#dean needing a reason for his resurrection

[lucyghoul]

“you can’t ask me to do this cas, not this…”

[queermania]

I need someone to explain to me what the value of the Chuck Won theory is. Why would you want the ending to be worse?

i can't speak for anyone else but the reason EYE like it is because, for me, it actually makes the ending less bleak. if i take the finale as is—if i accept that chuck lost—it means that jack really did become god, that dean didn't look for a way to rescue cas, that dean died young and suicidal, that sam spent the rest of his life obsessed with his dead brother, that none of the family they found and they built and they fought for mattered, that cas was just resurrected off-screen and decided to never speak to the brothers again i guess? and if you don't take The Winchesters into account, it means that dean got to heaven, found out cas was still alive, and immediately decided to drive for like forty years just waiting for sam who he literally just saw. and that's it. that's all there is. how is that not the bleakest fucking tragedy ever?

but, if i assume that chuck won, it means the story isn't actually over. it means they're not done.

i know this is an unpopular opinion because people hate the idea of dean being sad but uhhhhhhhh to me dean dying in the finale is him giving up because he doesn't want to fucking do it anymore. he doesn't want to live without cas. and while that's wildly depressing, it is in-line with the dean i know. because the dean in the finale is either an imposter or a shell of a person who has neither purpose nor hope anymore.

but, if chuck won, the reason it seems like everything sucks is because it does suck. and that means there's still hope! they can beat chuck without losing every single other thing that matters. they can have jack back. they can rescue cas. they can keep their family. they have a shot at actually living.

i guess what i'm trying to say is that the reason Chuck Won truthing is so appealing to me is that it means the story isn't finished. dean is going to get the gay happily ever after he deserves. jack is going to get to go fishing with his dads. cas is going to hear that someone loves him. sam is going to get pegged. and eileen is going to fucking matter gdi

[itsjustwincest]

I'm gonna need some fic recs from you. I just know you'll know the kinda wincest I need 🙏🏻🙏🏻

Hi, anon! Sorry it took so long for me to respond to this, I was filtering through all of my stuff to decide what I was going to recommend first. A lot of these are kind of classic ones to read. They've all gotten a lot of hits, and for a really good reason.

I'll post more recs in the future, especially hidden gems, and maybe a list of Dead Dove (like, the dove died, was resurrected, and died again) kind of content, because I have a lot of those to reccommend, too.

All of these are rated E. Most of the things I've bookmarked are, ngl, but if you want some T or below fics, I'd be happy to do a list of those, too!

First up is The Little Spoon by leonidaslion. This is an established relationship fic. It's 2k words and is the perfect mix of adorable and slightly smutty. To his horror, Sam discovers that he's a stealth!snuggler.

Next is, in my opinion, a Must Read. It's Couples Counseling by MsImpala67. It's a getting together fic, which I have a particular fondness for, especially those involving a fake relationship, like this one. What better way to investigate a marriage counselor (who may or may not be responsible for the death of six of her clients) than to go to marriage counseling? It's just pretend right? No different than putting on the FBI suits. Of course, nothing ever goes according to plan, and Sam and Dean quickly get more than they bargained for. It's 18k words over 10 chapters, and very worth the read.

Fragments by arclucifer666 is a one shot. The smell of sex is still in the air, and all these memories are making his cock swell up. And he hopes there will be one more round before his guest leaves. Don't open this one in public, there is a porny gif at the end. Little bt of fluff, luttle bit of soft sex. CW for somnophilia.

I don't often do AUs, but A Fire Ever Burning by BewareTheIdes15 is a fun read. It's based on the world of Pern, which you don't need to be familiar with to read. It is a dragon riding AU that kept me absolutely invested from beginning to end. It's 16 k words of charming for anyone with a love for the fantastical. Sam and Dean have always been oddities among the dragonriders; the youngest man to Impress a Bronze dragon in a hundred years and a boy who turned his back on the riders to become a dragon healer instead. But when fate steps in a chooses a far different path for Sam, the brothers and all the Weyrs of Pern will have to come to terms with much greater changes in their traditions.

I want to add a bajillion more, but I am going to limit myself to two. I'm realizing I have a lot of Sam/Dean/other, but I will do those on another list.

I have to throw an ABO and a case fic in, so I'll give you a twofer. Opus Amore by Skylee is all of my favorite tropes wrapped up in one. Sam and Dean go undercover at a couples retreat for Alphas and their Omegas to root out a monster. Dean hates being an Omega so the fact that he'll have to openly be one and stop taking his suppressants pisses him off. Still, the more they pretend to be a happy Omega and Alpha couple, the more he starts to think that maybe being an Omega isn't so bad, not if Sam is his Alpha. It's all of my favorite tropes. Hesitant Omega Dean, fake relationship, getting together, clever monster hunt. 31k words over 17 chapters and I'm ngl, I read this in one sitting.

Finally, last but certainly not least, The Truth In The Lie by flawedamythyst. It's another fake relationship case fic. The side characters are fun, the hunt is fun, it's just another all around awesome read. Sam and Dean pretend to be gay lovers while they hunt a monster on a bus tour of Nova Scotia.

There you have it. My first ever wincest fic recommendations. As I said before, all of these are well-loved on AO3, with good reason. I want to do more of these lists, especially if any of you have something specific you want to read.

[hawkland]

Art masterpost: If Only You Return to Me Author: arlingtonchamberofgay/ @arlington-chamber-of-gay Artist: sidewinder/ @hawkland Time for Pinefest art post #2 for this year! I'm always up for tackling a good fixit fic, and I had a lot of fun doing my pieces for this story.

This was the first piece I worked on, as it was just a scene/moment in the fic that immediately jumped out at me. I won't say more than that for spoiler reasons, but as much as I love painting elaborate backgrounds and scenes, sometimes it's fun to do an "Empty" scene because of the chance to really just hone in on the character(s) and their emotions against a complete black background.

The second piece I did for the story is for a scene where Cas, newly resurrected, finds himself back in the bunker right where he died. So I wanted to suggest the sigil still there but faded/darkened on the door behind him. Like the first piece, I did this one on smooth/hot press paper which I've been slowly getting more fond of for certain types of illustrative pieces. I was going to stick with using it for all my art for the story and to do them all on the same size (12"x6") watercolor block, but then...

...When I started thinking of a banner art piece, I wanted to go bigger. I also felt the need to go back to my usual rougher/cold pressed paper for the layering I wanted for the image in my mind.

This was a really challenging one to try to capture what I envisioned: Dean, in Heaven, chasing through different multiverses looking for Cas (and haunted/thinking about the moment of his death and not getting to respond to what Cas said to him.) So it's meant to be kind of overlapping images with a not-quite-real look to it. I went back and forth working on it a lot and it's a BIG piece (20"x16") but it finally came together in time to post today!

This last piece ended up being my favorite, and I tried to keep it kind of soft and warm and dreamy to fit the moment :)

Thank you to arlington for being so easy to work with and so enthusiastic for my work! Please go read the story now, and enjoy (and I'll be back next week with, at long last, my own Pinefest fic!)

[scoobydoodean]

Everyone (besides the Braedens) is so annoying about Dean in 6.01. In a way, he's almost treated like some sort of exotic animal by other hunters—"the hunter who got out" is considered an impossibility in the hunting world—both from a moral perspective, and from a trauma perspective.

Bobby keeps repeating "You were out" when Dean gets mad at him and Sam for keeping Sam's resurrection a secret, and while there is obviously a loving angle in Bobby wanting Dean (someone he views as a son) to live a long life, the secret is so unapologetically cruel in the face of Dean's grief that Bobby's actions also suggest more personal motivations. This, along with Dean's demand "Good for who?" when Bobby insists he made the good choice, almost lends itself to the idea that this wasn't just about Dean. It was about something Dean symbolized for Bobby. Dean was living proof that hunters could get out, and have families, and live long lives, and this probably soothes something in Bobby as someone who lost his wife tragically right after an emotional betrayal. In "Death's Door", Bobby is implied to have had a vasectomy he never told Karen about. He was the child who ruined everything he touched according to his abusive father, and decided never to have children because of it. Bobby still grieves losing Karen, and he grieves what could have been if he hadn't let his dad get in his head. Like Bobby, Dean is also a person accused of having a corrupting touch, and Bobby is very aware of Dean's self-worth issues (2.22) and I think sees a lot of his own emotional hangups in Dean. So I think it's possible that for Bobby, seeing Dean get to be happy is something Bobby needs... for himself in a sense? While being something he wants for someone he loves, it also just... soothes something inside him, symbolically and personally.

Other characters don't react so positively to Dean as a symbol representing hunters being able to get out and overcome the tragedies that generally bring them into the life to begin with. The Campbells immediately look down on Dean for not being a hunter anymore, treating him as a greenhorn, suggesting he was never meant for the work they do (his features are too "delicate"), poking around his house like it's a zoo exhibit. Sam also joins in, mocking Dean for having golf clubs.

Samuel feigns sympathy, saying he "gets it" because Mary wanted out of the life too, but it's just a little carefully placed pathos before he launches into giving Dean the same speech Mary was likely subjected to repeatedly, telling Dean they need all hands on deck, that he has a responsibility but would rather "play golf" (which is really what shows most that Samuel has zero understanding of why Dean or his own daughter wanted normal lives).

