Dean returned to his apartment a little after dark. He made the journey home drag. He was not looking forward to the company of his family and friends. They would be happy with the choice that Paul had made, and he would have to accept that. Before arriving at his door though, he found Alex.

She was sitting in the hallway just outside of his door. She had a tablet and seemed to be reading rather intensely. "Hey there," he said as he approached.

She looked up at him. "Hey yourself." Dean leaned against the wall next to her and peered down at what was on her tablet. "Whatcha reading?"

She angled it toward him a bit more and said, "It's about the herb moly."

"Uh, why?"

"It was on the list. It was the plant given to the hero Odysseus in Homer's Odyssey."

"Oh." Dean slid down the wall and sat next to her. "So why're you out here?"

"I was getting tired of the crowds. It's hard to read anything when everyone wants to chime in with some humorous thing that they stumbled upon in the moment. We're on a bit of a timeline here, and research is kinda important."

"Yeah, nice to hear that someone agrees." Dean angled her tablet over and read a few lines. "So, things going okay with Claire now?"

"Uh, yeah." She angled the tablet back and made like she was reading it.

"I just couldn't help but notice that you didn't sit next to her at church today."

Alex set aside the tablet. "Seriously Dean? You? I mean I expect the meddling from Jody, maybe even Sam, but not you."

"Just gotta make sure my favorite girls are doing okay." Dean pulled his knees up to his chest and hugged them. He could feel the strain in the muscles all down his back.

"Well, you've talked with Claire. You know what's up."

"I have, but I haven't talked with you. Last I checked you were two separate people. Also, I had no clue you two were a couple now. Way to clue a guy in." Dean smiled and then looked away so she wouldn't feel uncomfortable.

"Yeah, it's a little recent and maybe short lived. I blew it." Dean looked back at her and caught the way that her seriousness had fallen away for something more sorrowful.

"I don't think all is lost. You just gotta talk to her. Work it out."

"I thought we did, but apparently not. I didn't realize that she had been drinking as much that night as she had. She said that she forgave me, then in the morning, she said she was drunk."

"Oh, that's rough." Dean didn't really know what else to say so he sat silently at her side.

"I was wrong. I don't know what else I can say to convey this." She was staring down at the now darkened screen of the tablet that was turned off. Then she looked up at Dean and said, "I love her. I don't want her to leave me."

Dean reached over and settled a hand on her shoulder. "Then you do whatever you have to do to fix this. In my experience, and it is vast, let me tell you, you can't let stupid moments like this derail you from one another. You don't want to spend the rest of your life regretting the moment that you didn't make the right move or say the right words."

"Like with Cas?" She asked in a whisper.

"Exactly. Everyday I regret everything. Don't do that to yourself. She wants to forgive you, and truth be told, there's not much to forgive."

"There's plenty to forgive. I doubted her. That's a kinda big deal."

"Nah, partners are supposed to doubt each other every now and then in this business. Hunters are supposed to have a healthy dose of skepticism running through their veins."

"Not directed at each other though. We're supposed to doubt everything else, but not each other. She's never doubted me, no once since we started hunting together." She dipped her head down and rested it on her knees.

"Well, I could throw in a few words with her. I've been trying to send her down a path of reconciliation. I just know what it is to live with regret, and I quite frankly want better than that for you both."

She leaned into his side and he hugged her. "You think all of this will get Cas back?" She looked up at him with the question.

"Obviously, I am not on board with any of this."

"Even if it gets Cas back?"

"It won't. That's the worst part. I'd know if he was out there trying to get back here. I'd know if this thing was gonna work out. We had that sort of connection. It won't end that way though. He's gone, and the moment I let myself even remotely acknowledge that there's a chance is the moment that I set myself up for every kind of hurt."

Alex slipped back up to a fully upright position. "Aren't you already kinda hoping? I mean, haven't you even considered the likelihood?"

He looked away then, and got up. "I've been doing my best to push it aside. I fail sometimes. I can't risk believing that he's out there though. It'll kill me when it turns out that I was wrong."

Alex got up then and walked up into his space. She hugged him. "It's the lack of hope that makes you die, Dean, not the other way around. You gotta believe in something, so why not in Cas?"

He hugged her back and said, "I always had faith in him, but this is different." He stepped back and added, "Let's go in and guilt someone into making me some dinner."

