#spn so true gotta see it through to the bitter bitter end

[incarnateirony]

I'm gonna need fandom to stop projecting some weird romanticized and/or bitter idea of suicidal ideation on 15x20 Dean which is directly contrary to the text.

If anything, 15x20 was Dean's least suicidal period. He had opted to start trying to enjoy life. He still clearly struggled with depression and grief from his sloppy room, but that doesn't necessarily translate to suicidal thoughts.

Dean highlighted his desire to make sure sacrifices weren't in vain. He tried to eat after a whole season of refusing to because he was too angry and scared.

People misunderstand "being realistic" as "suicidal". While yes, you can even check the script and there's a moment of panic thinking about if Cas was there, and yes, it even clarifies the nearest hospital is 45 minutes away and yes, clarifies Dean was 100% run through, just because that didn't make it to screen doesn't mean it's suddenly Dean surrendering.

Maybe this is something not understood because of how international SPN fandom is, or how urban its digital demographic tends to be--but I've got news for you. It's basically common knowledge that places like that are at least half an hour from anywhere in the US.

I've lived in those places.

One such place, for example, was Timpson Texas. When I moved there for a few months, I was warned. Don't get hurt. The nearest hospital is 45 minutes away. But if it's really bad--they do have a volunteer EMS department. Which, they joked, was "express delivery" because it was located right next to the funeral home, and frankly nobody was sure what their actual credentials were in a town of 200~.

It's very, very rare to find a farmhouse setup like that near a city. Or at least anything less than 20 minutes from anywhere. There's a few exceptions to that rule for anything in life, like the Independence, MO area that has really weird fucking zoning and you can go from farmland to ghetto to farmland to downtown in a straight shot, but by and large, this is how it is in the US. I know 45 minutes sounds insane to someone living in like, the UK. Or even people who've lived their whole lives in and around big US metro cities like New York and Chicago.

But I can promise you, just because those thoughts didn't come out of Dean's mouth, they ran through his head, like many silent things you can see him assess at any given moment in the show that are common sense life, battle, or other issues. "Well, shit, it'll take an ambulance at least 30 minutes to get here if I'm lucky and my vision's already tunneling, Cas isn't here, gotta take my chance to say what's important, like I learned from Cas."

That's it. That's what that was. Was the death comically long? Yes, still not enough for him to get help. Were there ways they could have illustrated it better? Sure, they could have used that one overhead driving in a field shot for the 1000th time. Would the text have helped in dialogue--maybe, you know this fandom loves missing the point anyway.

Everyone goes "but why tell Sam not to bring him back then!!" bro-- bro--he literally says why, and it's true. That always ends bad. It's stopping this jerk off cycle and realizing it's ok to be freaking mortal. That they can't keep fucking up the cosmic balance for all eternity. Letting hundreds/thousands/millions/billions of people have their entire universe fucked up because the two brothers insist on being in the same spot at the same time. He insisted Sam live on.

Maybe it's a misunderstanding of biology too? Hell, there's some ways that could have gone in that would have had him dead even faster. It really just depends what exactly it punctured how. Is it technically survivable? Yeah, if you're not basically an hour and a half out from a hospital with the weewoo cab trip both ways. If he already felt himself fading though, reality strikes.

That's Dean Winchester becoming spontaneously aware of his mortality, not giving up. Like I hate to tell people, but you'll never make it out of life alive. That's not suicidal, that's reality. The point is, to live the best life you can while you have it, and to not give up, sure. But also to be aware that you might get diagnosed with terminal cancer or you might get hit by a bus or maybe you'll fucking ridiculously get run through on a dickbar. Some things in life you can't control.

Are there ways this could have been pulled together far better? 100% absolutely. The finale was a disaster in delivery. At literally every corner. In every way. But that shouldn't make us just scream past it and somehow convert it into the worst possible take guys. I should hope that a young adult to middle aged demographic understands things like basic biology, emergency response time, the fact that we're all mortal beings, and the general moral of learning what to say when it's important and maybe your last chance, c'mon.

