CHAPTER 1

Dean was so fucking tired of being tired.

The way his limbs refused to move properly, how his damned head felt like a distant unconnected part of his body, like something enveloped and wrapped in cotton and how his eyes were sticky and red with a slight burning sensation at the edges. Just one time, he wished he could get a full night's sleep. No trudging around the bunker at odd hours, lying awake on his comfortable, memory-foam mattress for hours on end, or stupid nightmares plaguing him deep into the night.

Alas, wishful thinking.

Going into the kitchen he spotted Sam at the table, right as his brother was sitting down and fiddling with his shoes. He was humming to himself, some stupid pop song probably, and Dean looked on in bewilderment.

"What the hell are you wearing? Are you going outside like this? " he asked irritated, ignoring Sam's cheerful behaviour.

Sam startled a litte at his voice, then gave him his patented bitch face and said, "Good morning to you too, Dean. And it's called jogging these days. You should try it sometime. "

Dean mustered his black training pants and the grey sweater, running shoes completing the outfit. Then his eyes wandered to the kitchen clock and he sighed in exasperation. What normal person went jogging at half past six? Yeah, his health freak of a little brother apparently.

It wasn't even warm outside, for god's sake last time he went outside it was snowing.

"Ugh, have fun, I guess? " he said dubiously.

Sam smiled at the concession and nodded. "You could come if you want?"

Like hell he was going jogging at the crack of dawn! Thank you, but he worked out enough what with hunting monsters, demons and all the crap of the world. No reason to freeze his balls off to exercise.

Laughing at his expression, Sam got to his feet, ready to start his work out, when he paused and mentioned, "Cas found a case."

"What? Really?" That was certainly surprising, considering the dude hadn't come out for more than a moment in weeks. Cas had barricaded himself in front of the tv in his room, and god hadn't that idea, to give him his own room and tv, been an epic fail? Damn it, Dean couldn't even remember the time they'd last exchanged more than a few words and now he was talking to Sam about a hunt? What the fuck!

"Yeah, caught me by surprise, too. He thinks it might be a djinn, I don't know apparently there are signs. Lots of missing people over the years."

"Doesn't hurt to check it out, I guess", Dean admitted, shrugging.

"Just so you know, Cas wants to come along" Sam said, shooting him a wary glance, as he checked over his running gear.

"Wait, what? What the hell is he thinking? The guy's secluded himself in his room for weeks and now he suddenly wants to hunt?"

Sam stilled and looked at him. "Dean, this could be a good thing. We should give him a chance. And, you know, after the whole thing with Claire and her mum, he feels responsible."

"He's totally out of it. You trust him to have your back like this?"

Dean scoffed and stared back, not letting himself be talked around. He hated it when Sam got all rational and calm like he was some hothead that didn't know his stuff.

"It's Cas, Dean. We'll manage." It's not like Sam had to point at the one thing, he couldn't really object to. Because it's Cas and that would be enough in any case. If Cas needed to hunt some djinn to get closure and feel like he hadn't failed at protecting Claire - although he honestly kind of did - so be it, they would help.

He sighed. "Alright. " It felt like an enormous concession, especially considering the big grin flitting across his brother's face.

"So, we doing Christmas this year?" Sam asked brightly and headed for the fridge.

"What kind of question is that?"

Sam ignored him and Dean watched him go through the drinks, dismissing the coke and passing the beer, until his hand rested on a weird green concoction he'd never seen before, at least not in their fridge. Sam took out the glass bottle of green sludge with a triumphant 'Ah' and a muttered 'Knew there was still some left'.

Dean eyed the vile, liquid something and couldn't stop himself from asking with a mixture of curiosity and horrified fascination, "Where do you even buy this shit?"

"It's called a smoothie, Dean and you know I like them. They're healthy and full of numerous vital vitamins, and yes they taste good. And I didn't buy this, I made it." At Dean's look of incomprehension, Sam laughed a little and pointed towards a - huh, what the hell? - mixer on the counter right next to the fridge. When did that happen?