She smiled at him, but it looked a little melancholy. "Sounds like a good plan."

Time passed and he struggled to remain aloof. He helped with the research in the evening, and in the other times he went to work. On some days, Claire would go with him to his classes. On other days, Alex would go with him. It was like they each had developed a sixth sense where he was concerned. They seemed to be able to see the way that he was withdrawing more and more into himself. Sam saw too, but he was knee deep in his this thing, and all that he seemed to offer were mere phrases of encouragement, 'we'll figure this out,' or 'we've got this,' or 'good job team.' Dean was reminded of all of the times that Sam had said before that they'd save Cas only to have his words proved false.

Charlotte seemed to sense some change in him too. She made an effort toward spending more time with him. She also did her best to give him space when he seemed to be at his wit's end. It was how they found themselves on the last day of finals sitting together in Dean's office grading papers. Charlotte could have been in her own office, but they got something out of the silent companionship that the activity brought to them.

An hour in and Dean had just ten more papers to go. He was fast. Plus, most of the test had been completed on Scantrons, life's greatest blessing. He glanced over at Charlotte, who was studiously reading through a bunch of Blue Books that she must have used for short responses to her test. "You know what's faster to grade than Blue Books?" Dean waited for her to look up. When she did he answered, "Everything."

She wrinkled her face up into a look of displeasure. "Not all of us have the luxury. Philosophical comprehension can't be tested in such a mechanical manner."

Dean laughed at her and said, "Sucks to be you."

"Mature."

"I know. You know what else?" Dean jostled his stack of exams and Scantrons into a neat stack. "I'm done grading. Hello, summer break."

"Asshole." She began stuffing her Blue Books into her satchel and got up to go. "Well, celebratory drinks should be had when I finish. I'll call you when I'm done."

"Do." He got up and walked to the door as she was gathering her things. He started to open his door as she picked up her purse. She froze, hand hovering as she leaned. "Charlotte?" He stepped closer, reaching out to her as he did. Her body snapped back into a stiff, straight posture. She shook and her mouth fell open.

Light surrounded her and she spoke, looking at Dean as she did so with a dead eyed stare that seemed to actually just be seeing right through him. "Time is passing. You have one month to arrive at the coordinates that have been given to you."

Dean's hand fell back to his side from where it had hovered in the space between them. "What have you done to Charlotte? This is not okay. She did not consent to this."

"You are wrong. She consented to this long ago." The voice was not hers. It was lower, and rough like it was not something that was typically used. "Get to the site."

Charlotte was shaking now, and Dean reached out to her despite the fact that it wasn't her in the driver's seat. "Charlotte! Tell it to get out. Cast it out!"

She looked at him and light glowed out of her eyes, blindingly bright. She opened her mouth to speak and a small noise, came out, like her voice and not whatever it was that was controlling her. Then it spoke again. "I'm not harming her. Dean, get to the site. It will all make sense there."

The light seemed to flow out all around her now. Her head tipped back and her mouth was open, then the light shot away from her. She fell toward the floor. Dean caught her up and held her. "Charlotte, Charlotte. Come on, be okay. Be okay. Shit, shit, shit." He rocked her back and forth. Not her. Oh God, not her too. Please don't do this. Don't take her too.

She opened her eyes. First it was a flutter of her lids, then wide open shock. "Dean," she choked out, and then promptly threw up on him.

Dean was worried about Charlotte. He got cleaned up as best he could and drove her back to his apartment. She wasn't talking. He tried asking her simple questions. Nothing. She walked just fine and even carried her satchel and purse. Dean would have carried them for her, but her movements to collect them were so mechanical that he didn't want to intervene. He settled a hand on her lower back and directed her out the door and to his car.

When they got to the apartment, he got out and she waited for him to come around and open her door. She still did not talk. Normally, she was not one to wait for help with doors and such. Charlotte was no damsel in distress, except right now, Dean thought that she was in a great deal of distress. There was a sickly grey hue that seemed to blanket her features. "Be okay, Charlotte. Please be okay." She just looked at him and then straight ahead. He directed her into the building just as he had earlier to get her to his car.

When they got to his apartment and safely inside, He closed the door and noticed how everyone was staring at them, like they knew that something was deeply wrong. Sam was the first to speak. "Dean?" Charlotte seemed to lose her strength again and started to sink to the floor. Dean wrapped an arm around her and then lifted her, carrying her to the couch. He set her down and the others quickly rushed to his side. "What happened?"

