#we’ll see though bc i wish them nothing but pain and suffering after everything they’ve put us through

[sortasirius]

Grace and Graffiti

Pairing: Dean/Cas

AN: So I know I posted like seven chapters but they needed serious editing so here’s the whole thing at once lol.  Endverse!AU

Warnings: Drug use, alcoholism, major character death, sexually explicit, angst bc i know nothing else lmao

Words: 26,558

Whole thing is on my AO3 here.

August 7, 2014

Cas broke free of the clawing hands and vicious screams of the Croats for a moment, a heartbeat, just long enough to look out the window and see Dean on the ground.  Impossibly, maybe Cas is imagining it, they lock eyes. He knew what Dean had done.  He knew that he had willingly sacrificed them, sacrificed him to the Croats and the demons. He saw Dean’s face, that face that he would do anything for and he thought he could see the regret, the pain. He thought Dean tried to say something, just as Lucifer snapped his neck.  Cas felt the scream wrenched out his chest, he didn’t hear it, but he felt it tear through every millimeter of his body.  He could never get used to the physical pain of being human, the shattering pain of bones breaking, the searing pain of being burned, the throbbing of a split lip, the aching of sore muscles after one too many fights, but nothing could have ever prepared him for the unquestionable, all-consuming pain of losing Dean.  There was no way forward.  He couldn’t see, breathe, even hear the terrible sound of gunfire and Croats and demons and his dying friends.  He stared and stared and stared at Dean, his Dean, his one and only Dean lying broken on the ground, Lucifer’s white shoe still on his neck.  The pain went on and on, crashing over him like the ocean waves that he wished would drown him, take him out to sea.  There was only one thing to be done.  After a moment, Cas stood, looked at Dean lying there on the ground, turned, and let the monsters take him.

August 10, 2010

Summer days like this made Cas glad to be on earth.  Cool and breezy with a light blue sky, the area around Bobby’s place was green and lush. The world was beautiful, and Cas was glad to be in it.  

Dean always said that Cas was too quiet, materializing directly him, but this time it was Dean that surprised him.  He appeared at his shoulder, looking out, clearly trying to see what Cas was looking at, and, probably, if it was a threat.

“What’re you doing?”

“Admiring the view.”

Dean scoffs, taken aback.

“What?”

“Sometimes even I can admire the beauty in things.”

Dean watched him.  They never really had time to look at things. Dean had traveled all over the country and Cas was sure that he had seen almost none of it.  He had never understood how Cas could sit in a park for hours after a hunt or simply watch the scenery go by in the Impala, but he hoped one day Dean could slow down enough to see how beautiful things on earth could be, monsters aside.

“Yeah well, nature tour’s over, we have bigger problems.”

Clearly, today was not that day.

“Such as?”

Dean, mysterious as ever, dodged around his question.

“Come on, Bobby’s waiting.”

The inside of Bobby’s house was the same as it always was, simultaneously a wreck and a home.  Similar to the car bodies outside, it was rusted and well-loved, old and strong, beautiful in only the way humans could make beautiful.  

Dean was leaning against the counter, swigging from a bottle he had pulled from Bobby’s fridge.

“We have a problem.”

Bobby was never one to wait for dramatics.  He sighed and wheeled himself towards the kitchen table, pulling his journal off of it and turning back to Dean.

“Out with it, boy, what is it?”

Dean slammed some newspaper clippings on the counter.  Cas looked down at them.  They were from all over, mostly small towns, one little city in Texas called Taylor. People gone crazy, killing indiscriminately, normally peaceful people simply turned violent for no apparent reason. He had heard something of this, when he was in Heaven, before he knew Dean or Sam or Bobby or anything about the world.  He knew it was bad news, probably worse than bad news.

“What is it?” Bobby asked, looking up at Dean, who was, as usual, doing his best to be unreadable. He was never very good at it, but he tried.

“Croatoan.”

“And what the hell is that?”

“A virus.  Me and Sam took on a town with it in Oregon a few years back.  It, it does this to people, makes them violent, stronger than normal.  It’s…bad news.”

“How the hell did it get out?”  Bobby’s voice was stricken with something, an emotion he didn’t often show.

Dean swallowed.  He obviously knew something, and if Cas knew anything about Dean, he wasn’t about to keep it from Bobby.