Sam also completely switches up on Dean by the end of the episode, going from justifying keeping his resurrection a secret because Dean was happy, to saying that Dean can't be normal and should return to hunting because he's putting Lisa and Ben in danger by being with them. Of course, soulless Sam flip flops because he doesn't actually care about whether or not Dean is happy. He was going through the motions of wanting Dean to be happy because he thought it was what he should want based on his memories, and he didn't have any emotional need for his brother and therefore no reason to bother him or care that he was grieving someone who was alive. But the moment he saw Dean display the heart of a hero, rushing to try and save his neighbors when all hope was lost, he saw something that he thought would be useful—someone with a heart who might make the "rules" of how to conduct himself more clear. Dean then seemed like a useful asset.

[fandomtherapy44]

Castiel x reader Chapter 16

Summary: SEASON 5 WHOOOO!!!!!!!! LET's GO! So I am so excited for this season so many great episodes. There are going to be a lot more Cas and Y/n scenes. And more chapters too. I do recommend that you read my first book so you get the full Y/n Winchester build-up. Okay with out further due enjoy the second book of Love War and Grace.

Paring: Castiel x reader

word count: 4.4k

Warnings: Some language, Typical Supernatural violence, Spoilers for season five of Supernatural, Guns

AN/ Hey Ya'll so I did notice that it's been a month since I've updated this series sorry for that. This is the longest I've written in a while so that's part of the reason why it took so long. Anywho hope you enjoy especially Cas's and Y/n Renion.

Chapter 16: Good God Ya'll

POV: Y/n “Alright, it looks like you can go home.” The doctor said while putting her supplies away. “Great thanks doc.” She stops and seems to peer into my soul. “You know I have never seen a heart attack like yours I mean you're twenty-four, fit, don’t smoke it just doesn’t make sense.” Yeah I know but it's not like I can tell her that Angels exist and that they all pretty much hate me. “Uh yeah crazy.” I walked to the door. “You must have a guardian Angel.”  She jokily said. Oh, you have no idea.

I stepped into Bobby’s doorway to his room he was in his wheelchair just staring out the window. “Hey, what did the Doc say?” Sam asked me. “All good thanks to Cas.” Speaking of him where the Hell is he. Dean comes to us carrying an envelope. “It's been like three days now?” Sam and I both sighed. “We got to cheer him up. Maybe I'll give him a backrub.” “Dean” Again Sam and I both said. “Look...we might have to wrap our heads around the idea that Bobby might not just bounce back this time.” I mean he’s right this kind of news you don't just get drunk and forget about it.

“What's in the envelope?” I nod at the paper. “Went to radiology.” He pulls out the X-ray. “Got some glamour shots.” It was his ribs and it had Enochian engraved in his bones. “Is that why I feel like I have the worst heartburn ever.” I pointed to the picture. “Yup, curtsy of Cas apparently no demon or Angel can find us” Okay does not mean him too? Then Sam’s phone rings. “Hello? ...Castiel?” CASTIEL! “Speak of the devil.” “Ah, St. Martin's Hospital. Why? What are you—Cas?” Cas had hung up on Sam. And the Angel walks up to us. “Castiel…” I just got lost in my thoughts staring at him.

“Y/n I'm glad to see that you're doing well.” That’s it! He must have something on his mind. “Cell phone, Cas? Really? Since when do angels need to reach out and touch someone?” Dean questioned. “You're hidden from angels now—all angels. I won't be able to simply—” He tried to explain. “Enough foreplay.” Bobby announced from his chair. “Get over here and lay your damn hands on.” “I can't.” What? “Say again?” He spun in his chair.

“I'm cut off from heaven and much of heaven's power. Certain things I can do. Certain things I can't.” What about me then? “You're telling me you lost your mojo just in time to get me stuck in this trap the rest of my life?” I can see Castiel is sad that he can’t help. “I'm sorry.” “Shove it up your ass.” I feel terrible for Cas and Bobby.”At least he's talking now.” Dean commented to Sam and me. “I heard that.” “I don't have much time. We need to talk.” Cas directed to Dean. “Okay.” “Your plan to kill Lucifer.” “Yeah. You want to help?” “No. It's foolish. It can't be done.” Cas does really not have any fucks to give.

“Oh. Thanks for the support.” “But I believe I have the solution. There is someone besides Michael strong enough to take on Lucifer. Strong enough to stop the apocalypse.” We are wondering who he’s talking about. “Who's that?” “The one who resurrected me and put you on that airplane. The one who began everything. God.” Okay God right I mean why not. “I'm gonna find God.”

Dean closes the door so people don’t think we're insane. “God?” “Yes.” “God.” “Yes! He isn't in heaven. He has to be somewhere.” Cas sounded so sure. “Try New Mexico. I hear he's on a tortilla.” Dean said and poor sweet Cas did not get the joke. “No, he's not on any flatbread.” “Listen, Chuckles, even if there is a God, he is either dead—and that's the generous theory—” “He is out there, Dean.” “—or he's up and kicking and doesn't give a rat's ass about any of us.” Cas just glares.

“I mean, look around you, man. The world is in the toilet. We are literally—at the end of days here, and he's off somewhere drinking booze out of a coconut. All right?” “Enough. This is not a theological issue. It's strategic. With God's help, we can win.” he really believes. “It's a pipe dream, Cas.” Cas gets very close to Dean. “I killed two angels this week. My brothers. I'm hunted. I rebelled. And I did it, all of it, for you, and you failed. You and your brother destroyed the world—and I lost everything, for nothing. So keep your opinions to yourself.” Damn, I don't think I've ever seen Cas like that before.

“You didn't drop in just to tear us a new hole. What is it you want?” Bobby voiced. “I did come for something. An amulet.” A necklace? “An amulet? What kind?” “Very rare. Very powerful. It burns hot in God's presence. It'll help me find him.” “A God EMF?” Sam questioned. “Well, I don't know what you're talking about. I got nothing like that.” Bobby shrugged his shoulders. “I know. You don't.” Cas turns to Dean. He looks down at Dean’s necklace. “What, this?” “May I borrow it?” Cas asked politely.

“No.” “Dean. Give it to me.” Dean is silent, he looks at me and I nod my head. “All right, I guess.” He takes it off. And hestionly gives it to Cas. “Don't lose it. Great. Now I feel naked.” Cas now has the necklace. “I'll be in touch.” He goes to walk out of the room. “CAS wait up!” 

He is very quick on his feet I guess having wings would help with that. I caught up to him and grabbed his wrist to pull him into a room ironically it was the chapel. We just stood staring at each other a little. I couldn't believe that he was here. I finally shake out of my trance-like state. And go to hug him tight like he would disappear in my fingers. And he does the same. “Cas were you really …. Dead?” I say right next to his ear. An answer came that I never hoped to hear.

“Yes.” A tear slips down my cheek and I squeeze him harder. We let go of each other slowly. We sat down on the pews. “So do you really think God will help us?” “I'm here aren't I” I sigh and process everything. “Ok, we will get God’s help then.” “Y/n do you really believe in this plan?” He wasn't just asking as a tactic to win this war but as my friend.

“I believe in you Cas yes God brought you back but you are the one who is fighting actively with us so no matter what remember that.” “Thank you Y/n, I must go start the search.” “Ok but now that you can’t just pop in where I am please use your phone that I gave you for that very reason” I finish with a smile. He gives me one back and files off.

When I was gone Rufus had called Bobby sounding really in trouble and something about Demons. We drove up to this bridge in Colorado and it looked like a tornado had walked through. “This is the only road in or out.” Great. “Looks like we're going to put those scout skills that we never learned to use boys. Let’s Go!” I grabbed my pack and gun and we were off.

We walked into the town slowly and lets just that tornado had walked over and full on ran through. Cars flipped over store doors open … blood in lots of places. Sprilikers on for hours. I had been in haunted places before but I have never felt a chill in my body like this. We are checking out this car when we hear a gun cuck and we turn around. It’s Ellen.

“Ellen hey!” I go to hug her but she raises the gun to my face. Dean gets in between us. “That’s far enough.” “Ellen, what the heck's going on here?” And in response, she throws holy water at Dean. I have to hold back my snicker. “We're us.” He says annoyed, whipping off his face. We walked to a church where the survivors of whatever happened held up. When Ellen knew we were safe she threw herself onto me first for a hug. When she hugged Dean and she pulled back she slapped him.

“You can't pick up a phone? What are you, allergic to giving me peace of mind the only one to call is Y/n. I got to find out that you're alive from Rufus?” Dean seems surprised by her care. “Sorry, Ellen.” “Yeah, you better be. You better put me on speed dial, kid.” “Yes, ma'am.” All of us go to the church basement and theirs a demon trap in front. “What's going on, Ellen?” I ask. “More than I can handle alone.” “How many demons are there?” Sam asks in almost bewilderment. “Pretty much the whole town, minus the dead people and these guys.” Holy shit Demons are having super bowl parties.

“So, this is it, right? End times? It's got to be.” Ellen states. “Seems like it.” Sam replies back. Ellen knocks on the door and the makeshift peephole cover gets moved. “It's me.” Someone opens the door and we're let in, the people in here look like they've been through… war. They all look normal and one of them is pregnant. Peachy just peachy.

“This is Sam and Dean, Y/n. They're hunters. Here to help.” A guy who looks like he's the most confident out at of everyone comes up to us. “You guys hip to this whole demon thing?” “We have some experience.” I answered laughing inside. There was another man in glasses sitting at the table who looked especially like he had seen something. “My wife's eyes turned black. She came at me with a brick. Kind of makes you embrace the paranormal.” Yeah, I would too.