As if reading his thoughts Sam explained, "I bought it two months ago at a sale. It's very cost efficient, since I can blend my own smoothies now. This one contains -"

"Thanks! I don't want to know what's in there besides that it's green and leafy, alright?" Dean interrupted with an exaggerated shudder.

" - spinach, milk, an apple, a banana, oats, a little coconut oil and hmm... I think cinnamon", added Sam relentlessly and laughed at Dean's disgusted expression. "Want a sip?"

"Sometimes I can't believe that you're my brother", Dean groaned, waving his hand in the universal gesture of stay-away-from-me.

Sam smirked at him. "It's great for pre-workout", he said, drinking the smoothie with an exceptionally fake expression of bliss, then effortlessly switched the subject to their previous discussion, "Well, I mean, what about presents?"

Dean raised his eyebrows. "Why, you want anything special?"

"No, I don't really care, you know that. It's just, this is Cas first Christmas with us. Did you get him something?"

Dean scowled. "Go jogging, Sammy. "

"Good", he said with a knowing half smile, "I was thinking, maybe a book about all the various human cultures in modern times, their conventions and customs. Cas might find that interesting, right? Still got some days to order something."

"Yeah", was Dean's lacklustre response and he made shooing motions to get Sam out of the door.

"No, really, I think it would be nice to have a real Christmas for once!"

"Why the heck would you want that?" They never had before, not even with Bobby. It was just something not done in hunter circles, well, maybe those with kids and families did celebrate, who knew. Not that John had ever bothered. True, he tried his best, but Christmas time was usually when all the monsters and crazies crawled out of the woodwork.

"Just, could be our last one... with the three of us", Sam uttered hesitantly.

Dean swallowed hard. The first and the last, huh? He thought about it with dread churning in his stomach.

Neither mentioned the Darkness, but it was on both their minds.

"What, you want a tree too?" Dean asked in mock resignation, a prickle of warmth shooting through him as he imagined a big fir tree with colorful baubles and lights like in the movies or shop windows. It would look totally out of place at the bunker, and yet...

Sam grinned at him, recognising the signs of him giving in. "Actually, yes, I do."

"You're such a weirdo", Dean commented, shaking his head in disbelief at the perfect picture of childish delight his big lug of a brother just made. Seriously, those puppy-dog eyes.

###

Sometimes Dean dreamed.

There were the usual ones of hell, being tortured, torturing souls himself and losing all hope. Those never fully went away, only stopped for a while and gave him a breather.

Then there were the stupid, fairytale ones in which their parents were still alive and Sam and him had a simple, ordinary kind of life, without monsters or demons or angels. Everything would be impossibly prefect with them experiencing every little, mundane thing they'd always wanted to. From driving lessons, to learning how to bake mum's pie, to cramming for tests and getting a degree. It's funny how things seemed to crop up in dreams, that he hadn't thought about for years. Ironically Cas was a frequent addition, always human and appearing randomly as a friend of Dean or Sam or both, but always there.

Waking up was hard on those days, feeling disoriented for a moment and on one crushing instance even wondering what to get for mum's birthday. They always left him with a mess of constricting feelings in his chest, a bittersweet taste in his mouth and the faint urge to retch.

But yeah, he got the whole plate of nightmares, dreams of purgatory, of being a demon, of Sam dying and Cas dying. Of Ellen, Joe, Bobby, Benny, Kevin and Charlie.

But none of those were the worst kind. No, that was reserved for hearing Cain's voice spouting prophesies over and over and not knowing whether it was all just some stupid bullshit, that had wormed itself into his head somehow, or whether his destiny had been sealed by taking the Mark.

And if by fighting fate and releasing the curse, he had doomed them all.

Because it was like this, looking straight at it, ultimately his actions had brought about the second apocalypse.

The only cure he'd found against dreaming was fairly easy: don't sleep. Worked every time.

If you have to, well, being drunk as fuck usually helped.

