he pressed his lips together to hold in a laugh. Cas tilted his head to one side.

“Don’t,” Cas said.

“I wouldn’t,” Dean said.

“Dean…”

“I’ll never mention it again.”

“I thought…” Cas closed his eyes, his head dropping as he smiled again at his own misunderstanding, and Dean let himself laugh. He reached out and put a hand on Cas’ shoulder, still a little tentative, still feeling his heart sing with the ability to touch. Cas leaned in, their bodies swaying together slightly.

“I love you,” Dean said, the words flowing up out of him like water from a spring, so easily, so naturally. He felt the immediate seize of panic afterwards, hearing those three words said in his own voice, out of his own mouth – but he couldn’t regret them, not when he saw Cas’ head lean back again, his blue eyes glowing with happiness.

“I love you,” Cas answered him. “I love you.”

[finaledenialist]

(blame this post by @lobotomycastiel and tumblr tags limit)

It's almost august, and Sam is worried.

Dean simultanously can't bear to look at the kid and he can't leave him out of his sight. This leads to carrying Jack with him when he goes shopping, or for a walk in the forest. And Jack loves the forest. It's calm and the wind hums gently through the branches. Sometimes a bird chirps in the bushes. It's peaceful and for the longest time those long walks with Jack were the only times the little one was able to fall asleep, so they kind of became a habit; a sort of tradition; even after a few weeks when Jack finally learnt how to sleep in his cradle. Which obviously is in Dean's room because he is not. letting. Jack. out. of his. sight. Because he is the antichrist you know. The devil's son. Evil incarnated. That's why Dean has to keep an eye on him even if looking at him is the last thing he wants to do. At least that is of course how Dean excuses this to himself.

Then there are grocery runs. Dean made sure the Impala is safe for the kid and just drives with him safely tugged in the backseat. Jack absolutely loves those drives. He is looking in awe through windows at the passing world with his big doe eyes that not at all remind dean of C--  

No. On their way back Jack usually falls asleep in 5 minutes. Their way home sometimes lasts way over 2 hours because Dean just likes  to drive okay there is nothing wrong with a guy wanting to calm his thoughts and have a moment to himself in his own car right? That is not at all about the fact that Jack sleeps so peacefully and he looks so cute and innocent and Dean doesn't want to disturb it.  So he drives and he drives and he drives. Sometimes he stops somewhere to look at the view or something and sometimes his eyes wander up to the sky, to the heaven's above and Dean doesn't know how or when but he caught himself praying and crying more times than he could count. In those silent prayers he tells Cas all about his day, about what they did with Jack: how Jack laughed when he saw a pidgeon or how interested he was when he saw a dog for the first time. You know; all that day to day stuff. It always ends with Dean almost begging for Cas to come back because he can't do this alone, because Sam just doesn't understand, because it's Cas' kid, it's Lucifer's but it's Cas', and it's Kelly's and he just can't let him go but he also can't do it alone. And holy shit Cas I don't know how it happened but he looks like you even though it's literally impossible. He has your eyes, even though they are not blue. But they are full of wonder and awe and life and curiosity about the world and sometimes they are full of tears but they are always, always full of love, and Cas, just please come back just this once, this just one more time, one more, only one more--

And then he hears Jack has woken up so he wipes his tears and walks to the car and smiles to the kid he should hate, who he wants to hate so desperately but he can't. He can't because this is just a kid - a newborn baby - who is completely at his mercy and he can't bring himself to hate him. He just doesn't have the energy that hate requires. What he has is grief. So he walks up to the car and takes Jack to his arms and Jack smiles at him with all the love and adoration of a child and Dean's eyes are teary again and he looks at the sky again and he says something like 'I don't believe that whole tarot crap you know'; he says it quietly. No one is there to hear him but Jack, but his voice is a soft almost-whisper and Jack's attention is immediately on the sound of Dean's voice because he loves that voice; the one who sings him lullabies and the one who calms him when he's scared because it's dark and he is so small and his mom's not there, and then Dean continues: 'but one day I will tell you all about the angels'. And then he kisses the top of Jack's head, the blond locks that are nothing like Cas', sits him safely in the car and they drive to the bunker. Jack is loudly complaining because he loves the forest and the town and people and the sky and the sun and the bunker is so dark and lonely and there is no dog.  