“Could be the demons. Think about it.  If they release it, it could decimate the planet, turn everyone against each other.  It makes sense.  But what I don’t get is why right now.  I mean, we all know they’ve been kicking it up a notch recently, hell we’ve taken down groups of em every other week it seems like, but this?  I just don’t see why the timing works out,”

Cas cocked his head to the side, looking at Dean.  Now he was the one that knew something, and he had always been terrible at hiding things, especially from Dean. Dean was rubbing his forehead.  Cas used to think that this meant he needed healing.  He had tried more than once to touch his forehead and heal whatever pain Dean was in when he did this, but Dean insisted that headaches were part of being human, and he didn’t need it taken away every time he rubbed his head. Still, Cas didn’t like to see Dean do this.  It meant he was stressed, and above everything, Cas wanted to make Dean’s life simple, not more complicated.

“Dean.”

“What, Cas?”

“I’ve been hearing some things, and you won’t like it.”

Dean’s eyes snapped up to him.  Green as the grass outside.  Humans really were amazing, billions of different shapes, sizes, colors, and minds. And eyes.  Green had always been his favorite, though he wasn’t sure why. Dean’s tongue ran across his teeth.

“Okay, I don’t like most of the things I hear nowadays, I’m sure this isn’t the worst.”

Cas looked at him and he knew that what he said next would quite literally change the outcome of their lives.  It may sound dramatic, Dean and Bobby often said that he sounded like he’d been ripped from a dystopian novel.  He didn’t understand that reference at first until Dean had thrust Cormac McCarthy’s The Road in his hands one night and hadn’t said another word.  

“I heard that Lucifer is making moves, trying to find Sam.”

Dean’s face doesn’t move.

“Sam wouldn’t say yes.”

Cas paused.  He could feel Dean daring him to go on, daring him to accuse Sam of saying yes to the Devil, even in theory.

“From what I’ve been hearing, he might.”

Dean stood and stood closer to him, their faces are only an inch apart, blue meets green, grass meets water, you might say.

“He wouldn’t.  Say yes.”

“Dean,” as always, Bobby broke the tension.

Dean took a step back. He sighed.

“So, about Croatoan-”

Cas only half listened to him as he planned with Bobby.  Planned next steps, planned where the infection could spread, planned worst cases and best case scenarios (which, admittedly, aren’t very good).  He knew that Dean would never believe Sam would say yes, even though he and Sam hadn’t spoken in almost two years.  Dean would never think anything bad about Sam, Cas knew that, but the angels he had spoken to had been clear.  Lucifer was doing his best to find Sam, and Sam was wearing down. They had told him that Sam was getting tired of running, of constantly saying no.  And if he said yes…

“Alright, fine, we’ll take it from there, but we have to keep an eye on it,” Dean jerked him out of his thoughts, “Can I talk to you?”

“Of course.”

He followed Dean back outside, to the beautiful sunny day that knew nothing of the literal plague sweeping the lands.  Dean leaned against a pillar on the porch, trying his best to be casual.  Again, he was good at many things, being casual was not one of them.

“Is that really all you’ve heard about Sam?”

“Dean-”

“Don’t bullshit me, Cas, I need to know.”

“From what I’ve heard he is…close to saying yes to Lucifer.”

“And if he does?”

“I think you know.”

Dean ran his hand down his face and sighed.  Cas wished he could take this away from Dean, who has been through so much and suffered so much.  He wished he could take away the pain, the heartache that he felt, but this was his job, and his job alone.  Cas could only be there every step of the way, to never abandon or leave him.

“I can’t, I won’t say yes.”

“That is your choice.”

He knew Dean wanted him to give him an answer to tell him unequivocally yes or no.  Yes, say yes to Michael, stop the apocalypse the way it was meant to be stopped, be damned the loss.  Or, say no, and hope that Sam stayed strong and stays away from Lucifer.

“Yeah.”

“Have you considered-”

“It’s better if we stay away from each other.”

Cas nodded, reaching out to touch Dean’s shoulder.  He hoped he wasn’t imagining it, but he felt Dean lean into the touch.  They stood there for a while, not enjoying the scenery, but enjoying the company all the same.

Read the rest here!