“All right, catch us up.” Dean told Ellen. “I doubt I know much more than you. Rufus called. Said he was in town investigating omens. All of a sudden, the whole town was possessed. Me and Jo were nearby—” What? Now that’s a surprise. The last time I knew she would rather have Jo be a Barmaid than a hunter! “You're hunting with Jo?” “Yeah, for a while now. We got here, and the place—well, the place was like you see it. Couldn't find Rufus, then me and Jo got separated. I was out looking when I found you.” Well, that’s great.

“Don’t worry Ellen we’ll find her” I touched her arm in a comforting way. She gave me a small smile in return. “Either way, these people cannot just sit here” Sam said looking at everyone. Especially the pregnant woman. “We got to get them out now.” “No, it's not that easy. I've been trying. We already made a run for it once.” “So we just reverse the plan-” Ellen stopped me. “Sweetie we used to have twenty.” My eyes widened. “Well, there's four of us now—” Dean tried again.

“You don't know what it's like out there. Demons are everywhere. We won't be able to cover everybody.” “What if we get everyone guns?” Sam suggested. “Sam you want to give walking nursery over there one she won’t make it five feet without going into early labor.” I said to him hoping to slap some sense into him. “More salt we can fire at once, more demons we can keep away.” Of course, it didn’t work when did my brothers ever listen to me!? “Fine everyone but her I'll carry two guns” I could tell Sam was ashamed but he was right, unfortunately. Dean broke our tension.

“There's a sporting goods store we passed on Main on the way in. I bet they got guns.” “All right. You stay. We'll go.” Sam said to Ellen. “What about—” I pulled Ellen into a hug. “Ellen if she’s out there I promise to bring her back.” She had tears in her eyes but kept them back to be strong. “Thank you Y/n.” I squeezed her arms and followed my brothers. 

We stop outside the door well Dean stopped us. “Why don't we just go?” Dean directed to Sam about him and I. “What? Just you and N/n?” Sam clapped back. “Well, yeah. Somebody's got to stay here and start giving them Shotgun 101.” “Yeah. Ellen.” Sam starts to go but Dean stops him again. “No no no. It's gonna go a lot faster if you stay and help, okay?” “While you and Y/n split up to go get guns and salt and look for Jo and Rufus? That's stupid.” “Dean We’ll be okay.” “Thanks N/n.” But Dean was stubborn. “You don't want me going out there.” Sam realized. “I didn't say that.” “Around demons.” “I didn't say that.” “Fine, then let's go.” Sam stopped upstairs and Dean gave me an uneasy look.

Dean and I had gone to go look for Guns while Sam was getting salt. “Ok come on let me have it.” Dean said to me. “I don’t know what you're talking about.” I looked at the shotguns not looking up at him. “Y/n I know you, your silence speaks louder than your words so spit it out.” “Dean, I can't tell you how to feel about this.” “But you're judging me.” “No, I'm not.” I put the bag of guns on the table and filled it. I could tell he was still thinking that.

“Dean I think you're feelings about this whole demon blood situation is right but Sam deserves our sympathy with him.” “But he!-” “I know what he did I was there. But he’s our brother and I am going to choose to believe that he can handle this and if he can’t then I'll be with him every step of the way.” I stopped to take a breath. “I hope you choose that too.” I picked up the bag and walked out.

We went to the store to check on sam and when walked in the scene was not good. Sam was bent over a body looking at the blood dripping off the blade like it was liquid drugs. “Sammy?” He drops the knife. 

The basement air had grown stronger with tension more and more the longer we were stuck down here and now seeing Sammy Dean was on edge. Teaching everyone shotgunning quickly is harder than it sounds. “Miss, can you show me?” It was the pregnant woman. “Mahm what’s your name?” “Caddy.” “Caddy, do you know the gender and name?” she smiled looking down at her bump, and that right there I knew I wouldn't be able to live if I let her out there. “A girl and her name will be Andra”

“That’s a beautiful name and Andra is the reason why I can't let you go out there.” She looked shocked. “But I can fight.” “I know you can Caddy but if you got hurt then you may never know your kid and I won't allow that.” She sat down tears in her eyes. “I'll fight for you double-fisting it so don’t worry the demons will get it no matter what.” I tried to add a little humor to it. “Thank you.” “Don’t mention it.”

“I'll be back.” I overheard Ellen say. I got straight up. “Where are you going?” “I can't sit here on my ass. My daughter's out there somewhere. I'm not back in half an hour, go. Get these people out of here.” Before I can say anything Sam speaks up. “No, wait. I'll go with you.” “Whoa, hold on. Can I talk to you for a second?”  My two brothers walked out. And I could hear the arguing. Suddenly the door pops open. Dean is up against the wall and Sam is holding him there. “If you actually think I—” Sam was getting emotional and they were talking about the demon blood.

With Sam and Ellen gone the pastor was reciting prayers like crazy. And Dean was thinking, walking back and forth. Someone pounds on the door Dean goes to open it and there is Ellen. “Ellen, what happened Where's Sam?” I asked, seeing her state telling me that she had taken a punch. She doesn't answer me and just sits down.

“They took him? Demons took him? Oh my god. What if they're in here? The demons?” Caddy got very worried. “Caddy don't worry they can't get past that door.” I pointed. Dean grabbed a shotgun and was going to leave. “Everybody sit tight. I got to—” He glanced back at everyone and saw their faces and knew he couldn't leave them like this. “Okay, we need to get a plan together. Tell me everything.” He sat down and tells the pastor and he gave me a nod of his head like, don’t worry.

“Guys, one of them's in Jo. We got to get it out without hurting her.” Well, now it's personal. Ellen snorts, laughing at something. “It called me a bitch.” “Ok no offense Ellen but I've been called worse because I took the last hot dog at seven eleven,” I responded. “No, that's not what I meant. It called me a black-eyed bitch.” Dean and I hear and either these demons are looking in mirrors or something fishy is going on.

“What kind of demons are these? Holy water and salt roll right off. My daughter may be an idiot, but she's not stupid. She wears an anti-possession charm. It's all kind of weird, right?” Ellen commented putting the pieces together. “The whole thing's off.” Dean finished. “What's your instinct?” Mine would be call Cas but I know he’s trying to look for God or whatever. “My instinct? My instinct is to call Bobby and ask for help. Or Sam.”

“Well, tough. All you got's me and N/n, and all we got's you. So let's figure it out.” “You know I agree with Ellen Dean.” “All right.” “Ellen do you know why Rufus came was there a specific sign or?” I asked. “He said something about water. That's all I know.” Water? “Padré, you know what she's talking about—the water?” Dean asked the pastor. “The river. Ran polluted all of a sudden. Last Wednesday. And the demon thing started up the next day.” Interesting. “Anything else anything at all?” “Maybe, but it's pretty random.” “Trust me Austin in this life nothing is random.” he takes in my own words. “Shooting star—does that count?”

The three of us look at each other in knowing. “Real big. Same night. Wednesday.” “That definitely counts.” Dean goes over to the bookshelf and grabs one of the many Bibles. And flips through the pages till he finds the right one. “"And there fell a great star from heaven, burning like a torch, and it fell upon the river, and the name of the star was Wormwood. And many men died."” I leaned down on the table thinking about it.

“I don’t know about you guys but that sounds like a giant ass warning sign of the apocalypse.” “Y/n’s right.” Dean agreed with me. “And these specific omens, they're prelude to what?” “The Four Horsemen.” The pastor responded. “And which one rides the red horse?” Dean questioned. “War.” war!? War. “Dean that sweet ride that was parked on main street the red Mustang.” I pointed out and he shook his head in agreeance. “If War is a dude and he's here, maybe he's messing with our heads.” “Turning us on each other.” Ellen concluded. “You said Jo called you a black-eyed bitch. They think we're demons, we think they're demons. What if there are no demons at all and we're all just killing each other?” I asked everyone in general to everyone. 

“So now you're saying that there are no demons and war is a guy.” Austin vocalized and he was right, our lives sound like they were ripped from a cheesy early two thousand TV show. “You believed crazy before.” Dean voiced back. Then there was another slamming on the door. It was Roger which is weird because I don't remember leaving.  “I saw them, the demons. They know we're trying to leave. They said they're gonna pick us off one by one.” “Wait wait wait. What?” Dean proclaimed our thoughts.

“I thought you said there were no demons.” “Austin there's not, okay.” I told him. “I thought someone should go out and see what's going on!” Oh come on! If I did not know about the supernatural world I would be pissing my pants right now! “They're gonna kill us unless we kill them first!” Roger responded in panic. “Guys please hold on!” “No, we got people to protect. All right, the able-bodied go hunt some demons.” Austin said straight back at me. He grabbed the shotguns.

“Whoa whoa whoa. Slow your roll. This is not a demon thing.” Dean tried to stop him.  Out of t the corner of my eye, I see Roger twist a ring on his finger. Fuck it's him. “Look at their eyes! They're demons!” He pointed at us and I'm sure we looked like demons. Caddy gasps. No no! “Caddy!-” But before I could get another word out Dean pulls me out of the room and a gunshot almost hits us.

