A/N: Yeah, I'm back. If you have good health and a stable home life, you better cherish it, that's all I'm saying.

A/N#2: Thanks to nancylou for her PMs to me about this story, and to Anonymous, Jena and StoryTagger2. I will answer your kind reviews personally.

Summary: What does Coyote Dean do after he destroys the world and nearly everyone in it? Extreme Winchester angst ahead.

Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural. This is for entertainment purposes only.

Chapter 25 - not the poster boy for normal

Coyote goes down, and I land right on top of him. He hits the ground hard, on his back, and he's not goin' anywhere 'cause I've got one knee in his chest. I dig my fingers deep into that damn thick fur around his neck, and he's staring up at me with this wide-eyed, surprised look on his face. I've seen him play act like that a million times, but this is for real. I can see it in his eyes: he doesn't get it. A cloud of thin white ash fills the air around us. It's in my hair, all over my clothes. I can taste it in my mouth, dry and bitter.

An hour ago the ash was living, breathing people.

That pisses me off even more.

I bear down on the Old Man with all my weight, my fingers tighten around his throat and I'm liking that panicked look on his face even more.

What the hell is wrong with you, pup?

"Told you…." I hear myself say. "I asked you to kill me. I begged you, you mangy sonofabitch. And you didn't. Do. A damned. Thing. To stop me. You didn't." I thump him even harder with every other word and Coyote bucks upwards, his eyes bulging like that stupid 'yote in those dumbass Road Runner cartoons.

I had to get it out of my system, huh? So Bobby and Ellen and everybody else had to pay the price for that? I killed the earth. And this jackass says I can fix it?

My power's a hard heavy lump in my gut. I'm so pissed off my throat closes up. I feel like I'm choking. The next sound that comes out of me isn't words, it's a growl. I press down on the Old Man even harder. He could have easily thrown me off, but he doesn't. I don't give a damn why he won't.

This isn't enough. I want to see him beg.

I want to see him burn.

And then I hear Sam. "D-Dean?"

"DEAN!" Dad roars. "Stop it! That's enough!"

It 's not his command voice, not the one I gave him. It's his Dad voice. First time in life I ever ignored him, too. I don't pull my hands away from Coyote's throat. If anything, I squeeze even harder.

Dad's arms go around my chest and shoulders, Sam grabs me too, and they're both pulling on me. I finally let go and we stumble-step backwards until I lose my balance and land in Dad's lap.

I really wanna get back to beating Coyote's ass, so I raise up, try to lunge forward. Then I look up, and I really wish I hadn't.

I see dead people.

That pissed off feeling drains right out of me. I wish I could say that Sam and Dad being there stopped me, but that wasn't the reason I stopped dead in my tracks. The look Bobby gives me was what did it.

He looks majorly pissed.

Same flannel shirt, same trucker's hat, and a white apron that says "Kiss The Cook." He's standing there holding the same frying pan he had in his hand when he looked out his kitchen window and saw the sky fill up with my song and my power.

I remember his last thoughts. Damn you, Dean. I wish I could forget it all, but I can't.

Bobby died that way, and now he looks like he wants to club me to death with the pan.

If he could I wouldn't even try to stop him.

Ellen and Jo are right next to him. Ellen's got her arms around Jo, she's cradling her like she was a little kid all over again, and I know why. Jo's having a hard time dealing with this. She stares at me, through me, shakes her head (No. No no no no no) over and over again.

The look Ellen gives me is fierce and full of murder. If looks could kill, I'd be pushing up daisies.

I see Andrea and Lucas Barr. Cassie and her mom. They don't say anything. They don't have to. They looked shocked when they died, but now they're pissed. Every single one of them. Billions of spirits, as far as the eye can see. They're all around the shield, and they all wear the same look. They're mad as hell and they know I'm to blame for this whole mess.

