It was strange being topside - off putting even. Maybe not as torturous as getting back from the Hell had been, but it was definitely disorienting. He'd get flashbacks, more in terms of how his blood responded with the pure energy of the fight than the black and white images that would cross his mind.
Worse, there were times that he swore he saw Cas, either walking down the side of the road of standing on the other side of the street, looking just as ragged as he had been in Purgatory. But then he was gone and Dean was forced to remind himself the truth. Cas couldn't be here with him. He was stuck in the land of monsters. Dean hadn't saved him. He'd failed once again to protect the ones he cared for.
That was the thought that kept him awake at night and put him on the edge throughout the day. It was the guilt that had Dean biting angrily at his brother. "You left me to die for a girl?!" He had accused with unjustified rage, because it was easier to project his rage at Sam than to wallow in the guilt that had festered and boiled inside for the past year.
Because the truth was, Sam had tried to move on, just like they had always tried to get the other to promise to do. Who was Dean to become angry that he had managed to do so? Especially considering that Dean had moved on in that year too, up until the point he had been thrust through the portal and forced to come to terms with what he had done and what he had allowed to slip away.
Dean had been high on adrenaline. It was what kept him alive in the land of monsters. That, and the mantra that rang between his ears to keep him focused on his mission: find Cas, save the angel.
That's all he could allow himself to think about. Everything else was just reflex, his muscles doing what they had been trained to do..to kill.
He held the blade of bone to the monster's neck, blood trickling down slowly at the threat of a slow death if the hunter didn't get the information that he wanted. The vampire was a few steps behind him, watching warily at the volatile display. "Where's the angel?" Dean seethed, pressing the blade slowly deeper until the thing sobbed that he knew nothing, like too many monsters before him.
Benny was careful around him as they moved further into the bleak landscape, grudgingly following after the obsessed human because it was his only way out of Purgatory too. He tried to make the voyage more comfortable by getting Dean to engage into light conversation, but it was no use. All Dean could think about was Cas. About finding him, keeping him safe, and getting them both home.
Because Dean had to find Cas and bring him back to the world of living alongside him. Returning without him would be the end of the Dean Winchester.
The last year of all this monster infested mayhem had been miserable, being left with the image of his best friend bleeding out along with the black goo leaking from his eyes and mouth. Of him sinking into the dark waters with nothing but his trenchcoat left behind.
Dean had forced himself the year, going through the motions with little inside of him truly alive. Bobby hadn't been far off when he had said Dean was sounding like one of the dead hunters. Out of all the shit he had ever gone through (Hell, torture, abandonment), none of it compared to the betrayal and disappearance of Cas.
He knew, at the foundation of his being, that he couldn't go through another year like that. If he were to lose Cas again, especially now after just getting him back, he wouldn't be able to pretend that things could be okay and just wallow in the bottom of a whiskey glass.
Dean needed Cas. That was a fact of life now.
Then they caught a lead. One of the monsters that Dean and Benny had attacked and threatened saw him standing by a river not too long ago. Dean hurriedly killed the creature, then rushed through the trees to catch the angel before he disappeared into the bleakness of Purgatory again.
When Dean could see Cas through the small path that he and Benny rushed through, Dean took off ahead to swing his arms around his friend. Feeling the solid body within his embrace was a relief and settled the wildness that had taken ahold of him so strongly since Dick's death.
Then it was months of following Benny to the portal, mostly at ease with himself once more, now that he had his angel by his side.
For the first time in a long time Dean was hopeful. With Cas walking with him, the two of them heading home together, things seemed to be getting better. Things were looking up. It hardly mattered what was waiting for them topside; he had Cas, so it would be okay.
It was that hope that should have set off warning bells. Afterall, nothing that good came for a Winchester.
Looking back, he should have known better. He should have known that no matter he did he would fail. There's was no chance in Heaven or Hell, and certainly not in Purgatory, that Dean could keep the one thing thing that had the power to keep him going.
The image of Cas slipping through his grasp right before they were both supposed to enter into the portal was worse than watching him walk into water as the Leviathan. This time was all his fault.
Each breath he took dug him deeper into guilt. As he made his way to find his brother, that guilt separated into darker forms of resentment and rage and self-hatred.
He had spent a year obsessed with Cas, nothing else worthy of thought. Which meant he had spent a year away from Sam, leaving him to whatever horrors had surrounded him after Dean and Cas had disappeared.
How could he? Dean berated himself. How could he abandon Sam like that? And for what? For a fool's mission? For something that was a dead end? That couldn't have ever been anything but a dead end?
He should have known saving Cas was a lost cause, because it always was. What he should have been focusing on was getting back to his brother, making sure Sam was okay. Dean clenched his fists as he moved forward, his whole body tense. Who knew what Sam had been going through - what horrors - while Dean was too busy going after something that he didn't even deserve to have.
He was terrified by what he would find, to see the state Sam was in because he hadn't been there to save him.
Why? He raged against himself. Why, out of all the times Dean had put Sam before everything, had he put someone else in front? Losing Cas had to be a punishment. It was the Universe reminding him that Sam was his top priority. Compared to everything else Sam was meant to be first, because in the end Sam was all he would be able to keep.
What would he do if Sam was gone? What if, because of his obsession with Cas, he had lost his brother? He wouldn't just be dead inside, he would literally kill himself.
Then he found Sam, expecting to see the worst and hating himself for it, only to see that Sam, though a little sad, was reasonably healthy and stable.