“Okay this is plan you and Ellen get Jo and I'll get Rufus.” Dean whispered to us. We nodded and went to them.Ellen sets off the bomb. Jo walks a little close to window and Ellen grabs her and pins her to the wall. Of course she tries to fight. “Now you listen up, Joanna Beth Harvelle.” Ellen pulled the full name card. “Jo its us!” “Get off of me bitches!” “Jo if we were demons we would have disaboled you by now!” I try to reason. She listens. “N/n?” “Yes!” 

Now both of them didn’t want to kill us we could talk. “We all on the same page?” Ellen asked. Rufus and Dean nod. “Good.” “Hi, Jo.” “Hey.” Ok sensing tension between these two I'll pin that for later. “Okay, we got to find War before everybody in this town kills each—” Gunshots. Everyone ducks. “Damn it! Where's Sam?” Dean yells. “Upstairs.” I let him go, I had a feeling that Caddy needed help. They have the horseman and I have the people.

Ellen and I tried to sneak out to the battlefield but it was pretty hard with bullets flying through the air. “Caddy! Caddy, you have to get out of here!” “No, you're a demon!” “Caddy if I was a demon I would want you out here!” she was going to say something else but I saw a person behind her holding a handgun.

“CADDY!” I push her out of the way and a bullet goes into my arm and I'm pushed back on the ground by the force. I don’t even have time to look at my wound before the guy gets on top of me with a knife. He’s about to stab me in the heart but I catch his wrists before he can slam down. I'm slowly losing strength and the knife is slowly going down. I’m sorry guys, Cas.

The blade is about to go in my chest when the guy stops. “What the fuck!!” He gets off. “Yeah me too dude.” I breathe deeply. “Y/n! Are you okay?” CAddy asked me. “Nothing a little dirt won’t fix.” I simled to hide my pain. “You saved me.” “It was nothing.” She pulls me into a hug. “Yes, it was.” 

It feels surreal to be at such a wonderful beautiful place when the day was so ugly and stressful. I was sitting at the picnic table with my brothers twirling the ring in my hands. “So, pit stop at Mount Doom?” Dean broke the silence. “Dean—” “Sam, let's not.” “No, listen. This is important. I know you don't trust me.” Dean looks away and I nudge him to bring him back. “Just, now I realized something. I don't trust me either.” We both look at him.

“From the minute I saw that blood, only thought in my head...and I tell myself it's for the right reasons, my intentions are good, and it, it feels true, you know? But I think, underneath...I just miss the feeling. I know how messed up that sounds, which means I know how messed up I am. The thing is, the problem's not the demon blood, not really. I mean, I, what I did, I can't blame the blood or Ruby or...anything. The problem's me. How far I'll go. There's something in me that...scares the hell out of me, Dean Y/n. In the last couple of days, I caught another glimpse…” “So what are you saying?”

“I'm in no shape to be hunting. I need to step back, 'cause I'm dangerous. Maybe it's best we just...go our separate ways.” I think he's right if he needs time. “Well, I think you're right.” Dean responded and Sam and I were both surprised. “I was expecting a fight.” “Me too.” “The truth is I spend more time worrying about you than about doing the job right. And I just, I can't afford that, you know? Not now.” I feel like Dean is still avoiding his feelings but that's up to him. “I'm sorry, Dean.” “I know you are, Sam.”

“So Y/n which one of us do you want to go with. I thought for a minute and then I came back with an answer. “I think a little separation will be good for us all to sort through our own feelings without anyone else's opinion mixing in our own.” I want Dean to really think by himself. “Where will you go?” They both ask me. “With Ellen and Jo if they are okay with that.” Sam stands up and hugs me. “But you better still call me that threat could still happen.” I tease. “You too Dean.” “Yeah, I know my little sister can kick my ass.” He said as he hugged me. 

Jo and Ellen are packing up a truck. “Hey, N/n came to say goodbye?” Ellen asked. “Um actually the opposite and I totally understand if you don't want to but I was wondering if you had space for an extra hunter for a while.” Ellen throws me a pack in response. “Well come on we just got word on a possible vamp nest in Texas.” Jo smiles and we get in the truck. I roll down the window and just hope that this time apart will bring us together. 

AN/ Hope you all enjoyed and don't worry the siblings will be back together soon enough. See you Ya'll next time Xoxo Gossip Girl:)

[microwavebeeep]

IM SO SORRY FOR THIS BUT I NEED TO COPE IT ALL SOMEHOW

I am hyperfixated on that one Castiel's death in 12 season for no reason and I overthink it too much (I can't even think about rewatching it rn, it's painful, so I'm sorry, if I didn't remember something), but I just realised one thing...

It's not the first, when Cas dies, but all other times he more like. disappeared. or was soon resurrected (like in the end of s5 or when he was a human). There was no time to grief or no body to cry on, so a small chance of Cas being alive was there. And Dean did believe in it, keeping his trench coat in Impala. But this time... It's different.

For the first time Dean had to deal with Cas's dead body. He saw, how he died. There was no chance he might be alive. No place for faith. God didn't answer. Nothing changed, when he returned and put up the blanket. The dead body was here and that was the end.

For the first time Dean had to arrange a real funeral for Cas, had to look how his body was burning. He lost two people he loved, and one of them had gone forever... And now he had to deal with that fact and his grief. He was completely broken.

[hexedwinchester]

Supernatural S02E16 Roadkill

One of those well done horror episodes. The story was good, the jump-scare was good, the moral was good, the final closure was amazing

A fine example of how Sam and Dean perceive everything differently. Dean is all black and white.. he is aloof, sees Molly as just another ghost that needs getting rid off without feeling sorry for her. Sam is clearly dwelling in the gray area. He knows the world is muddled and doesn't really fit into black or white. He is empathetic of Molly's situation and believes he has to do her justice. He is also kind enough to not leave Greeley's wife's dead body hanging in the house.

The Greeley's ghost 'grabbing Molly through the window' is so similar to that scene from Friday the 13th movie (yes, the Jared Padalecki movie) where Jason grabs Clay

The walking encyclopaedia of weirdness 🤣

Okay..hear me out!! David and Molly are Sam and Dean parallels for the entirety of the show.. molly and Dean love David and Sam too much to let go. Coincidentally, both Molly and Dean suffer for 15 years because of this. While Molly is physically dead, we have seen the show portray Dean to be dead inside too. Sam is Dean's unfinished business just as David is Molly's. As Molly relives her nightmare every year, time and again, Dean has been stuck in his own limbo. Molly chases David and Dean does the same but by trying to bring Sam back on various occasions: first the cold oak resurrection, then trying to get Sam's soul back in appointment in Samarra, the Gadreel possession, the almost deal with Billy in Red Meat. Finally Molly realises she is dead and needs to move on just like Dean at the end S15. Both David and Sam go onto live a fulfilling life.. thoughts?

Only Sam Winchester can be this gentle to a haunting ghost. Also after she moves on, you can see Sam feeling at loss. Sam Winchester grieved for a ghost! One of the infinite reasons why I love Sam Winchester the most!!

Hope's kinda the whole point

[deancasbigbang]

Title: right in the palm of your hand

Author: LoversAntiquities

Artist: JenniferB

Rating: Mature

Pairings: Dean/Castiel, Dean/Others (mentioned)

Length: 39000

Warnings: Suicidal ideation, descriptions of torture

Tags: Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Parenthood, Trauma Recovery, Future Fic, Post-Season 12 Finale

Posting Date: October 30, 2023

Summary: Five years after Castiel's death, Dean has built a life in Murphy, North Carolina. A decent life, with a house he built with his own hands, and Jack, now five years old and beginning kindergarten in the fall. Only, after a string of failed relationships and sleepless nights staring at the urn on his windowsill, he makes an unwilling decision--to bury Castiel for good. Only, the night he and Jack bury Castiel's ashes, the unthinkable happens--Castiel rises from the dead, wounded from his time in the Empty, and with his resurrection comes questions Dean never thought he would need answered. Namely, how long will Castiel stay with him--and will the Empty come back for him, once and for all?

Excerpt: On the other end, the phone rings three times—then a fourth, and Dean’s heart sinks. A fifth, and the dial tone ends halfway, the noise replaced with a tired sigh. “Isn’t it a little late for you to be calling?” Dean snorts and tilts his head back, eyes closed. “Jack had a hard day. Swear, the kid’s brain never shuts off.” Mary hums a noise. A metal chair scrapes the concrete floor on the other end, grating in Dean’s ears. Kitchen, then. “When you were three, you used to go on these tangents,” she says, mirthful yet somehow sad. “I couldn't understand what you were saying most of the time, but on the days you talked the most, it took forever to put you to bed.” “I probably gave you hell,” Dean says. He rubs the bridge of his nose, the pressure only furthering the ache behind his eyes. “I’m turning into John.” For a long moment, Mary doesn’t reply. Dean listens to her walk, her socked feet padding lightly through the Bunker; a door opens, then clicks shut. “Don’t talk about yourself like that,” she says, quiet. “What happened?” Nothing, he thinks. In the grand scheme of things, today’s incident was barely a drop in the bucket of Dean’s bad parenting skills, but it still stings all the same. “I’m—The kid scares me to death,” he says with a pained laugh. “I thought I was getting better at this. I thought, if I did everything the opposite of what dad did to me, then I’d finally redeem myself, but I…” A breath. “He scared me today, and I—I scared him.” “Dean.” Her bed frame creaks. Dean imagines her sitting on the edge of her mattress, dressed in a cotton robe with her hair pulled back, her eyes just as tired as the day he left. “I wish you would’ve let us help.” “I know.” Admittedly, he should have let Mary and Sam take on co-parenting duties, but Jack was Castiel’s son, and for some reason, letting anyone else take responsibility of him felt like betrayal. “I’m not gonna throw a kid in your lap again, especially after you just…” After you came back, he wants to say. “Know it ain’t been easy on you, either.” “It hasn’t,” Mary says, “but it’s getting better.” There’s that, at least.