Victor Hendrickson puts his hand on his weapon, even though we both know that wouldn't do him any good. Gordon Walker's right beside him. Gordie's got his Bowie knife out, and he stares at me like he's trying to decide where to make the first cut.

I see all kinds of animal spirits, too. Lions, dogs, cats, giraffes, you name it. Every type of large and small and in between critter you can imagine.

They all look like a jury.

I could get up, walk outside. Open myself up and let 'em do whatever they wanted to me. It's a good idea, but I know if I tried that Sam, Dad and the Old Man would have something to say about it. They'd stop me, just like they did before.

Ganking myself isn't an option. Not yet, anyway. Not until I get clear of my family.

I can't tell if Dad and Sam can see what's outside. The Old Man has his back to 'em; he raises up on both elbows staring at me like I've lost my friggin' mind. Maybe I have.

My arms and legs are lead weights. I'm so beat I don't move. I can't, not even when Sam and Dad untangle themselves, sit back and look at me. They've both got eyes on me now. They're not scared of me. They're scared for me.

I sure in the hell don't like that.

"Dean?" Sam kneels by me, and I can't look him in the eyes. I stare at the ground instead. I can still see the faces of the people I killed. The dead don't say anything, but I can hear them just the same.

Coyote turns over, drops down on all fours and shakes the ash out of his fur, from head to tail.

Dad stands up. "Sammy? Stay with your brother, y'hear?"

Sam nods.

Dad looks at Coyote with his eyes narrowed. "Old Man? Come on over here. We have to talk."

"Uh…oh-kay." Coyote looks uncertain. His ears twitch and his tail drops down between his legs.

They walk about ten feet away from me and Sam. Ten feet, ten miles, wouldn't have mattered. I can still see and hear everything. Coyote sits down at Dad's feet like some damn German Shepherd pup, grinning this cheesy grin like he's not exactly sure Dad's gonna cuss him or hit him. Hell, I'd known the time when the furball was scared shitless of Dad and he would've hidden inside my head 24/7.

Bastard.

Coyote, I mean. Not Dad.

I stare down at the ground. Sam's in full Dr. Phil mode, with this concerned look on his moose mug. He wants to hug me. I know if I even look at him, Sam'll come at me full force: "Dean, I'm here for you. You know I am. We gotta talk about this."

The hell we do.

He can keep all that New Age crap about my feelings. I need my ass kicked for what I've done. That's the least I deserve, and from the looks of things that's exactly what I'm not gonna get.

So I don't say anything. I go silent. I stare at the ground and I ignore Dr. Phil. What the hell am I supposed to say after what I did?

Dad glances over at us one more time, then he puts both hands in his jacket pockets and leans forward a little. "So, uh, you destroyed the world once, right?"

"Yep!" Coyote's ears perk up and he grins again. Fool loves to talk about himself.

"And you put it back okay?"

"Sure did!" My not so better half looks suddenly shifty-eyed for a split second. I see it, and I know Dad does. "Well, most of it…97 percent of it, anyway." The furball does another raised pawflap. "Uh…95 percent…heck, nobody noticed the difference then. They still don't."

"Dean can fix this. You can't. Why not?"

Coyote lays his ears back. "Doesn't work that way. If I tried, the fix wouldn't take. Gotta be the one that broke things in the first place. Them's the rules."

"Well then," Dad says slowly, "if this is Dean's first time ganking the world…"

Coyote nods like a damn bobblehead.

"…and he needs to set things right, then don't you think you should help him along a little?"

The Old Man's eyes get wide. "Help…help him along?"

Dad shrugs. "Well, yeah. Show him how it's done if he's having trouble. Tearing stuff up is easy."

Coyote blinks at him.

"Putting it back together is harder."

Coyote's ears go straight up. His jaw drops open. Anybody else would have thought the furry bastard's faking it, trying to be tricky, but I knew better.