Or worse, trying to turn it into "Dean didn't want to live anymore because he missed Cas." Like shit. I'm blazing "Destiel is canon and has been for a while" trash but -- that's literally? Contradictory? Dean wanted to live because he respected Cas' sacrifice. That's canon. Even when he still felt down and his room was still messy and some days he might have almost felt dead, he kept trucking, kept dreaming, put in job applications, tried to be the young self he used to be and go to a pie-fest, whatever. He kept moving. THAT'S where he kept fighting.

Giving up isn't Dean accepting that a pike through all his major organs an hour out from medical help is gonna be the end. Giving up would be him having stayed passed out on the whiskey bottles on the floor forever moping and just WAITING for that instead of being like, damn, I didn't think today would be the day.

Is it a perfect ending, no, not saying that, nor in any way defending the fucking trashfire finale but I'm so sick of seeing this "suicidal dean" talk. When that isn't even remotely what it was.

[katsidhe]

And now it’s your turn! I would love to get the Director’s Commentary on “Awake, Arise.” Especially if you get inspired to add another chapter. 😜❤️

Thank you so much to both @caranfindel and @quirkykayleetam for asking about “Awake, Arise”! It’s a multi chapter, WIP season 9 AU with all my favorite things: Sam, and also torture. What else is there to say??

…okay, fine, let’s add some background.

How did you come up with the idea?

Sam’s been hurt a lot, hasn’t he? He gets injured every other episode, he gets tied up and threatened and tortured, he gets choked and stabbed and conked on the noggin and everything else under the sun. It’s why we love him. But most everything that’s happened to him (with the big ol’ glaring exception of the Cage) has been, if not wholly unanticipated, at least a shock in that moment. On the job, then acute hurt, then relative safety. When he’s in a fight, he can give as good as he gets. If he’s abducted, it’s a surprise, and it’s temporary. If he’s killed, it’s sudden, and he’s coming back. Even though hideous injury is a predictable hazard of his occupation, Sam hasn’t really been in a prolonged period of helplessness/anticipation of injury without a reasonable hope of escaping it or fighting back… at least, not on Earth.

In the Cage, on the other hand, Sam experienced unimaginably brutal and creative abuse, with no hope of escape or fighting back or rescue, and with every anticipation that each new day would be more absurdly unbearable than the last. But… he also didn’t need to be functional, per se, not beyond whatever variable standard of “entertaining” that Lucifer specified. He didn’t have to pull himself together to research a case or interact with civilians or navigate the nuanced and thorny complexities of his relationship with Dean.  

Basically, Sam’s day-to-day struggles are stressful and ongoing and dangerous, but he never knows precisely what to expect, and he knows he’s generally equipped to fight back; his time in the Cage was a lot more morbidly predictable and inevitable, but there was no requirement to be a sane, productive member of society.

So….. what if we combined the best worst of both worlds? What if Sam got an exact time and date and description for the hurt, a who what when where, without any way for him to fight or avoid it? And it would just keep happening, but in between, he had to keep living his life? What if, on top of that, it was the worst thing he could imagine: a return to the Cage? (Trauma is nice but REtrauma is nicer.) How do would he deal with THAT flavor of ongoing trauma—something unlike anything he’s felt before? 

Hence… the premise of Awake, Arise, which I tossed around in my mind for a few years, sort of fruitlessly wishing someone else would think of the same idea and write it. (I found a few stories with premises that were… vaguely similar but not quite there.) Eventually, I realized I’d have to be the change I wanted to see in the world. Or some such thing.

Why is it set in season 9?

Short answer? Not to put too fine a point on it, but adding Lucifer to s9 makes a stew that I think most embodies what I see as SPN’s mission statement: “Sam Winchester navigates various abusive relationships, of varying severity, to varying degrees of success.”

Longer justification: first of all, it’s gotta be after season 7—so that Sam’s in a place of relative functionality—and before season 11—so that Lucifer’s got little hope for imminent rescue. So that narrows the field a little.

And then I got to thinking about the other goals I had for a fic (y’know, beyond just endlessly self-indulgent Lucifer and Sam convos and Cage headcanons, which is my real genre of choice), and I realized I really, REALLY wanted to deal with the intricacies of Sam and Dean’s post-Gadreel relationship. The newly Mark’ed Dean is looking for absolution that Sam’s in absolutely no mood to give. Sam’s reeling from possession and betrayal; he’s trying, for the first time in a long time, to set some boundaries in their relationship. What better time to make things EVEN WORSE, than when Sam’s already got to navigate his victimhood at the hands of his own brother? What better time to add in Lucifer as both foil and cruel truth-teller?