###

Dean stumbled drunkenly into the kitchen, feet dragging behind him. He crashed into one of the kitchen chairs, as he fumbled for balance. His head felt fuzzy, the world around him seemed unsteady, lurching towards him in odd places and had an altogether unreal feel to it.

In a haze, he shook his head, trying to break free from the dreamlike quality of his vision.

Goddamnit, he knew better than that! It had been months some he'd felt this out of control that it seemed like a good idea to drink himself into a stupor. And he absolutely hated the fact that he could recognise how sloshed he was. Took the buzz right out of it.

Another bottle might help that, he thought sardonically, eyeing the tempting half full bottle of whisky someone had thoughtfully left on the kitchen counter, right next to the new mixer. Sammy, maybe?

He shouldn't though. He was supposed to be resting, since the plan was to get an early start tomorrow.

Today.

Somehow Cas had caught wind of a hunt on the border to Iowa, how he'd found the time to do that with all the netflix binging he was doing simultaneously, mystified him. Apparently it had all the signs of something involving the kind of djinns that sucked on the fear of their victims, and wasn't that a nice thought?

Cas seemed to consider it a personal duty to off those bastards, their sort had killed Claire's mum after all.

Anyway, they were going to Iowa in the morning and he needed the distraction the alcohol could provide, otherwise it would be impossible to get any kind of sleep, because, shoot him, but he couldn't forget about Amara.

Couldn't forget the monster he'd released into this world, a monster he shared some strange connection with. He felt bound somehow. Something deep within him refused to truly hurt Amara in any way - and it was driving him nuts!

Sure he'd tried to shove a knife into her belly, not that he'd really thought it would succeed. Wasn't the first time that move epically failed to work.

They were talking God's freaking sister here! With all the effort (or rather lack of it) he'd put into killing her, he could have as well just saved himself the trouble and got right down to the love confession.

Fuck, she'd kissed him. And what the hell had he done? Yeah, try nothing.

God knows what the heck he was doing.

Hah, maybe not.

He grinned to himself, silently saluting god with the bottle in his hand in an epic kind of fuck-you-gesture and took a deep swallow of the liquid. Huh, couldn't even feel the burn anymore.

If only his thought could be numbed as easily as his tongue.

Damnit, he was supposed to be a hunter, saving and protecting innocent people was his job!

Amara was fucking with his head, why did he even take the time to talk to the soulsucking beast?

Dean sighed, and sank down on a conveniently placed kitchen chair, bottle still in hand.

Maybe because lately he'd realised that far too many of his friends were less than human. His dad's black and white policy was more than ineffective in these times. Truthfully, he wouldn't have it any other way. Sometimes people could be monstrous as well, just look at all those psycho serial killers, so why shouldn't monsters be able to act like good people?

Maybe it helped that he'd met guys like Benny and Garth along the way. Even Crowley in a way, though mostly when it suited his own interests.

And there was Cas of course.

No need to wonder what John Winchester would have thought of that.

The bottle slid through his fingers and shattered on impact with the floor, whisky splashing in all directions.

Shit. Sam would be pissed.

He fuzzily heaved himself over to the sink and filled one of the glasses with cool water from the tap. Maybe the water would help a little with the headache, though hopefully he wouldn't sober up too quickly. Raising the glass to his lips, he took a few sips, when his gaze landed upon his arm.

The skin looked smooth and undamaged. There was no bright red scar winding across his arm, no dark destiny to keep him awake at night.

The Mark was gone. The curse had been lifted weeks ago, but Dean still forgot sometimes, it had become such a central part of himself after all.

In theory it was easy, his own life should be back on track with his focus being on destroying the threat of the Darkness, that he and his brother had unwittingly released.

Only it wasn't that simple. Wearing the Mark had changed something fundamental within himself. Even with it gone, Dean himself wasn't the same person he'd been before. Maybe that was why the bloodlust was still his ever-present companion and his thirst for violence hadn't abated yet.