The Old Man's stumped. He doesn't know what to think. Mark that one down on your calendar, boys and girls. He stares up at Dad for a long moment, then turns and stares hard at me, with one eyebrow raised up. The tip of his right ear droops down slightly. I can hear the wheels turning in that head of his, and I still want to kick his ass.

Bastard. If he'd ganked me none of this would have happened in the first damn place.

I don't move, not even they both turn in my direction. Dad takes the lead. Coyote follows.

Dad kneels on my right. I can't look at him, not even when he reaches out and touches me on my shoulder. I try not to flinch, but I still do.

"Dean? Son?"

Dad, please…

"We're gonna fix this, all right? It's gonna be okay."

I want him to yell at me, but he won't. I don't nod. I don't say anything. Like I said, what the hell would I even say after all that?

Damn, this is awkward.

Coyote starts prancing and dancing all around me like some oversized Yorkie. "Come on!" God, I wanna strangle his yappy ass. My hands curl up into fists.

"Let's go, pup! Chop chop!" Coyote raises his left forepaw and waggles it at me. "This plane of Creation isn't gonna right itself! Sometime this year would be nice!"

I glare at him.

"Damn family's gonna run me stone crazy one day." The Old Man sits down on his haunches in front of me. "Okay, you done? You wanna play it wounded and offended? Wanna roll around on the ground and wail and gnash your teeth? Fine by me."

Coyote looks at the dead all around us. "And while you're sitting there sulking and wasting daylight all these dead folks ain't getting any livelier, are they, Haley Joel?"

"You lousy sonofabitch-"

Right then and there I realize that Dad, Sam and the furball could see the spirits all along. Bobby and Ellen give Dad and Coyote the stink eye. Sammy? He's got Gordie and Hendrickson's full attention.

Coyote's eyes go to slits. "Good. You with me?"

All I can do is nod.

"You broke this. You can put it back."

He doesn't even wait for me to answer. "Gotta go to work here, people. Can you give us a moment alone here?" Coyote calls out over his shoulder to the dead. "A little more privacy, a little less visual distraction?"

Nobody moves.

The Old Man raises himself up on two legs. He puts both hands on his hips and turns around tapping his left foot impatiently. He scowls at them. "I said leave. Now."

Still nothing.

"Oh-kay. Who wants to stay dead? Forever?"

Bobby growls."Idjits." He vanishes. Ellen gives me another dirty look and a second later she and Jo leave too. One by one they all disappear, until it's just me and my family, and dead black ash blowing in the wind against the shield.

Coyote shakes his head. "Huh. Tough crowd." He turns back to me and puts his paw on my arm. "Time to get a move on, grasshopper."

Well, I blew it the first three hundred times.

You think I'm kidding? I'm not.

I never had that much trouble doing anything before in my whole damn life. What would Sam call it? Yeah, performance anxiety. That's it.

Thank you very damn much, Dr. Phil.

Those drills Dad would put us through? Using a baby toothbrush to scrub every inch of one of those cabins we stayed in? Oh yeah, that doesn't sound hard, does it? How about scrubbing down the walls, the outside and the roof too?

Piece of cake.

Balancing on a tree trunk with one leg bent holding a brick in each hand for hours at a time?

That was easy.

Being handcuffed and left in an abandoned building while Dad sat outside in the Impala timing us with a stopwatch to see how long it would take us to get loose?

No prob, Bob.

Bringing back the earth and everyone in it?

I got nothing. Epic fail. Zip. Nada. A big round goose egg.

I tried blanking my mind completely.

Epic fail.

I don't remember how many times I put my hand palm down on the dead ground next to me, tried to imagine that space coming back to life, thick green grass pushing up through the dirt in the shape of my hand.

What came up?

Nothing.

My power's waiting inside me, ready to go, and I imagine after all this time it's sitting there with its head cocked to one side going "What the hell is wrong with him?"

There's nothing wrong with my mojo. I'm the one with the problem.