DCBB 2023 Posting Schedule

[ananke-xiii]

More on the power of resurrection as the "apple of discord": Billie won theory.

So. Chuck vs Billie, it's all about the preservation of the natural order. Now if you ask me what "natural order" means in Supernatural I wouldn't really know how to answer. I think by that they meant a concept akin to that of metaphysical necessity, of a causality that's prior to space and time. However, Chuck has subdued the Moirai as we know from s6 and s15 and he controls life, death and space and time. Therefore, the natural order seems to be Chuck himself. Or he definitely thinks he is but he's really not 'cause, as it turns out, it doesn't really matter if Chuck exists as God, anybody who can contain God's power can become God. Just like any reaper who dies can become Death in case Death is absent. In other words, "Death" and "God" are just "roles" that virtually anybody with sufficient power and in the right circumnstances could play.

In this respect, Chuck is more powerful than Death because he can control space and time as he pleases while Billie can't. I mean, it appears on Supernatural that techinically Billie can manipulate space and time but her issue is precisely that: if you start manipulating space and time Death ultimately really means nothing since it's a concept that's intrinsically connected to these notions.

This is why, I think, resurrection is the core problem in the ultimate power struggle, i.e. God vs Death. As a concept, it defies the rules of Time. If resurrection can happen, then time is no longer irreversible and if time can be reversed then Death doesn't really need to exist. But apparently in Supernatural necessity is the ultimate force and Billie wants to protect that, she wants to protect the role of Death in the story. Surprisingly, in this view I find Chuck a litte bit more fascinating because he's not only playing around with his toys, he's actually messing with Necessity itself. And no smart God would have done that 'cause it only ends one way: a recknoning.

So following this probably unsteady logic, in the end Billie won. Because what did she want? In the words of the Shadow:

The Shadow: Become "New God." Classic narcissist, right? She's all tingly for the rules, the good-old days. [...] Everyone back to where they belong... realities, dimensions, graves. What should be dead dies, angels off Earth, demons back to Hell, and I go back to sleep.

It's always, always about "the good-old days" (insert teary gif from The Office's last episode).

She didn't get to become the "New God" because she made the same mistake as Chuck: inserted herself in the story, thought she could use Jack and focused all her attention on Dean Winchester without realizing who her real enemy was (as I've previously said, it's totally Castiel. It's always Castiel, Castiel must die die die for the story to end).

But if what mattered to her, power aside, if the reason why she wanted to become god was because she didn't want anybody to interfere with the natural order AND if it doesn't matter who Death and God are as long as they stay hands-off... then Billie totally won in the end.

And she won because Castiel died and didn't resurrect (more or less, he's somewhere in Heaven probably but we don't see him. Seeing is crucial in resurrection stories: if we don't see him he might as well be dead to us). Dean died and asked not to be resurrected (incidentally I should talk about how Billie's values align with Dean's but not today). Sam eventually dies too and Jack is... somewhere, sometime, being God all alone and in everything but without interfering with Necessity (and I should also talk about what the fuck they mean when Jack says "[people] just need to know that I'm already a part of them and to trust in that". LOL what people and what trust? And why should they care? Are these the same "people" Chuck didn't give a shit about? Chuck was already a hands-off type of God, hell, he was the absent father, right? Not just to the Winchesters and the Angels, no, he was humanity's absent father. Chuck self-inserted into the story just to play with his two toys, this has nothing to do with "people". They clearly didn't know how to end the show and tried to pull the mysticism card like they did in S11 but with worse results).

Order is indeed preserved. Time as we know it is safe. Still, there are monsters and Heaven and maybe even Hell, Purgatory and the Empty. God exists but doesn't interfere. Most importantly, Death has no obstacle and can do her job just fine. Everything in its place and a place for everything.

The universe is indeed many things. And sometimes it is poetic (justice).

[chuckwon]

I find it hard to imagine an emotionally satisfying and compelling plotline for an SPN sequel/revival that isn’t “Chuck won” related.

Here’s my logic:

-What reason would there be for Sam and Dean to push to ~leave Heaven~ if they’re supposedly content? (The Winchesters also showed us exactly why Dean ISNT content, at length, and that’s still true for his character whether or not the sequel/revival will reference any of its plot and events directly.)

-To position Sam and Dean as compelled to leave Heaven for ANY reason unavoidably highlights the original finale wasn’t a good ending. (Which, again, The Winchesters has already elaborated upon for 13 episodes.) That necessitates answering why and how that ending happened at all.

-They can go with some kind of general “Well life is life. Sometimes you die. True free will is that everything can’t be perfect :/ They just want a second chance“ but that WOULD be a cop out. Not compelling at all and blatantly hollow reasoning to just make more of the show.

-If Jack’s truly the new God, and that’s supposedly good and fine, what reason would HE have for resurrecting Sam and Dean? What could he ~need~? There’s no POV where Sam and Dean having more “work to do” isn’t tragic, and no compelling sense to it if it’s not about the obvious: Jack’s the problem.

-How’s Jack the problem? However you slice it, he’s been corrupted by God power. That routes back to Chuck because he orchestrated this outcome, as well as cycles of violence.

-Any SPN sequel requires reciprocal Destiel. It simply does. And the original silence—Dean and Cas being kept apart at the end of season 15—is thematically connected to all this.

-If Jack was corrupted by God power and that was Chuck’s plan all along, things have then been “fake” and called into question just like throughout s15; so, what’s real? Unavoidably there’d have to be emphasis on that. And what’s “real” still includes, purposefully, Destiel. They’re a hallmark of reality and their love is part of the key to their collective freedom.

It’s just math to me!! All the threads tie together!!!!

They could do something else, of course. But if they just pull some random big bad out that the gang needs to fight (that Good Jack can’t handle?? A BIGGER God??) it’ll be laughably transparent and hard to care.

That’s why the Akrida were even connected to Chuck in The Winchesters. They know this. They’re in a corner. They could resurrect Sam and Dean to do small cases again, but… again, to what purpose?

If they resurrect Supernatural, they’d better have a damn good premise.

There’s no Bigger Bad than the Big Bad they already fought and supposedly defeated…unless they didn’t win.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The brothers and the gay angel need to free their son. And themselves in the process.

[eisforeidolon]

OMG, the script said Dean "can't" reciprocate, not that he "doesn't"! This means he must have wanted to and a vast queer-suppression conspiracy at the CW totally exists!!! [X]

Just... The extent to which being a heller seems to make you absolutely blind to how other conclusions besides the one you desperately want to be true aren't magically wished out of existence just by waffling in circles chasing your own tail on and on and on...

She's trying to make the difference in Castiel's speech that leaves ambiguity - I love you versus I'm in love with you - happen in the opposite direction with that script note. Except it doesn't work, because there is no such fundamental difference in usage meaning of can't and doesn't built in there. She desperately wants can't to mean there HAS TO be some kind of external pressure there. Except whereas nobody would intentionally say "I'm in love with you like a brother"? You can switch out can't and doesn't and they work equally well to mean functionally the same thing. Let's take the potential reasons mentioned:

Dean can't reciprocate because he has no such feelings for Castiel. Dean doesn't reciprocate because he has no such feelings for Castiel.

In the canon itself, Dean made it clear his feelings about Castiel were friendly/familial/brotherly over and over again. Jensen has made it clear over and over again how he sees, and how he was choosing to portray, Dean and Castiel's relationship - if we're going to count actor's statements as word of god, it's fucking absurd to pretend anyone else's count more than the actor actually making the choices in depicting what his emotions are. Even after the goodbye scene, Jensen's statements haven't changed - except to add speculation that angels may not even understand love in the same way humans do. Putting aside whether Dean was even sure enough of what he meant, given the ambiguity? Dean simply not feeling the same fits with everything we know (and they deny) about canon Dean. Whether that's the same in terms of romantic love, or the same in terms of the level of effusive word vomit Castiel was spewing out.

Dean can't reciprocate because he's too shocked in the moment. Dean doesn't reciprocate because he's too shocked in the moment.

Except in the canon itself, we see how Dean reacts after he's had time to process. While the Winchesters still worried about Chuck destroying the world, sure, Dean does seem excited at the implication Castiel might have been resurrected again - when they still need any allies on their side they can get. But when the apocalyptic shit is all over? When Sam brings up missing Castiel, Dean basically shrugs it off and says they should live their lives. When Dean gets to heaven and Bobby mentions Castiel helping Jack, Dean just goes and drives in his car. He doesn't ask if Castiel is in heaven, ask how to find him, seem to care, nothing. If we count TW, there's still no Castiel and no mention of Castiel in Dean's vicinity. Sam is Dean's reason (still). Bobby and Jack are there. Castiel? [insert bad negative space meta here] If he really felt twue lurve for the angel and just needed time to process as they have been insisting since, like, season four? It should be pretty clear at this point the amount of time to process that non-existent feeling into canon reality is fucking infinity.

Dean can't reciprocate because Bobo's hand got slapped. Dean doesn't reciprocate because Bobo's hand got slapped.