They come back and Sam immediately yells at Dean, 'Where the hell did you two been?!' and he's obviously worried and a little angry, too, because this is getting out of hand. Everything is getting out of hand lately. So he adds, more softly this time, 'Dean you can't just... Your grocery runs can't last 6 hours, man. I am worried', but Dean is holding Jack with one hand and the groceries with the second. He puts the bags down and finally looks at Sam with dead eyes and doesn't speak. He hasn't in 3 months.

[mishacollinsthighsss]

"Sam, what do you want?"

Cas stared at Sam, unsure why the younger brother wanted to talk to him so badly, but now seemed to struggle to get a single word out.

"Listen man, there's- there's things you should know about. It's about..."

Sam trailed of with a sigh and sat down in one of the chairs in the library, so Cas did the same.

"About what?"

He got more and more confused by the second, but he could sense that Sam was really nervous, almost scared, so he tried not to be too impatient.

"It's about Dean."

"What about Dean? Is he- did he get in trouble again when I was gone?"

Sam sighed again, even deeper this time, but shook his head.

"No, that's not- have you noticed anything different about him since you're back?"

Cas furrowed his brows and lowered his gaze to the table, trying to think of anything, but there was nothing, at least not something he'd noticed.

"No, not really. Well, he eats even more, but other than that-"

"Yeah, he eats more because he was starving the last few weeks?"

"Starving?"

Cas tried to keep up with Sam, but it got harder and harder.

"Yeah. He- you know how he is, when someone dies, he always blames himself-"

"It's not his fault. I told you to go, both of you. I thought I could handle it."

"I know Cas, but that's not the point."

Sam brushed his hair behind his ear, and just then Cas noticed that he was shaking a little.

"What is it, then?"

"If you'd stop to interrupt me-"

"If you'd just say what you want to say-"

"Okay, okay, stop. This isn't going anywhere that way."

Cas looked up again, his eyebrows still knitted together, but as soon as his eyes met Sam's, he could see the worry in them, so he closed his mouth and made a gesture for Sam to continue.

"Listen, this wasn't the first time. I mean, it was the first time it was that bad, but... whenever you die, Dean's- he's different. He doesn't eat, drinks whenever he can get his hands on some booze, he doesn't sleep, has nightmares. He's a mess without you, dude."

That definitely wasn't what Cas was expecting, and even though it was good to hear that he was important to Dean, his heart felt heavy because Dean suffered because of him.

"That's normal when you're grieving Sam, you should-"

"No, no its not. Not like that. When- when Charlie died, or Kevin, or even dad... it's different with you."

"Oh."

"Yeah."

Sam took another deep breath, before he locked eyes with Cas, a determined expression on his face.

"Do you love him?"

Cas was taken aback for a second, because of everything Sam could've asked, he definitely wasn't expecting that.

"Of course, you know I love you both-"

"No. No, no, not like that. Are you- are you in love with Dean?"

Cas sucked in a sharp breath, his heart racing. He knew that Sam asked because he didn't know, how could he, Cas tried to hide it as good as he could. He thought about lying for a second, but why should he?

"Yes."

His voice was quiet, almost a whisper, and he couldn't hold Sam's gaze anymore. His eyes fell closed and he had to lower his head once again, because he could feel his cheeks burning.

"Good."

"Good?"

"Yeah."

When Cas looked up again, a small smile appeared on his lips, but the angel couldn't quite figure out what was going on inside the younger brother's head.

"Why?" he asked after a long moment of silence, afraid of the answer, but he was too curious not to ask.

"Because I- I think he loves you too."

Even though his grace was protecting the vessel, Cas could've sworn that in this moment, he was close to a heart attack, but he quickly shook his head.

"No, that's not- he... he doesn't like men, Sam. It's normal that he's grieving me, he said it a few times, I'm like a brother to him-"

"Oh, and you believe everything that comes out of his mouth without any doubt?"

Sam raised an eyebrow, challenging, and Cas quickly shook his head.

"No, of course not, but he- he made it clear that he isn't interested in me that way."

"Goddamnit Cas, do you have any idea what I have to deal with when you're gone?"

"No, I don't know if you've noticed, but I was dead."

