Summary: Sam died saving Dean's life. With everyone they love dead, Cas and Dean hunt together. One night, while Dean and Cas sit on the impala hood after a hunt, Cas asks Dean what it means to be a hunter. Dean is silent for a long time, so long Cas thinks he may be asleep. And then he speaks: "when you are a hunter there are two states of being…" With each word Cas' heart breaks.
Episode Tag: Post-Series
Disclaimer: I own nothing… if I did I would treat them a lot nicer than their current owners.
When you are a Hunter there are Two States of Being
When you are a hunter you have two states of being. The first is "hunting." The second is "thinking about hunting." The first may be the more dangerous of the two, but the invigoration of the hunt… the adrenaline of going toe to toe with a monster… the simplicity of knowing you place, your purpose, in the universe… when you are a hunter, hunting is the only time you feel alive. In those moments; life's complications and complexities fade away into single-minded peace – kill… protect… survive.
In the aftermath… the afterglow, as you clean your blade, or pistol, or wood chipper (as the case may be), as you dispose of the body, you realize it is the only time you feel at peace with the universe –with yourself. The stillness after a kill, knowing you are still alive, while your foe burns at your feet is the closest to serenity you are likely to get in this life. For in that brief moment you have made a difference in that person's, or that family's, or that town's, or the world's (as seems to be the norm of late) existence. Their life continues because of you, and maybe, you would like to think, your hands made their life one increment safer – better.
With the job done, your purpose outlived, you exit quietly into the shadows. For your continued, unwelcome presence is only a glaring reminder of their loss. You see, the world needs hunters, but there is no home for hunters in the world. So you take your comfort where you can, riding the sense of success, of peace, for as long as you are able. Sometimes, when you are lucky, it last for a few days, other times – only a few hours. You relish and covet these moments for they are fleeting and far between. For they are proof of your continued existence and more importantly a testament to why you are worthy of life, while so many around you fall. These successes are what you will hold up at your final judgment as your life's work… and hope they are enough.
Leaving whatever town in your rearview, you drive until you are the only car on the road. You have no destination in mind, simply "away." When you finally can't stand the feel of caked blood on your skin anymore you pull over. With your car pulled into a field on the side of an abandoned back road, you bandage your wounds and change your clothes. You try futilely to wash the blood from your shirt in the lake, knowing you will probably have to trash it.
Hoping to prolong the afterglow of peace – of worth, for it is fading fast; you pull a six pack out of the trunk and sit on the hood looking up into the stars. You drink 1… 2… 5… 6 beers as you gaze unseeingly upward rolling the latest kill around in your brain, savoring the taste of victory, even a small one such as this. You play with it mentally like one would absentmindedly toss a stone in the air on a cool spring evening such as this in a simpler, better life. You move to mimic skipping it across the surface of the lake, to send it out into the universe to see what ripples, if any, you meager existence can create, wondering how far your efforts will go. Yet you know it will never be enough. You will never be enough. Your hand stills. No, you won't throw the precious stone. You hold onto the pebble of hope for all it is worth, hoarding it away in the secret pile of other pebbles just like it – your personal tally of good – of worth.
This pile of good sits atop one half of some masochistic hunter's internal scale of justice deep inside of you. And in that moment as the stone leaves your hand, falling toward the pile, you think, maybe just maybe, this time, the good you have done will finally tip the scale in your favor. Then maybe, you can rest. As the stone hits the pile you believe for a split second you see it waiver, bowing infinitesimally. Your stomach clenches and you allow yourself to see a life beyond this, beyond hunting, a life full of love. But the scale does not shift. The absence of squeaking scale joints is deafening.
As you sit there barley moving except to move the bottle to and from your mouth, the decidedly less desirable state of being a hunter; "thinking about hunting," begins to encroach. You feel it seeping into your bones like a chill you can never shake. You wrap your jacket tighter around yourself as if that will stave off the invasion of your thoughts. For if you aren't hunting, you are thinking about hunting, and when you thinking about hunting you see the pile sitting on the other side of the scale, each painted with the faces of the people, the families, the towns you couldn't save. The innocent, ignorant victims you just weren't fast enough – weren't smart enough – weren't "enough" to save. And worse, there are the faces of your loved ones, the ones you would die to protect, as they instead died protecting you. Their eyes, so full of love and fear in those last moments together, creep into your chest and squeeze until breathing is unimaginable. The debt you owe is suffocating in its enormity. You wonder if you will ever be able to repay it.
But secretly you know the truth, the truth most hunters die running from. They run from it until they are taken out by a monster, their own gun, or the bottle. This is how hunters end, going to their grave with the scales unbalanced. You can never balance the scales. For every town you save there are three others you didn't. For every apocalypse you advert, there is another larger one you caused. For every monster you kill, there are a dozen families left to pick up the pieces of their lives, partially ruined by knowing you. That is the life of a hunter. Your best is never good enough but stopping isn't an option because in the aftermath of a kill is the only time you feel human. If you stop, you die. So you chase that high, thinking if you run fast enough, hunt often enough, the rest won't catch up to you. You know it is a lie, but hunters are addicts chasing a high, so you run and run, telling yourself the next time will be the one that changes it all. You know it's a lie, but the lie feels good. The lie keeps you from eating a bullet. So you grip the steering wheel and you ride toward the next hunt. Because when you are a hunter there are two states of being; treading water and drowning.