Except outside of canon, in the real world, not their conspiracy theorist fantasies? We were directly told that reciprocation was never even pitched. Nobody got their hand slapped down, because Berens and Misha knew nobody would give a fuck if they threw away what was left of Castiel's character in their shitty last minute queerbait, but dragging Dean down with him was a different story. In the hellers' heads, because they desperately want it to be so, D/C is some truism of the universe that is poised to spring into being if only the haters would stop holding it back!!! Out of a whole room of writers and executive producers - including a few who variously said they had not, were not, and would not be writing any kind of canon lurve story between those two characters? One bitter hack who knew what he could (and couldn't) get away with and therefore didn't even try to legit make it canon is not some conspiracy. Bobo the clown isn't some universal truth teller of ThE ReAL stOrY of SpN fighting for great justice just because he gave them the closest thing to validation they were gonna get (as ambiguous, one-sided, and utterly cringe as it was). No matter how many times they lie about it, before the takeover the CW was one of the - if not the most - friendly network(s) towards LGBT+ content. Nobody even seriously considering making your single specific OOC ship canon is not oppression or censorship FFS.

[sammychrist]

Dean is abusive, there's no denying this, but at the same time you can't get mad at him for the things he says and does sometimes because he also sold his soul to resurrect Sam when he thought Sam would leave him as soon as they got their revenge.

He wasn't even sure he could spend the last year of his life with Sam, yet he did it anyway. If it wasn't for Sam relapsing into their codependency every goddamn time, Dean would have barely had a few more days with him before going to Hell. Do you even get how crazy this is?

So yeah, the reason why Dean needs Sam alive is selfish - he can't bear to be alone, he'd rather kill himself. But he condemned himself to an eternity of torture when chances were he'd end up alone anyway. He's mad.

[entropic-saudade]

Also can we just talk about The Implications from when Jack says “I wanted mankind to make their own fate. No interference from anywhere, no exceptions”?

Without interference, Sam’s world could’ve been destroyed too. Even if Sam and the other living hunters would’ve copped onto the danger eventually, because the Akrida needed to be killed by something not from earth, then their chances would’ve been slim (of course, they could’ve gone to Purgatory or Hell or used the HunterCorp versions or Apocalypse versions of the people that may have still been down there —unless Jack put them back — in order to find a suitable weapon, so it’s possible they had a better chance of not getting destroyed compared to other worlds). We know this, bc Dean says it next as his reasoning for meddling.

That fact is why Dean and Baby were vital, even when the core four did most of the work throughout the season to make their own fate after Dean set the ball rolling in The Winchesters. Dean needed to interfere in order to save all the worlds.

And in doing so, isn’t Dean making his own fate?

Or do you only get to make your own fate if you’re alive? (In which case, Heaven isn’t quite as free as it claims to be).

Are you only considered part of mankind if you’re alive? (Ouch. The person who throughout the show, at least to Cas, has been humanity’s representative (“He’s in love… with humanity,” “I loved everyone because of you”) and one of its saviors is no longer considered to be part of that?)

Thinking outside of “Chuck won”/“Jack is corrupted by Chuck/god power” theories, it’s possible that since Jack is still pretty much a kid (he still can’t tie his shoes 😭) he just doesn’t understand the nuances or full implications of the rules he’s trying to implement. He doesn’t understand that without Dean’s interference those worlds— even a world with people he cares about on it— may have been lost. He doesn’t understand that not doing anything to save those worlds is a bad thing (abstaining from action is not a neutral choice, it aligns one with the oppressor (in this case, the Akrida, and thus Chuck) in situations where one otherwise has the power to help). He’s trying so hard to maintain peace and order, to not repeat the mistakes of his grandfather and father, that he’s tragically still missing the point. It’s a lot of responsibility and power, and the only existing guidebook on how to wield it is basically trash so he’s having to make stuff up as he goes too. Which is terrifying and stressful and things would work so much better if people just stayed in the lines he’s drawing.

A large part of early SPN was focused on how God (and by nature, all gods, fathers, & makers) seemingly left. No prayers answered, no signs, just radio silence. His absence was the impetus for a lot of major events— the angels gunning to get the apocalypse started and over with bc they wanted some peace too; the angel civil war after they averted the apocalypse and Cas subsequently swallowing Purgatory for power, going mad, and unleashing the leviathan; Cas inadvertently causing the angels to fall in the struggle for power after Naomi and Metatron’s manipulations, Metatron making himself God, the factions that arose from fallen angels; Amara being released and yelling to be heard. God being absent, and being seemingly hands-off, didn’t work.

[For now I’m not even going to dissect how Chuck claims he left because ‘helicopter parenting’ didn’t work, and that him leaving was okay because humanity made it— because it had Sam and Dean. But then we see him later (and in actuality throughout the show) just trying to repeat the same narrative patterns he already wrote— Isaac and Abraham, Cain and Abel, etc for the sake of the story when it’s revealed he does interfere]

The late seasons posit that in actuality the issue was that God interfered too much, both by writing the overall narrative and with all the times he interfered (writing himself in as Chuck, resurrecting TFW countless times, anything he did to make a good story— and specifically, with his actions toward the end— killing Jack, raising Hell, snapping everyone away and trying to make his ending happen).

Jack only knows or has only experienced the latter— with the exception of Cas not being there after he was born and his short-lived experience of being separated from a father figure in that way, he hasn’t had to experience what Cas, Sam, Dean, humanity and the angels experienced for centuries. [This to me would’ve made leaving the deleted scene from 15x19 where Jack prays to Cas but gets no answer more poignant if they left it in— Jack knows what praying to no one feels like, what that pain and confusion is like]. Especially since Jack was just able to wake Cas up from the Empty anyway, and evidently pull him back out unseen in the finale, compared to everyone else he hasn’t had to experience the early seasons absent god/father struggles. He doesn’t understand that interference from on high isn’t always a bad thing in terms of where it gets humanity; the issue was that Chuck did it as entertainment, toyed with them and forced them through all this for a story. The solution then, is to just try to get Jack to understand the nuance and help with the rules and reign (which we see here a little bit, when both Dean and Bobby explain why Dean interfered and Bobby vouches for him, so Jack allows it, giving him the Colt. He still wants to put Dean back in the Heaven box but again, he’s just trying to hold things to gather and it would be a lot easier if everyone would stay where they were put).

But it shouldn’t be solely up to Jack to bear that weight.

Over and over the show has shown us that any single person trying to dictate how Heaven should be run or trying to fill that space — be it Chuck himself, or a well-meaning Cas, or Raphael, or Naomi, or Metatron, or Lucifer— doesn’t work. Over and over the show has shown us that what does work is when people work as a team— team free will, both versions; any time they rally all their allies to unite against a force bigger than they are; every version of found family on the show. Every time a hunter helps another. (Something The Winchesters emphasizes too.) Any time they win — whether it be finally killing Azazel, stopping the apocalypse, stopping the leviathan, or Amara, etc— although it’s usually one of the boys that does the final act, they never get there on their own. It always takes the help and teamwork from friends and foes alike to get there.

Although Amara wasn’t always great (blame her early attitude on Chuck), she brought up a good point about how ruling should have been about balance— not a single point of view or dictatorial narrative, but at the least two of them, working in tandem. Although Chuck absorbed Amara and Jack took in Amara when he took Chuck’s power, this balance still isn’t something we necessarily got to see onscreen in either show. It would be nice to see Amara out and let her help, along with getting visual confirmation that Cas is there and helping too, and it’s not just Jack.

If you do look at the situation from a ‘Chuck won/corruption’ theory, however, then the implications are far more sinister— Jack doesn’t want Dean or anyone interfering, meaning those worlds including Sam’s would’ve been destroyed. Interfere, and risk getting cast out of Heaven— and away from where you got the chance to meddle in the first place. He’s choosing to not interfere because on the surface it makes him look like a better, changed God, but I reiterate: abstaining from action is not a neutral choice, and in a situation where he literally has the power to do otherwise, it aligns him with the villain— the Akrida, and thus Chuck. So nothing has really changed, underneath. Mankind makes their own fate but only within limited parameters set up by Chuck, making it a rigged game. It’s a no-win scenario. Dean has to go back to the box of Heaven, where despite his family being down the road from him he still feels driven to seek out a universe where his family had a shot at a happy ending. Dean is made to go back to where Carry On was playing, where he no longer gets to pick the music. (In. What. World. Would Dean pick that cover of Wayward Son. 💀)

Either way, whether Jack is actively corrupted by Chuck, or if he just doesn’t really fully understand what he’s doing, Jack needs a little help in running Heaven and the multiverse. Dean should be allowed to be part of that help. We should get to see Cas be part of that help. We should get to see Jack change a little more, to have more nuanced understanding and flexibility.

And we should get to see that more in Season 2 if the show is renewed.