Other things to love in season 9: Dean’s, erm, complicated relationship with violence and torture and Sam-as-victim is being exacerbated by the Mark (oh Dean, you scary bastard, I do love you)… and Cas and Sam’s friendship is both touchingly close and more than a tad off (”the only one who’s screwed up worse than you is me”, anyone?)… and Gadreel, whom I love, is hanging around to be a Sam-mirror (they should be friends but they’re very much noooot ahahaha)… 

What’s with the title?

“Awake, arise, or be forever fall’n” is a Paradise Lost quote. It’s Satan’s rallying cry to the other angels who have fallen from God’s grace: he’s telling them that he’s their only salvation. 

How closely is it going to follow canon events?

I’m operating under the logic that the ONLY thing that’s altered between canon and the Awake Arise universe is the existence of Abaddon’s spell. That being said, the addition of Lucifer to the season 9 chessboard upsets the plans of quite a few players, and changes the Sam’n’Dean dynamic dramatically! There are a lot of fun implications that come from that one alteration, so while  generally, facts that are true in canon remain true here, the landscape’s gonna look pretty different in the end.

Was this your first real attempt at creative writing?

Yepppp. It’s not my first fic ever (that dubious distinction belongs to a very short piece I wrote in about an hour right after 11.09 because holy shit 11.09 was not fucking around), but it’s the first one I’ve ever expended serious effort on. When I started writing it in 2017, I didn’t think of myself as any kind of an author. I think my writing has improved since then, and hopefully it will continue to improve.

It’s incredibly self indulgent, isn’t it?

Why, yes. Yes, it is. It is an excuse for my id to hurt Sam in fun new ways. I tacked intellectual character justifications onto it post hoc.

Are you ever going to update?

Yes. I am going to see this unholy thing through to the bitter end (which btw is already written). Chapter 17 is about three-quarters done.  

How long is it going to be?

Who knows! It began life with a broad fifteen chapter outline, but I kept thinking of more things to add to the middle, and then I needed additional things to connect those things in ways that made sense… you get the picture. Right now my outline has bloated to 33 chapters, and it’s almost certainly going to be longer than that.

And there’s my commentary! Thanks for asking!! I’m not even sure what people are most interested in knowing about this piece, since it’s a WIP… so if there’s some burning question or idle curiosity I didn’t cover, drop me a line!

[wayward-demons]

Game For Anything. Pt. 17

Word Count: 2,014 Warnings/Notes: Trigger warning. Torture, Uh- yeah Tags: @crawegirl @nea90sweetie @littlegirlsdontplaynice @queen-of-moons-peace-out-bitches @gaysmutstiel @xolyssaaa @uruburock13 @lisa-horn@jencharlan @fangirl1802 @spn-4-eva @hey-um-misha ((if you want to be added to the list just let me know))

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4 /  Part 5 / Part 6 / Part 7 / Part 8 / Part 9 / Part 10 / Part 11 / Part 12 / Part 13 / Part 14 / Part 15 / Part 16

Your body lay barely moving. You’re breathing was shallow. You were questioning how you were still alive with every slow blink. Randy had said he wasn’t done with you, but what more could he do to you? He’d drained you, he’d humiliated you, he’d broke you. And he knew it.

A door creaked open loudly. “Oh goody you are still awake.” Randy pulled your hair and forced you to get on your knees. “Y/N, I gotta say, this isn’t the prettiest you’ve been. This might be a bad look on you.” He turned to the male vampire behind him, “She’s not attractive, right?”

“She’s alright.” He shrugged.

Randy sighed, “Maybe the years just haven’t been good to you.” He leaned down, “I still remember all the good times we had.” He pulled away with half a smile on his face. You tried to focus on him but he threw you back down on the floor. You landed with a thump and became a heap on the floor.

Dean and Sam kicked at the dust covered house. The door was unlocked and barely shut when they made it here. Your car remained outside. They entered the house slowly, guns at the ready in case anything were to jump out at them.