Of course he hadn't told Sam, because how fucked up was that? For god's sake, he'd killed Death to get free and though the physical reminder of the Mark was gone, he didn't feel liberated, but as cursed as before. Perhaps more so.

With that refreshing thought on mind he got to his feet with the intention to finally stumble to bed.

To sleep and perchance to dream.

###

Iowa, Rockfield, outside of police station:

When they finally arrived another person, a girl this time, had been abducted. The count of victims had increased to five and judging by the hectic bustling around the station, the police officers seemed to be under a lot of stress from the government and the public.

"So, this sound like a djinn to you?", he asked Sam, leaning against the Impala and surreptitiously shuffling in his jacket for the painkillers he'd stuffed in this morning. If that got him a disapproving frown from Sam, so what, he had the hangover from hell and the headache was literally killing him where he stood.

Some police officer with the name of Murray had just reluctantly filled them in about all the recent abduction cases in the area, every second in his company made it apparent that he didn't want to hand the case over and generally wasn't very fond of his dear colleagues in the FBI.

Sucker.

Anyway, with a little posturing, they'd got the info they wanted.

Sam hesitated with his answer, obviously going through the facts in his mind once more. "It could be a case", he finally agreed. "Also possible this is just another deranged kidnapper. Still, better safe than sorry."

"How 'bout you, Cas?"

His eyes wandered to the angel, mustering his stiff form. And okay, so Cas looked shitty and kind of depressed, but at least he was committed enough to Claire that they'd managed to drag him out of his room, away from the netflix.

"There is a very high probability that we will encounter a djinn feeding on fear here", was his rather bland response.

Great.

"Okay, so it's settled. We'll look into it. First we got to take a look at the witnesses. How 'bout you two check out the elderly couple, Black was the name I think, and I hit the bar and see what I can do about that waitress, Trisha. She claims to have been one of the last to speak with Stacy before her capture."

Sam scowled at him in obvious in judgement. "And your interest in Trisha has nothing to do with her long legs? Or other... assets?"

Dean clutched at his heart in mock offense. "I'm only interested in her continued wellbeing and the information she can give us about the djinn. Doesn't hurt that she works in a bar though, or that she's a hot blonde babe."

He winked at his brother and when he didn't show any reaction beside a marked eyeroll, he turned to Cas and smirked filthily. The guy just smiled in his flasher tench-coat and gave him a painfully obvious thumbs-up.

Yeah, that was Cas for you.

"Good luck, Dean", he said, then walked over to Sam's Charger and it really was a good thing his brother insisted and they'd come with two cars. For a moment the angel looked mournful, obviously still not over his golden, ugly as fuck pimp-car. Cas had been so glad, when Sam thought he'd found the piece of crap in their search for Metatron, he'd lit up like a Christmas tree and honest to god squeezed the life out of first Sam and then Dean himself. The disappointment was great when it turned out the report was wrong and there was no Continental.

Heck, even Dean had felt bad at Castiel's sad expression. Admittedly, Dean might have been getting fond of that car, if only because of his friend's infectious pleasure.

"Don't get drunk, Dean, I mean it", Sam interrupted quietly and gave him an intense look. Right, obviously he hadn't forgotten about this morning. Dean winced and reluctantly nodded.

To be honest, Sam had every right to be pissed at him. It wasn't every morning, you go down for breakfast, only to find your brother passed out on a pile of broken glass and in a pool of whisky and his own vomit. Dean could still feel the little wounds that littered the skin of his right arm, where he'd crashed to the floor and consequently the shards.

"Yeah, don't worry. Take care, and keep an eye on Cas. Dude's still a little shaky, and you know how he is with witnesses."

They both grimaced as they remembered Castiel's tactful questioning methods.

"I'll make sure he doesn't accuse anyone of murder this time", Sam acknowledged, smiling, then they parted ways.

###

AN: Sorry for the repost, but I had to change something to make the story work, will be posting the other parts shortly! (Story is almost done)

And reviews are highly appreciated! Thanks!