Title: Others come and others go, but you always come back
Disclaimer: not my characters; title from Pink
Warnings: future!fic; spoilers for aired season 5
Pairings: none stated
Rating: PG13
Wordcount: 350
Point of view: third
He follows the North Star. He can't remember what he's looking for, only knows it's gotta be underneath the North Star.
He doesn't see any people. Well, any alive people. He sees lots of dead ones. Scavengers make short work of most of the bodies, but some they don't touch. He's not sure of the reason and doesn't investigate why. He just keeps his distance, following the North Star, the only light left in the night sky.
If I should die before I wake, he thinks sometimes, I pray Dean my soul to take.
He has no idea who Dean is. Maybe Dean's waiting at the North Star. Maybe Dean knows who he is, why the world's like this. He's really pretty sure it wasn't always.
If I should die before I wake, he screams sometimes, I pray Dean my soul to take!
Whatever a soul is. Maybe it's like a star, like the sun that glares down, revealing all the desolation. Maybe like his beacon, his guide, leading him to Dean.
One morning, when he's close enough to see the Atlantic—Atlantic, Atlantis, sank beneath the waves, how do I know you?—a man steps out of the air.
"Well, hello pretty," the man murmurs, looking him over. "And who might you be?"
The ocean before him, a dead landscape behind him, a stranger with hungry eyes at his side—he panics. So much he doesn't know, everything he can't remember, a North Star he's followed for such a long time; he begs, Dean, Dean, Dean—
Stars explode and he whimpers, falling to his knees. The man shrieks, curses, vanishes back into the air.
He remembers why he follows the North Star, and he knows who he'll find when he gets there.
Clever of you, brother, he calls, voice echoing over the empty Earth.
I'm waiting, Lucifer calls back, laughter and promise filling the sky between them.
There is no North Star anymore, just a Star of Morning waiting to end things. And there is no Dean to save his soul, just a vessel full of Michael's fallen grace.