Dad doesn't say much. He watches me like a hawk instead. There's no Marine lecture he can give me that would even apply to this, never mind that he's been to hell and back. I mean that literally, remember? I went Dark Phoenix on the planet, killed everything and everyone everywhere. It wasn't like I fucked up during a sparring match, or I face-planted during a run through an obstacle course. That's easy to come back from. Get up, dust your ass off and do it again, Winchester. And do it right this time.

I try to psych myself up, but all I can hear is The Endless and that Jack Nicholson wannabe inside my head.

so/sad/too/bad/can't/do/it/can't/fix/this/

"It's too big, Dean." NotJack says as he grins that shark smile at me. "Way too big for you to fix. You know it is."

I hear myself howling to my family as I burn the world down.

For you…I'm doing this all for you…

I keep my game face on, but there's a small part of me that's full-on screaming in the space between my ears. I want to curl up in a ball, go fetal on the ground and yell until my lungs burst.

For Bobby. For Ellen and Jo.

For everyone I slaughtered.

For trying to hurt my family after they ditched me at the mall.

Hell, I don't blame them for that. I would have run from me too, but I couldn't. Only thing was, I meant to hurt them. Can't lie about that. I would've Obi Wan'd Dad, Sam and Coyote in a heartbeat, done a quick and dirty frontal lobotomy on them like Randall McMurphy got at the end of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Everyone who loves me, leaves me? Not anymore. I would have made damn sure about that. Wouldn't have been that hard. Yeah, I'd take care'a that pesky "Let's ditch Dean" part of their brains. Rub that sucker right the hell out, and by the time I got done, they'd never leave me again.

Sammy wants me to talk about my feelings? I don't think he wants to hear what I'd say.

Killing Gordon and those SWAT guys, ganking Raven and Gaia and the rest, even before I decided to burn down the earth, all that gave me the biggest damn rush I ever felt in my whole damn life. I can't compare the feeling to anything I ever felt before or since. Fucking wonderful. Better than sex, if you really wanna know the truth, better than any time I got drunk on beer or the hard stuff. It was like a river of fire and light going through my veins. My hearts sang, and that was all I cared about. I knew I could do anything I wanted, and I wasn't bothered by a conscience. I didn't have one. I was bigger than myself, full inside my skin, and what I wanted was the only thing in the world that mattered.

And the thing I can't stop thinking about is, what if I decide to do that again? If I did, who the hell would stop me? Dad? Sam? The Old Man?

Short answer? Nobody.

My time sense is all screwed up. I've stopped counting how many times I tried. And failed.

After the last time I tried the laying on of the hands bit, and nothing happened (again!), my head hurt like a bitch, so bad I couldn't see straight. They say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

Hey, I never said I was the poster boy for normal.

"Yer tryin' too hard," Coyote growls at me. "Think of nothing. Relax."

I snarl right back at him. "Yeah, riight, Yoda."

My family watches me as I stagger off to the side and plant my ass on the ground. Hard. I'm glad nobody comes over to sit next to me. They're giving me space until the next go-round.

Damn.

I've been using my head, but I ache all over. Shoulders are tight as hell. No matter how much I roll 'em, I can't get any relief.

I stare at the dead earth outside the bubble. Grey skies, no sun, and the only movement is black ash blowing in the wind all around us. It's depressing as hell. How many years are we going to be out here? Forever?

Maybe Fuzzy's right. Maybe I am trying too damn hard. My shoulders slump forward, and I'm having a helluva hard time keeping my eyes open.

I finally close them, and the first thing I see is Martha Stewart mangling a defenseless lemon tree with a pair of pruning shears.

What the hell?

Back when I had the Old Man walled up inside my head, after that damn Illumi demon scratched the wall and started things rolling, I went full-blown Carrie. I mean big time telepathy, zero control. I couldn't stand being around people. Hearing their thoughts hurt me really badly. That worried the hell out of Sam so much he decided to block his thoughts from me. And yeah, you guessed it, he came up with the image of good ol' Martha and her plants. I guess he thought that would calm me down.