[autisticandroids]

Have you read Apokteino's Bone Trilogy? What did you think of it?

i have! i've actually read all four of apokteino's big four darkfics. i like bone in that it's interesting and well written, but i really wouldn't recommend it or reread it, except in certain circumstances. this is because it's just like, a super miserable read. like it's not very fun and it's SUPER depressing.

however, it's a really interesting fic to compare to the rest of the big four because it has some unique elements, so i definitely recommend reading it if you're interested in it for that reason. all of the lesser triad can really be seen in various ways as dry runs for with understanding, though of course they also have their own merit outside that context.

i'm gonna try to rewrite the big comparison essay that tumblr ate on saturday. so, the following discussing will assume familiarity with the plot of with understanding, but not with the lesser triad of major apokteino darkfics, which are: hesitation, the when series (when all is lost/when the road is as dark as my fears), and the bone trilogy (bone/scarred/unbroken).

here are some various sources to read the now-deleted fics

also, before we start i'd like to thank @astermacguffin, who i've had a lot of conversations about all these fics with, and whose various posts on apokteino and darkfic and evil deancas i might not always agree with but have absolutely influenced me and my opinions on these fics. they're worth reading as background for this post. honestly i'd really just like to dedicate this post to aster because he's gonna love it.

anyway, four thousand words of discussion below. spoilers for all four fics, and obviously, trigger warnings for discussion of rape, abuse, and general violence under the cut.

so i'll start with plot summaries of the lesser triad.

hesitation

hesitation is a canon divergence from season four. in this fic, as part of his metaphorical seduction of dean to the angels' cause, cas is ordered under pain of death to literally seduce dean in order to ensure his loyalty. cas does not want to have sex with dean and is terrified, however, dean does not know this and thinks that cas is coming onto him of his own free will. dean is sweet and kind to cas during sex and works to ensure cas' pleasure, which kind of fucks with cas' head because the sex isn't actually consensual.

canon continues as in the show up through the beginning of season five, with the addition of dean and cas' sexual relationship (which continues consensually after cas rebels). however, cas has some obvious issues and trauma that dean doesn't understand, plus he gets slutshamed by some other angels, so dean eventually figures out something is up and gets cas to talk about what's going on. when dean finds out that he has been unknowingly raping cas, he freaks out, goes into a huge guilt spiral, and they break up.

however, eventually they work through their issues and get back together. happilyish ever after.

2. when

when is a canon divergence from swan song, the only difference being that instead of being resurrected as an angel at full power, cas is resurrected in the same state that lucifer exploded him, i.e., as a human/fallen angel. dean and cas continue hunting together instead of dean going to lisa.

dean resents the fact that cas was resurrected and sam (and to a lesser extent bobby) weren't, plus the fact that cas, now human and useless, cannot resurrect them. as a result, and for some other more complex reasons i will get to in the discussion, he channels his rage and grief about sam's death into beating and raping cas, which eventually evolves into just raping cas when he feels lonely and needs comfort.

cas accepts this because he is entirely alone in the world except for dean and basically trapped with him because he is cut off from heaven and has no human connections, but also because he feels on some level like he deserves it (as a representation of the heaven that has taken everything from dean), that he's useless and that to serve dean or be used by dean is his purpose. cas develops some extreme trauma responses to dean's treatment of him, most notably he blacks out whenever dean gets violent or makes moves to start raping him. cas also prays for mercy on sam's soul.

eventually, an angel comes down from heaven and informs dean that sam is no longer in hell and his soul is in heaven, because heaven heard cas' prayer. dean freaks out but doesn't really talk about it, and the violence against cas stops completely, but they don't discuss it. they continue hunting.

like in both canon and with understanding, law enforcement believe dean to be a serial killer. like in with understanding and unlike in canon, they are extremely motivated to catch him and a credible threat to his and cas' lives and freedom. dean makes a mistake that leads them to his and cas' temporary home base and cas is captured and arrested.

initially cas is treated as dean's accomplice, but once the police? fbi? i forget who catches him, i think it's the police, but who gives a shit, notice his extreme trauma responses and the signs of physical abuse on his body, they reconsider and classify him as a brainwashed victim. a police officer comes and talks to him and tries to get him to work through some stuff.

eventually dean turns himself in out of guilt for the shit he's done to cas and to save cas. he works through some stuff with police officers and eventually they let him see cas, who he apologizes to.

cas breaks out of protective custody and rescues dean, but forces dean to promise that cas will be in charge of everything from now on, and they go on the lam together. happilyish ever after.

3. bone

bone is the most extreme canon divergence. dean stays in hell much longer than in canon and becomes a hardened torturer. instead of season four happening, the angels decide to create their own apocalypse. dean is resurrected to a world where humans and angels are in open warfare against one another and angels are losing.

dean is a torturer for the human side, and tortures angels for information. but eventually he decides to try to brainwash and stockholm syndrome an angel instead, and he happens to pick castiel. it works, and castiel breaks and is taught to serve and obey dean.

however, once cas is broken, dean starts to develop affection for him, then sympathy, and then finally guilt for what he's done. they begin a sexual relationship. due to the brainwashing and stockholm syndrome, cas is intensely traumabonded to dean, but no one, including dean, knows how to undo that, and cas is given his own free choices, but he always chooses dean anyway. also, the tragic twist is that cas is the only angel this brainwashing could have worked on, because it turns out he is the one who raised dean from hell, which changed him, making him capable of emotion in a way other angels are not.

cas and dean exist in a society with other people who know their history, including anna and gabriel who are both unequivocally on cas' side, and their relationship is very much overseen by other people. everyone thinks it's fucked up, but there really isn't anything to be done about it. cas is brainwashed to a super extreme degree, and no one knows how to fix him, so they just let him stay with dean. happilyish ever after.

okay. now discussion.

so, hesitation is kind of the odd man out here, inasmuch as... it has the same basic premise as the other three, which is essentially that cas experiences sexual trauma that bonds him irrevocably to dean, despite the fact that dean was involved in creating that trauma, but in hesitation, it's not dean's fault. dean is in fact as much a victim as cas. i think hesitation is probably sort of... the furthest flung from the other three. there's definitely some stuff you can see that's connected to with understanding, particularly cas' self-victim-blaming and complicated relationship to his own desire for dean, but i think the nature of that difference puts hesitation in a really different category than the other three. because even if the traumabond was created with dean, it's still essentially the difference between a victim remaining involved with their abuser, and a victim of abuse getting involved with someone else and having to work through that. zachariah is the perpetrator in this case, not dean. and that's not to say hesitation is unrelated to the others! i used to think of hesitation as, well, rapefic for cowards, on account of the fact that it had all of the trauma of rapefic but dean's complicity was totally sidestepped. now that i know that it was part of this greater series, i like it a lot more. i would also definitely say that hesitation is the only one of apokteino's lesser triad i would genuinely recommend outside of the context of supplementary reading for with understanding. it's just a genuinely good fic and you should check it out. i recced it, actually.

when is kind of... well, when is definitely and fairly obviously the closest to an actual dry run for with understanding. and that makes it really frustrating because like... well, when isn't very good.

when basically has three major flaws, and one big virtue which makes the flaws even more frustrating.

the first flaw is that dean's characterization is just like. it's just nothing. like the justification given for him to be horrifically beating and raping cas is like. well, okay, in the first one, which is entirely cas pov, cas speculates about his motivation. the motivations he comes up with are that either 1) dean is punishing cas as a way of lashing out against heaven, since it's heaven's fault sam is in hell, or 2) dean is actively trying to send himself to hell to be with his brother. there may be more reasons that cas postulates, i forget, but those are two big ones, and they make sense. however, in the second one, we see dean explain himself:

Dean looks away. He's not sure if Fitz is acting like he wants to be convinced – or isn't convinced, and trying to prove it – to get Dean to talk, or because he actually isn't sure. Either way, Dean needs to the be the killer, for Cas's sake. "It's more like … more like long periods, where I'm out of my head. And I do things because that's what there is. Hanging on the rack or off of it." "The rack?" Dean makes an aborted attempt to wave a hand, cuffs pulling. "Tortured or torturer." "And you chose the latter." Pretty sick that he does – did – put Cas on the rack, instead of himself. "And I guess that's what makes me evil, isn't it?" He looks at Fitz.

and like, i'm sorry, but i'm not gonna mince words: that's dumb. it's essentially a semimystical answer to a psychological question. it just doesn't make much sense. and frankly it's out of character. i hate it.

the second flaw is that it's just too short. when you read when, you gain an instant comprehension of why with understanding needed to be four hundred thousand words, because in thirty thousand, when really can't quite cut it. the characters just don't have time to develop and change and learn in the same way.

the third flaw is the ending, and it's actually a flaw that when shares with with understanding, although in with understanding it's not quite as drastic. essentially, in the end, cas is back in the exact same position as he was at the beginning, with only dean's word standing between him and a resurgence of the abuse. dean's brutalization of cas, like in with understanding and unlike in bone and hesitation, is essentially domestic abuse behavior. dean isn't engaging with cas as an enemy, and he isn't engaging with cas under the influence of false beliefs. he's engaging with cas as his friend cas when he brutalizes him. while dean is no longer under the psychological stress of believing sam is in hell, and has had an epiphany about exactly how bad he fucked cas up, that doesn't necessarily mean things will change, or remain different. old habits die hard. nothing is stopping dean, once a new psychological stressor appears, from treating cas just the same as he had before, except his moral convictions, which didn't stop him the first time. he could easily find ways to justify himself. and on cas' end, he's just as totally dependent on dean materially as he was at the beginning of the fic, and while he's worked through some stuff and might run if dean started up again, he also might not, because it's not like a few conversations are enough to really teach new habits of mind.