They searched each room separately. Sending one another off into different parts of the house with the guns still cocked. “Looks fishy.” Sam uttered as he left your bed room. He put his gun away, tucking it into his belt.  

Dean turned to his brother. “Well she’s been here.” He held up a mostly empty bottle of Whiskey to show his brother. “It looks like this might be how far she made it though.” He pointed to the line where the whiskey started. Dean took the lid off and smelt it, shrugging to himself, and took a small sip.

Sam pointed to the phone on the floor. It remained off the hook and next to where Dean had picked up the whiskey bottle.  “Who was her last call?” He asked.

Dean bent down and picked the phone, hitting redial only to get a loud beeping in his ear. “None?” He hung it up, looking at the thing as if it had clues that were going to jump up at him.

Sam shifted his weight. “Why would it just be sitting here if it was none?” He asked.

Dean shrugged. “Wait, is that-?” He took a few steps towards the kitchen. “A voicemail? Geeze when was the last time you saw something like this Sammy?” He laughed as he took a few steps towards the machine he was pointing at.

Sam rolled his eyes. “That’s a big number flashing.” He joined his brother standing over the ancient piece of technology flashing a number over 20.

Dean hesitated before hitting play; his finger resting above it as if it were going to burn him when it did. They both were not enjoying prying into your life this way. But they kept mentally telling themselves they needed to save you.

Your voice rang out clear as day, words slurring. “Randy, I don’t know why I keep calling. *hiccup* It’s not like you can answer. But I know if you did *hiccup* you would tell me I’m being silly. Tell me to take a *hiccup* break and just think about it all. Ha. *hiccup* You’d sit there and tell me that none of this is worth my time.” They could hear you take a deep sigh, could hear a little whimper let out before you hung up the phone.

Sam and Dean shared a look. They quickly turned it off before another one started, letting your voice ring out against the empty walls. They didn’t want to hear anymore. They had heard enough.

“So…” Dean started. “Guess I know what this was for…” He set the bottle down on the counter, carefully making sure it wouldn’t spill. His hands went back to his side as he awkwardly stood there not knowing what to do next.

Sam’s mind was racing. “So she comes here and listens to the voicemails, and what? Goes out for a jog to get away? Something doesn’t add up still.” Sam looked around the room, He was trying to fill the emptiness. “Why was the door still open? Why was the whiskey bottle left? Y/N doesn’t seem like she would leave a few drinks behind, let alone keep her door wide open.”

“She doesn’t have much here.” Dean gestured to the mostly empty apartment. “I don’t even see anything that could help with lore…” He spun around, still searching for an answer.

Sam walked to the front door, his fingers tracing along the side of it. “Dean look,” he pointed to the splinter in the door. “Forced entry. Y/N was kidnapped.”

Low and quick little breaths quickly filled your lungs. Your vision was blurry, time seeming to move slow as if you needed this torture to drag out any longer. Randy had circled you repeatedly to the point it was making you dizzy. His newest form of torture was not doing anything but watch you from different angles.

“Y/N, I need you to stay with me a little longer. Just a little bit I promise it will all end soon.” He lifted your face and looked into your half open eyes, and spoke clear and slow so you would understand. “Your heart beat is so quiet. Have I been too rough on you?” He let your head drop again and listened to the soft noise you made as it hit the ground. He licked the blood off his finger. “I’m not ready for you to die yet.”

Randy tapped his finger on his chin. A knock on the door brought him back to the real world and away from his overly imaginative brain of his. “Come in.” He yelled waving his thoughts away.

Another vampire entered the room slowly. “Uh- Randy?” he asked, his voice shaky. “The thing you asked for is here.” Randy gave a few nods before he left the room, and you.

Sam and Dean had tracked your cell phone to a remote little house in the middle of nowhere. They slammed their doors shut and rounded the car to the trunk. Dean propped the part that hid their true life open with a sawed-off shotgun as he searched weapons to fight with.

“So what are we thinking? Is it vamps?” Dean tossed around a machete in his hands. “Or, practically anything else?” He set the knife down and reached for his handy little gun. He checked the chamber to make sure it was full before closing it and looking at his brother.

Sam sighed, “All of the above? I don’t even know what we’re going into. We should have done more research.”