The angel's voice was quiet, but he couldn't stop it from shaking completely, so he hoped Sam didn't hear it.

"He's- he's not Dean anymore when you're gone, man. He's just- just an empty shell. God he- he wanted to die, Cas. You've seen him grieving, and when you're gone- that's a whole new level."

Sam looked stressed now, almost desperate, but Cas didn't allow himself to think about it, not even for a second, so he just shook his head stubbornly.

"You two are fucking killing me! Just go and kiss Dean and you'll see."

"Wait- what?"

Both their heads snapped around when all of a sudden, Dean appeared in the library, still wearing his pajama, a cup of fresh coffee in his hand.

"You heard that right, could you two just kiss? Do you have any fucking idea how frustrating it is to see you dance around each other, both of you obviously totally smitten, but neither of you has the balls to make a fucking move?"

Cas stared at Sam with wide eyes as he stood up and stomped out of the room, leaving Dean and Cas alone there.

"You uh- is he- I mean does he-"

"Yes. I'm sorry Dean, I know you don't feel that way and it was inappropriate for Sam to-"

"So you- you love me. Like... in love with me? The whole chick-flick stuff?"

Dean's voice came closer, but Cas was too afraid to look at him, so he stubbornly stared at the table.

"Uh...y-yes."

The angel could practically feel Dean's eyes on him, so he lifted his hand and rubbed his neck, in an attempt to lessen the feeling, but it just got stronger with every second.

"Huh."

"Huh?"

"Thought angels couldn't feel that way."

"Well, we aren't supposed to."

"But you do?"

"Yes."

"Great."

"What?"

"I said great."

"Oh."

"So... you gonna make a move now, or what?"

Dean's voice was close to Cas' ear now, and when he looked up, there noses were touching all of a sudden. Dean's eyes were shining and even though Cas wanted to bring some space between them, he couldn't stop staring. His heart hammered in his chest by now, and he knew he could use his grace to calm it down, but for some reason, he didn't want to.

"Because, y'know, me too. The same thing, I mean. Me too."

"You- you mean you...?"

"Yeah."

Both of them were just whispering, but they could hear each other perfectly, could feel their breaths on their lips, even. For the first time in his existence, Cas felt like he wasn't able to think, wasn't even able to breathe. He hesitated for another second, but then leaned forward to close the gap between their lips. A quiet whimper escaped him when he felt Dean's lips for the first time, followed by a sigh. He'd kissed people before, but not like that. He'd never felt the way he felt for Dean, which made it so much more special to him.

He could hear a distant noise, but before he was able to pull away, two warm hands were on his cheeks and pulled him even closer. Their kiss was messy, almost clumsy because of Cas' lack of experience, but neither of them broke it. After what felt like hours and no time at all, Cas could feel Dean sitting down on his lap, so he hesitantly wrapped his arms around the other man's waist. Apparently, that was a good move, because he could feel Dean smiling.

Dean was sighing quietly too now, so Cas used the chance to deepen it even more. His hands were shaking and he could actually feel his blood rushing through his veins, which made him chuckle just a little.

They didn't know how long they were sitting there like that, just kissing and touching each other, when suddenly, Sam cleared his throat from the other end of the room.

"You guys done soon? Because I found a case."

Dean was the one who pulled away first, a smile on his lips and his eyes shining with happiness, something Cas could stare at forever. His cheeks were flushed and the angel knew that he probably looked exactly the same, but he still turned his head to look at Sam, who was trying to hide a grin.

"If you ever do something like that again Sammy, I'm gonna kill you myself. And I'll make sure that you'll stay dead."

Dean's words were harsh, but there was no heat behind them. Cas tightened his grip around Dean's waist and buried his face at his neck, not ready to let go yet, which made the other man laugh quietly.

"Noted. Anyway, there's this case..."

*****

So, it's 3 in the morning, it's still 26° Celsius outside and I already forgot half of what I wrote. I'm also too exhausted to read over it now, so if there are any mistakes, my apologies 😅

Also I didn't make a tag list now, but I'm gonna tag the people who asked anyway. If you want to get tagged too in future fics, please let me know, and also let me know if you wanna get tagged for destiel, cockles, or both 😊

💙💙💙

@green-blue-heller @sam--ships--it