and then like... the big virtue of when is that in concept it's soooooo good and juicy. the heavy emphasis on outsider pov, especially the law enforcement pov which is really a treat just like in with understanding, except i like it more in when because it's about canon cas rather than fbi agent cas who is a good protagonist for wu but way too comprehensible to his colleagues at the bau. the way that dean and cas escape and hide by depending on the kindness of someone dean's saved. the idea that dean is brutalizing cas because he's actively trying to go to hell to be closer to sam, which is just so juicy i can't stand it because it simultaneously gets at the horror of the brothers' codependency and also gets at dean's tendency to not care who he's hurting as long as he hurts himself worse. the fact that cas is like if you had asked i would have given you my body willingly!! the fact that cas was already in love with dean when the violations start!! that's so crazy to me!!

a version of when that's a hundred and fifty thousand words, where dean stays in prison for months while cas recovers and goes to therapy in some kind of group home but is also unable to really integrate into human society because he is genuinely alien. more emphasis, almost hesitation style, on the idea that cas already wanted dean, and cas having to pick apart what desire remains there from the horror of being repeatedly raped. like the most unsatisfying thing about with understanding, to me, is how cas isn't really cas, and how dean and cas have no prior relationship. and like i do like some of the stuff in with understanding that comes from that, such as the fact that cas kind of becomes canon cas via trauma in some ways, and the fact that with understanding is like a dark subversion of the soulmate trope, but it does kind of make me crave a version where cas is himself and deancas are themselves you know? and when could be that. a much more complex and comprehensive outsider pov where we dig into juicy elements that when leaves on the table, such as the speculation that cas may have been in a cult (and we dig into how the outsiders are obviously wrong but maybe on some level they were right). maybe also some outsider pov from hunters and/or people dean has saved such that we actually see outsider pov on the nature of dean and cas' relationship from people who understand more of the context, and also such that when cas breaks dean out and they go on the lam, they can at least partially integrate into a community that will keep their relationship stable. or perhaps, for a tragedy, we see their relationship begin to deteriorate again once cas is dependent on dean again. make dean's motivation be about going to hell with sam, and really dig into that, explore dean's willingness to hurt other people as long as he's also hurting himself. when could be the perfect fic. it literally could. just for me.

and then bone is like... the thing about bone is that most of my thoughts about it revolve around it being a kind of counterpoint to with understanding and when. like before i talk about it i'm gonna say a couple of the things i really like about it which don't have that much to do with that.

the experiential descriptions of cas' brainwashed state are so fabulous and chilling, and that is i think the thing from bone that really made it into with understanding, although in bone it's so much clearer and more visible, which, you know, on the one hand, feels less real, but on the other it's soooooo chilling, you're really forced to think about it, to consider cas' experience, plus it draws your attention to similar moments in with understanding and makes those much more unsettling.

the side character stuff is fabulous, i especially liked ellen and anna, but really all of it is good.

the thing where angels can't feel and therefore could never have been broken like cas was, but the fact that cas had saved dean from hell, had been changed by him, on some level already loved him, and that's what made him vulnerable to dean's brutality is like such a juicy little tragedy.

but like. now let's compare.

like, i already pointed this out, but when and with understanding both start from like, a kind of domestic abuse situation that is enabled by circumstances that don't really change. bone, on the other hand, is like... dean is originally engaging with cas as an enemy combatant, and this is enabled by the fact that they are on opposite sides of a war. but these circumstances do genuinely change. bone creates a situation almost more akin to hesitation, where the main conflict and question is: you end up with a cas who has this trauma bond created by trauma which is absolutely in the past, and it can't be gotten rid of, so how do you live with it? as opposed to with understanding and when where it's more like how do you keep dean and cas from backsliding into an already established abusive dynamic. and the thing is bone dean is still culpable, and the level of like... so traumatized he's barely a person anymore that cas is on in bone is unreal. but it's more a question of: dean is not going to backslide into traumatizing cas again, but how can dean be prevented from accidentally or on purpose taking advantage of cas' traumatized state? how can cas be helped to rebuild his sense of self, is that even possible? cas wants to stay with dean, but can that desire be taken seriously if it's a result of horrific damage inflicted on cas that must be recovered from? is cas' consent meaningful? what if cas can never recover, does that change the answers to the other questions? if he can never recover, is it alright to allow him to be happy with dean? these are all super crunchy questions and they're like a really fun alternate take on the same basic premise that hesitation, with understanding, and when are all taking on.

and like the thing about. okay i'm gonna talk about with understanding for a moment. the thing about with understanding is that it rests on all of this exceptionalism and individualism and psychologizing of dean's behavior. when actually a lot of it is circumstantial? like the thing about with understanding is that with understanding dean if he was in normal circumstances would probably be a manipulative, emotionally abusive person who would be likely to pressure people into things including sex, have absolutely zero boundaries, and might even be inclined towards some light stalking, but he wouldn't be kidnapping anyone. he would probably stay in the category of "super shitty boyfriend" rather than "fbi manhunt." but the thing is his circumstances aren't normal. like, if you are dean winchester in the world of with understanding, it's almost a sane thing to do to temporarily kidnap your soulmate just so you can meet once and then let him go. it's still really awful, but it makes circumstantial sense because you KNOW that that will allow you to meet in heaven, and otherwise he would arrest you. it's really bad, but it's not as insane a move as it would be if nearly anyone else did it. it makes sense. and then once you have your soulmate kidnapped temporarily, it's not that big of a leap to just... give into temptation and not let him go. add onto that the fact that dean is just used to kidnapping and torturing people (those people are usually demons, but still), has access to all of these sometimes magical tools and weapons and equipment and a bunker in the middle of nowhere, is totally outside society and has no external observers in his life to sanity check him and no one to really hide from, and is used to being on the wrong side of the law and totally confident that that won't be a problem for him, and it's like... yeah. like the thing is if wu dean had all the same personality traits but was a car mechanic, cas would never have been in that situation. and like, the way everyone reacts to dean like they're so shocked that he treated cas "well" and that he's so capable of a certain level of basic self-awareness it's like... well of course! most people who commit crimes like the one dean has are probably way more dysfunctional than dean is in various ways, because they need to get over more barriers like "fear of being caught" and "the realization that oh my god i'm planning a kidnapping" and "having to go to work and leave their victim at home" and other such trivialities that dean's lifestyle makes irrelevant. of course every crime is made possible by circumstance, but dean's situation is particularly unique.

but that doesn't mean that because wu dean is less dysfunctional than the average kidnapper, he's easier to fix with psychotherapeutic solutions. indeed, quite the opposite! the barriers to him committing horrific acts are inherently lower due to his circumstances, which means that he could be the healthiest guy in the world and he would still be a lot more dangerous than john q. average. to pull an example from canon: one time sam has a sexual fantasy about rowena and it freaks him out so bad that he yells at her and slaps her in manacles. this is a pretty horrifying and misogynistic act, but sam is like... he's a fairly regular guy. he has some hangups about sex, but not to an abnormal degree. but he does have a set of magic manacles, and an occupation that has desensitized him to violence and chaining people up, and a pre-bottled justification (she's evil!) that says it's okay to be violent to rowena, and so this happens. you get my meaning? so fixing wu dean with therapy is like... it's kind of the last thing i'd reach for, you know? it's cathartic for cas, but it's not effective.

and like wu dean's circumstances don't really change! hell, in the end, dean and cas are ONCE AGAIN isolated together in the wilderness. and sure, cas is kind of choosing to be there, but he's also trapped by the fact that he's a wanted fugitive. it's so much more effective than the cuff because there's no more soft landing waiting for him back in normal society, only a hard prison cot.

anyway the thing about bone is that in bone the change is almost all circumstantial. like yeah dean does have like a guilt epiphany and shit, and obviously the pathology of hell trauma does affect dean's actions as a torturer. but the problem and solution are not situated in that pathology. in the end, the main thing that happens to fix things is that cas is no longer considered an enemy, and he is integrated into a society which contains people who care about and can care for, keep an eye on, and sanity check both him and dean. there will never again be circumstances in which it is easy for dean to torture and brainwash him. you know? and that really highlights what's going on in when and with understanding.

[egipci]

no please say more about how devastating it would have been if we’d had john in the later seasons. I personally am clenching every muscle in my body over how tall and skinny jdm is and how sturdy and broad (and shorter than his dad even though I know it’s just the angle they’re actually the sameish height but whatever) jensen looks in that pic of them

my dear friend, I'm generally not at all into size difference kink but there is nothing that brings me more joy than how they go from little twink dean and his big strong dad to beefy masc dude and his skinny old man <333 As it were we already have Dean carrying/physically helping his dad in almost every episode we see them together --- imagine if it were actual age-accurate John on top of that. Like, Dean can beat him up! Dean can hurt him! (and how does John feel about that? pride, admiration, envy, scrupulousness, security? etc). Except, of course Dean would never, ever hurt his dad, and neutralizing the issue of physical coercion really allows all sorts of interesting entry points into their relationship.

But also imagine if he'd been there with Dean at his most lethal/angry/violent. Every single time I see a gif of scruffy late seasons Dean being sad and grumpy I'm like, if only his dad were here to rail him, that would have fixed him. Many will have you believe that one or more characters have come to fulfill John's role in Dean's life, but I've never really been convinced by that. I think that little dude needs a break, and for all that their relationship was unhealthy and damaging and for all John had been cruel and careless, Dean can be "submissive" with his dad in a way he can't be with anybody else. It would be a fundamentally different show, depending on whether John never dies or if he's resurrected somehow, but these possibilities are always on my mind (mostly for the above-mentioned prurient reasons)