"It was like it was with Chuck. She got a vision or something. Actually, she was being used like a vessel to speak for something." Dean was down in a crouch, holding her arm like he could will her back to normalcy.

"What did she say?" Chuck asked as he came down to a crouch too alongside Dean. He also looked a little worse for wear. Dean glanced around and saw Alex hovering in the doorway to his room.

Dean replied, "She said we have one month to get to the site." Chuck looked back at Claire and then everyone was casting glances at each other without saying what they were all thinking. "What the Hell are you all doing?"

"Something happened here too," Sam said. He pointed at Dean's room and said, "Come see." Dean got up and followed him to his room. Alex stepped aside to let him pass. Laid out on his bed was Paul. He looked like he had been through something intense. His hair was a wild mess, and his shirt was a little filthy but also looked like someone had tried to clean it up.

"What happened to him?" Dean was at his side. He settled a hand on Paul's forehead and then ran a finger down to his neck to check for a pulse.

"He had a vision or something." Sam moved to his side and stared down with him. "He said we have one month to get to the site. Then he threw up a bit."

"Sounds like what happened with Charlotte." Dean was still touching Paul's neck. He stopped, pulling his hand back to his side.

Sam moved closer to his side and said, "Why would we both get the same message? Also, ours was in stereo. Chuck got a vision too. He just recovered faster. Doesn't make sense." Sam sat down next to Paul and reached across him to retrieve a blanket that was on the side. He pulled it over the reverend.

"What was he even doing here?"

"He comes by sometimes when you work. He researches with us."

"He's never been here when I've been here. How long's this been going on?"

Sam looked away and then back at Dean and said, "Since not long after you spoke with him. He said he didn't want you to feel awkward, so he would only come to help when you were out."

"And you only thought to share this little tidbit now? Don't you think that I deserved to know this?" Dean moved away from the bed to pace about angrily for a bit.

"It wouldn't have mattered. Why would you need to know? He was already going to go with us and help. What difference would it have made if he was here, researching?"

"The fact that you didn't share it is the problem. It's like you thought that something was wrong about it, or it's like you thought that I'd be upset, so you were trying to protect me. How do I know you won't keep other stuff from me?"

"I won't. This just wasn't important. It was just a secret because he didn't want to feel awkward, and he didn't want you to feel awkward." Sam got up and looked like he was going to storm out.

"Bullshit, Sam." Dean got between him and the door. "No secrets. None. You hear me?"

"Oh, now you're getting all high and mighty about secrets? Really Dean. This wasn't some earth shattering thing. It was a choice that came about only because you would feel awkward, not because we were up to no good. Hell, we were in your house. You could have randomly discovered at any time and it would have been no big deal. It's only a big deal now, because of this." Dean stepped back from Sam a bit. He still felt the anger coursing through him. "And another thing, let's just be a little happy that he had us here to help him. What if he had gotten the vision somewhere else?"

Dean tipped his head to the side to process that one. "Huh?" He wondered how it was possible that Sam could see it this way. "Seriously, Sam?"

"What?"

"It wouldn't have happened to him if he had been elsewhere. This..." He stopped and pointed at Paul, "This happened because he was with us. You think he would have been the happy vision getter if he had been alone in his office?"

"Uh, I guess I did."

Dean waved his arms about and said, "We are responsible for this, Sam. We're always responsible for this. We can't do anything without dragging people into our mess. Nothing is worth this. They are innocent, and we are going to destroy them just by knowing them!" Dean felt his breath coming to him in gasps now. It was stabbing him with the reality of his words. He looked back down at Paul, the sickly pallor of him and his spent, dishevelled posture on the bed, made Dean quake with memories of another time and another hopeless moment.

Sam came to him and tried to settle a hand on him. Dean shrugged him off with some force. "Dean." He tried again and then backed off. "I'm sorry. What should we do?"

Dean just looked at him and said, "I don't know. I thought that it was enough to get out of the hunting life, but maybe I didn't get far enough out of it."

Sam's eyebrows came together like he was feeling Dean's words turning into a piercing headache that was boring deep into him. "Please." It was one word and Dean knew what went unsaid.

"It's not that dire yet, Sam."