It didn't. He was so damn good at it he freaked me out. I mean, Sammy could think like that for miles. Pissed me off, too. I kept wishing he'd change the channel, think about something else.

Like…warm sunny beaches. Pamela Anderson in that orange lifeguard get-up of hers, running down the beach in slo-mo.

That sounds like a plan, so I make Martha fade out. Another image comes up. Pam's not around.

I see myself, back at the mall.

Throwing my duster over Gordon Walker. Smiling as he sickens and dies.

The SWAT Team dies in full HD and surroundsound, for the second time.

My hands are slick with Raven's blood as I pull his heart out.

Gaia kicks and screams as I drag her up the wall.

"Best seat in the house, sweetheart. Don't want you to miss a thing."

No. Please. I don't want to see this again. I don't…

What I want doesn't matter. I can't stop this.

I hear my own thoughts: I want her to see this. I meant what I said about her having the best seat in the house. She can watch her precious earth die. When it goes, so does she.

Sonofabitch.

My eyes jerk open and I sit there breathing so fast and so quick my chest hurts. Coyote, Sam and Dad are staring at me and I can hear 'em through the link (Oh shit. Now what?) but I don't care. I scramble to my feet, and it's the damndest thing.

I hear myself laugh. It's damned funny, but it's really not.

When the earth dies, so does she.

Yathzee.

You ever see that Twilight Zone episode, It's A Good Life? That little kid who used to star in "Lost In Space" was in it. He played a fugly. Six years old. Dad and I would have hunted him down and ganked him without blinking an eye. Sammy might have tried to talk sense into him.

I don't think that would have worked.

Anyway, this kid had godlike powers, and if something pissed him off he'd go medieval on 'em and then wish whatever was left into a nearby cornfield.

Poetic irony is a purebred bitch, okay? I know. I get it. Coyote thought Gaia into the ground

I bring her back up.

The WTF? looks on my family's faces when she re-appears on the ground a few feet away are priceless. She's still pretty much a crispy critter. Skin burned black, mouth open, arms drawn up over her chest like a boxer.

The Old Man flattens his ears back. He gives me this look like Crap, he's lost his mind. I knew this was gonna happen. "Kid, what the hell are you doing?"

I know how I look to them through the link. My eyes glow bright yellow. "It's all right. I know what I'm doing."

Sam gives me this sarcastic "No shit?" look. Dad doesn't say anything.

I could've brought the wall back too. Put her back up there like a trophy, but I couldn't do that. Wouldn't. Don't get me wrong, I can't stand the skank, not after what she and Raven did to my family, but I had no excuse for hanging her up like that. Doing that made me no better than the fucking yellow eyed bastard that killed my mom.

"Dean? Talk to us, son." Dad says quietly. I don't answer as I walk towards Gaia, and Dad doesn't get mad about it. He follows me instead. Sam and Coyote bring up the rear.

I stare at her so hard everything gets blurry, like one'a those optical illusion posters, the ones where you stare at 'em so hard you see what's hidden in plain sight.

I feel her skin with my mind. It's thin and if I push too hard I'll tear the hell out of it. I don't want to do that, so I take it easy. A slight push, and I'm in.

I see what's underneath.

No skeleton. Gaia's got a circulatory system. Two deflated balloons that look like lungs. I see something coiled up underneath that might be her intestines.

The heat I poured into her made her heart shrivel up like a raisin. I'd done a royal number on her. If she were a car or a truck she would have been in Bobby's Salvage yard for sure. Spare parts, if that.

News wasn't all bad, though. Overlaid over all the burned bits was a ghost image of how everything inside her used to look.

And how they were connected.

So far, so good….