“Geek.” Dean instantly responded to it. “You’re right. We weren’t exactly thinking rationally here. It was a ‘get here as fast as we can kinda moment.” Dean leaned against his car. “Okay let’s think. Vampires are what brought her to this town before. What’s to say that it wasn’t them who took her? Demons don’t hold a grudge against her-“

“Unless they found out we know her.” Sam butted in, “But they’d be surrounding the place and this place seems” They both looked around. “…empty.”  

Sam and Dean both reached for their blades, pocketing them both so they were at the ready. Wordlessly packing their guns full of ammo. Dean slammed the trunk door shut and looked over the house before them.

It was massive. It reminded Dean of the first time he met you. A giant house in the middle of nowhere, termite infested wood, windows broken out, fields of nothing surrounding the area. “Okay. Let’s go.”

You crawled yourself to the wall, propping yourself up and looking around the room. It was strangely clean, not even a drop of your blood was on the floor. You sighed, trying to gain bearing of where you were and what was going on. An I.V. poked into your arm, feeding you the nutrients you needed to even sit here.

Now that Randy was gone you were gaining consciousness. The world was spinning less. You could hear a few thuds from outside the door. But you waved it off and ignored the noises, passing them off as something Randy must be up to. Maybe more of his Vamps not agreeing with his standards.

Randy came in the door, out of breath and a bit shaken. “It seems we don’t have much time left sweetheart. I guess I have to rush a bit on our plan.” Randy pulled you to your feet and raised you higher. Your toes grazing the floor.

“Randy,“ You choked. “Why are you doing this to me?”

“Because you let me die. You let these vamps take me and make me one of them. You made me go out on that last hunt with you. You did all of this.” Randy gestured to his whole body with his free hand.

He tightened his grip around your neck. “And there isn’t anything I could ever do to make you feel the hurt and pain that I had to endure to be standing right here with you at my will. Nothing.” He paused. “Except I can turn you. Make you join me. Make you feed on those damned hunters making their way up here right now.”

Your mind raced, ‘Dean? Sam? Are they here to save me? How did they even find me?’

Randy bit into his free arm and raised it above your face. Blood dripped on your lips, “Taste it Y/N,” He ordered and loosened his grip on you so you could finally breathe. Our mouth opened just enough to let a few drops sneak in. It was harsh, bitter, and almost sour.

Dean burst through the door. Blade dripping blood at his sides. Randy dropped you, all his teeth finally baring for all of you to see. “Y/N, you okay?” Dean asked, refusing to take his eyes off of Randy.

“She’s doing perfectly fine. And in a moment, even better than ever.” Randy charged towards Dean so fast that Dean had barely even seen the attack happening. Dean hit his back against the wall, taking the wind out of him for a moment.

You sat coughing trying to throw up the blood in your system before it could affect you in anyway. Randy threw Dean before you in a heap, you hadn’t even watched the fight before you and now a passed-out Dean lay before you.

“Here, drink.” Randy ordered. He waited for you to respond, and when you didn’t he fell to the floor and raised Dean’s arm above you, “Drink!” He yelled. Again, you didn’t respond. But it wasn’t about ignoring him, at this point you didn’t even understand what he was asking you to do.

Suddenly you could hear so many things, and Randy’s yelling was ringing in your ears. Randy bit into Dean’s arm, taking a little drink for himself before forcing your mouth on the deep bite marks oozing blood.

Dean tasted amazing, like nothing you could even describe. You felt yourself filling up, and yet wanting so much more than you were taking. And then your brain kicked in. You were drinking blood. You were drinking Dean’s blood. Dean, who had come here to save you. Dean who had cared enough o track you down, and you were on the verge of draining him dry. You could hear Sam below you, fighting what sounded like the last Vamp in the house other than Randy.

You snatched Dean’s blade from close by and rose your feet. Suddenly overcome with a power that you couldn’t even describe. Randy jumped to his feet laughing, he didn’t even try to defend himself against your attack. You stood over his body watching the blood ooze out of his decapitated head. A smile remained on his face as it rolled away. “Fuck you.” Your voice broke as you tried to yell at him.

Sam kicked the ajar door open, Dean woke up with a start and you stood hovering over the dead body of the one guy in the world you had loved. The one person in the whole world you actually gave a damn about, and you had killed him yourself.

(( Pt. 18 ))