"It should never be that dire."

"There's a lot that shouldn't be, but it is. I've been selfish before. I've sacrificed much to protect what I loved, but that's just it. It was always to protect what I loved. It was what I wanted to save. And at what cost, the world, unleashing the Darkness, having a hand in unleashing Lucifer. I've killed myself with a crossroad's contract, let you die, and Cas too. In the end, it's about more than us. If darkness follows us like this. If our very presence is what brings suffering to others, then I don't see the point in continuing. I won't have people I care about, innocent people, dragged into this."

"Dean, promise me you won't do anything like that." Sam squeezed his arm and seemed intent on making Dean really feel it.

"I'll promise you that no one is going to suffer because of me. My life isn't worth that."

Sam seemed like he was not going to let it go. He turned from Dean then and ran his hand up through his hair. He stood at the window now. A little light poured in from outside. The grey around his temples was more noticeable now. His posture even was less imposing, like he too was carrying more than he normally would let on. Dean wondered when Sam had started showing the signs of their age. "So you think I should off myself with you?"

"No."

"Why not? You said that the bad things follow us. That we, WE, are the cause. If you go, shouldn't I go too?" Sam had turned with the last and faced him. The accusation in the tone sat heavy between them. The how dare you even think it was practically spoken.

Sam's tactic made Dean uncomfortable. He hated the logic of it because he couldn't argue with it. He had made the same point not so long ago before the darkness, and before Cas was lost to him. And even now, after all this time, age etching into their bones, Dean could not look at Sam and imagine him gone. He'd do it too, to prove a point, to make me see it. Dean sucked in a breath, and because he didn't have words of his own to settle the moment, he repeated Sam's, "It should never be that dire."

Sam just stared at him a few beats and then said, "It never should be. And even when it is, you take a different path right along side me. You got it?"

Dean just nodded at first, then he noticed that Sam was waiting for words. "Okay."

Sam came up to him and pulled him into a hug. "I love you, Dean. It's gonna be okay."

"I don't know how you can be so sure."

"I know because it has to be. The world isn't the same as it use to be. When God intervened, it changed everything."

"I don't need a trip down memory lane. There's a reason that I'm comfortable with the girls hunting and with us kinda leaving the business. The world is not what it was. They're working clean-up and they're capable. Doesn't mean though that things can't turn shitty." Dean looked down at Paul. His chest was rising and falling with deep breaths. He did not seem to be at peace. Dean wondered how Charlotte was doing. He also wanted to run. He wanted to put himself miles away from all of this. He wanted to know what it was to be so far away that no one and nothing could touch him or anyone else around him, because there wouldn't be anyone.

Sam followed his gaze. "I'll go run out to Walmart and pick up another mattress. Getting to be wall to wall people here." He was trying to sound light, but Dean heard the deeper tone.

"Yeah, I'll be here." He followed Sam out to the living room and gave Claire the nod to go sit with Paul. They did that sometimes, the silent communication that happened without words. Alex followed Sam out the door as if they had the same sort of communication that Dean and Claire had. Chuck just hovered in the space between them all. Dean sat on the coffee table and watched Charlotte. She seemed to be sleeping, but, like with Paul, it did not appear to be a peaceful sleep. He took her hand in his and said, "I'm so sorry, so so sorry."

She did not wake, and he'd be by her side until the morning.

At some point in the night Dean migrated to the recliner next to the couch. At some point, someone covered him with a blanket and a quick kiss to the forehead whispering, "Night Pops," so quietly that he almost didn't hear it. Nothing had changed with either Charlotte or Paul. Sam set up the mattresses where he could. The dining room now had one. If they weren't careful, the landlord would find out about the ever expanding household and might try to raise his rent or more likely kick him out.

His thoughts didn't linger on the housing situation for long though. They drifted back onto other things, that were more painful. He may have provided some comfort to Sam when he gave him his word that he'd not behave like a desperate man. Sam was right about some things. The world was different now. The world was better in many ways. God had seen to that at least.

It was part of the reason why he had such a hard time accepting that God was the one sending the message. It was part of the reason why he just couldn't believe that God was the one that wanted to come back to the world in any more tangible form. He had escaped, after all. It was an escape that Dean envied. Sleep overtook him fully and his mind drifted through memories as it often did.