Without even realizing it I start naming parts. I remember that from biology class, after all these years. Barnes Elementary. Merton, Oklahoma. Teacher was a dude named Arvin Thomas. He was a walking sleeping pill, but I stayed awake in class 'cause I was really interested in the subject matter. It was kiddie stuff, and I wanted to learn more, so later on I paid a visit to the library and walked out with two advanced biology books stashed underneath my coat.

They had pictures.

Funny thing was, I learned how to inflict damage on the human body before I even knew what the formal names for body parts and organs were. Dad taught us not to kill humans, but that didn't mean he didn't teach us how to kick someone's ass in a fight.

Common carotid artery. Brachial artery. Great saphenous vein.

What, you think I'm too dumb to read? And just who do you think helped Sammy with his homework when he was little? Dad? Nope. That was me. Dad was too busy taking care of us and hunting things. Sam's always been pretty damn smart, but in the beginning he needed help, just like everyone else.

Gathering up what's left of Gaia's insides is like holding broken eggshells. At first I can't get a good grip. Everything crumbles and breaks. After a couple of tries I get it all and pull it out into the open air above her body. What's left floats in the air above her. Looks like a hologram. Her heart separates from the rest and floats directly in front of my eyes, turns slowly enough that I can get a real good look.

It's a muscle.

An engine. That's all it is. Just like my girl's engine.

I stare at Gaia's heart, and it feels weird and right to me somehow. I compare her parts (...superior vena cava...left atrium semilunar valves...descending aorta...) to my baby's (distributor cap...crankshaft pulley...ignition coil...valve cover breather...)

That's when I realize: I got this. Hell yeah, I can do this.

Something tight inside my chest loosens up. I feel lighter somehow. This process is familiar. I've done it before.

Sam's staring back and forth at Gaia and me with this awestruck look. At one point his jaw drops open. Now usually I'd rag on him about it, say something smartass about him catching flies, but I don't.

I can't read Dad. For a moment I expect to see this look of disgust on his face (THIS is what my son is now?) but it never comes. I see that slight crinkle at the corner of his eyes, and he winks at me.

Knew you were on to something, kiddo.

Coyote's staring at me like he's watching Saturday morning cartoons.

What's left of Gaia has my full attention now. Left heart valve is blown. The edges are ragged. I run my fingertip lightly along the outer edge. I see what it should look like in my mind and the heart responds. The valve re-forms, the edges fill out and go round and even like they should be.

"Dean?" Sam sounds pissed. I can tell without looking at him that his bitchface is out in full force.

"Yeah, Sammy?"

"You're not gonna do something stupid, are you?"

That makes me grin a little, so I decide to mess with him. "Define stupid."

"Martyr stupid. Terminally stupid. Like…like giving her your life energy."

I smooth out the edge of Gaia's heart chamber with my fingers. "Nah. Tried ganking myself before, remember? And if I tried that again you guys would kick my ass for sure."

I nudge the heart around with a fingertip so I can get a better look at the other side.

"Klemson, Montana," I say out loud. "Six months after you went to Stanford, Sammy. Dad and I were on a hunt. Black dog. We got the mutt, but it tore Dad up pretty bad. I didn't think he was gonna make it. We were out in the sticks and I drove all night, blew the Impala's engine out getting him to the ER."

"Sure," Dad nods. "I remember that."

"I found a job at a local body shop and rebuilt our girl after hours, when the shop was closed. I slept in a room out back. The owner didn't mind. I traded my skill for parts. We stayed in town until Dad got better."

Sam quirked an eyebrow at me. "And?"

"I'm gonna rebuild Gaia from the inside out, just like I did the Impala. I figure if I do that, the earth will come back, in sync with her lifeforce."

Coyote blinks in surprise. "Huh. That'll really piss her off."

He gives me a smirk and I grin right back. "Yeah. I know."

"I like it!" Coyote yips.

I slip out of my duster and hand it off to Sam. I roll up my sleeves.

Time to get hands on.

Next: Coyote POV. Dean calls do-over. Maybe.