Tonight his mind went straight to the nights preceding his greatest loss. Cas had been tortured by Amara. Well, actually it was Lucifer that she was tormenting. She mistakenly believed that he was God's favorite son. Dean never lost the sense of pity he felt for this all powerful being that was so completely out of touch with reality and what mattered to anyone.

Dean had begged Cas to eject Lucifer. He had done what he could to convince him that he was needed. Cas was stubborn though, thinking that Lucifer was necessary in the fight against Amara. He didn't see things for what they were. In the end, it wasn't Dean that convinced Cas to kick out Lucifer. It was God.

Past the fighting of biblical proportions, past the sky opening up above, past the plagues, and forces of wills too grand for any human to fully comprehend, was a man just barely hanging on as he tried to save an angel.

And when the fighting was done, and they kinda won, it was Cas that had made the ultimate sacrifice. He gave himself over to God, to be used as the Almighty saw fit. They had been given one moment before the end. Dean prayed out a world of No's and punctuated then with a repeated mantra of You don't need to do this.

In the silence of the moment, that was much more than a moment, they were given what seemed to amount to an eternity of regrets. Cas stared at him like he wanted to say so much. Instead, his eyes looked sorrowful as he said, "Dean." It was a quiet utterance and filled with regrets and a world of conversations that they'd never get to have.

"Cas, don't." He had even turned to God then and said, "Don't you let him do this."

"It's the only way. She has to be tethered to something." God was speaking through Chuck at this point, but he did not merely look like Chuck. There was something much more powerful evident in his whole demeanor.

Dean tore his eyes from him and looked back to Cas. It was time. Cas turned and started to leave, but then he turned and came back to Dean. He cupped Dean's face in his hands. His thumbs moved lightly, gently against Dean's cheeks. He leaned in and Dean thought that Cas was going to kiss him, right there in front of God and Sam and the end of the world, and he was fine with that possibility. He'd kiss him back, and he'd tell him that he couldn't do this. He'd fight him, even if he was an angel. He'd fight him and keep him from going. He hadn't realized it, but he was crying. Slow moving tears were running down both cheeks.

Cas brushed them aside with his thumbs and rested his forehead against Dean's. He didn't kiss him. He just stood there with him and made everything else go away for a moment. The noise of the storm that was whirling about in the sky above, making everything seem dark despite the fact that it was day. Here in this moment was Cas, and here in this moment was their eternity. They breathed each other's air. Dean held his breath at one point to just feel the burning in his lungs, knowing that what was in him was once in Cas before. In this way they could be close. Cas let him go and he didn't fight him like he had planned.

He watched him walk with quick, deliberate steps out into the battle. He just wanted to stop him. Instead he felt compelled to just stand there watching his world disappear. His body wouldn't obey him. His mind was screaming out to Cas to stop, please just stop. He didn't listen though. God followed him into the battle. Dean could do nothing but watch. And it wasn't until Cas' life had ended and God had disappeared, that Dean had regained the ability to move again.

In an empty space, with nothing more to fight, there was Cas. He was gone, but his body was still there as if Dean needed this last bit of torment, this last vision to carry with him to his grave. And how many more would toss their lives away for Dean Winchester? His memory, his dream, took on a darker tone then as Cas' face twisted into new forms. It became Charlotte and then Paul. And if he didn't feel defeated enough, the face became Sam, then Chuck, then Alex, and finally Claire. He was sobbing uncontrollably now, holding the body and rocking back and forth. Everyone. I'm gonna lose them all.

And if he could, he'd have run, but this was but a dream. And yet it wasn't. It had happened, some of it. When Sam had finally pulled him away from Cas, when he had finally convinced Dean that he needed to go, Dean had at first just stood in the space. He looked down at Cas then up at the sky that was bright and blue. He looked up at the sky and felt the sunlight burning into his skin. He knew that the world had been saved from unspeakable horrors and that Cas had given humanity the hope that came with that blue sky. But for Dean, all that he saw as he gazed up into the empty blue was defeat. He saw his fate. He saw all that would burn away at him. The blue skies were the color of Cas' eyes once death had taken him. They would mock him, and so he would seek his comfort in the dark with only the moon and stars to brighten his vision. Even that though wasn't really comfort. It was just something that he could tolerate, something that would remind him of his fate, something that would keep him from living a life that would ever include much in the way of hope.