A/N: I'm a horrible person for not updating in so long and I deeply apologize. Good news, next chapter won't take so long because it's already written.

Warnings: Homophobia and child abuse. Not a John Winchester friendly chapter, here for spoilers: angelsarewatchingoveryoudean . tumblr post/119141531095/spoilers

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Chapter 12

Carry on my wayward son

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Cas' hands roamed over his body. They went through his back to his arms, to his chest, where Cas' teased his nipples. He swallowed down the whine that had threatened to escape his lips when Cas skipped his aching dick to start caressing his tights. But his instructions had been clear.

"Don't move," Cas had ordered, and he intended to obey.

So all he could do was clutch to the sheets that slid between his fingers while he endured the slow and torturous assault of Cas' hands on all fours. The slow pace with nothing strictly sexual was easier to tolerate when it came to the ex-angel, years of the angelic training and having "no emotions" helped him to be able to tease Dean while still sustaining a pretty hard erection. Dean, however, couldn't help it when Cas finally inserted a lubed finger past his rim, to shove back against it.

"I said 'Don't move'," Cas reprimanded him withdrawing his finger and holding his hips still. "Will you behave, Dean?"

"Y-yes," he complied in a broken cry.

"Good," said Cas and inserted his finger again, moving it in and out of Dean's ass.

Dean had to hold out more moans. He needed this. He needed Cas to be inside him, he needed him over him and to hold him down while he fucked into him. He needed it. Since Garth's death he had become nothing more than a shell of a man, and he had given up on everything. He had given up on trying to distinguish between the different shades of gray, and it was all black and white now. If they found a monster, then he killed it no matter what. This brought discussions with Sam, who didn't agree on his view of the world. Eventually, Dean had given up on his relationship with Sammy too.

He had also given up on hope. There was no room for it. Not since he saw the news. There were fucking Croats roaming again and the Croatoan virus was on the loose. Oh, people didn't know it yet. They thought it was just a disease, a psychiatric condition. But he knew better, and he could see the truth. All his worse fears had become true, all he had to do was to hold on tight and endure the ride while it lasted. So there was no point in holding onto anything save this. He couldn't lose this. He couldn't lose Cas. He had lost him many times before and he couldn't stand it once again. He'd hold on to Cas until the very end.

Cas was already three fingers inside him, but he was in no way fully prepared but he didn't care.

"Now, Cas, please." He wanted it this way. He wanted it to hurt and he wanted it rough. A reminder that he was having something that he didn't deserve.

Cas didn't want to enter Dean yet. He missed making love to Dean instead of just fucking. But since they fight after Garth's death this was all he was getting. And he would always just take whatever Dean was willing to give him. The first week after their fight had been hard. Dean had kicked him out out of his bedroom and he had more than happily agreed to go back to his old room. They had barely talked to each other during that week. Sam had tried to shake things up a bit by bringing easy salt-and-burn cases. But things remained the same, even after the ghosts were gone.

It had been the night after watching the news and seeing how the Croatoan virus was taking place once again. He had been alone in his room, getting ready to sleep, when Dean had entered his room. Without uttering a single word he had walked in and kissed him hard. Dean had undressed him, and then he had ended up on his back with the hunter riding him. Dean had cried after they both came, and they had held each other for a while. Then without saying a word Dean had left and gone back to his room leaving a confused and unsatisfied Cas behind.

The next day, Dean had kissed him as soon as they were alone and they had ended up fucking against one of the washing machines. And just like that, everything had returned to normal and Cas had gone back to sleep with Dean. Except that it was not the same. Dean wouldn't hold his look for more than a few seconds, they didn't kiss goodnight and they didn't hold hands while watching TV anymore.

Cas was left with a void inside of him. A void that he was desperate to fill and didn't know how. Because this fucking wasn't enough, but it was what Dean wanted, so he would comply.

"Cas!" screamed Dean in pain and pleasure when Cas entered him in one single thrust.

Dean didn't bother to hold back the moans this time when Cas started moving, pounding mercilessly into him. He didn't even had to push back, as the fallen angel was firmly holding his hips and moving them to match every single one of his thrusts.

Cas tried to lose himself in the tight familiar heat that surrounded him and to fill his void with the gasps and moans that came out of Dean's mouth every time he hit his prostate. But it was not nearly enough. So he grabbed Dean by his chest and he pushed him until the hunter's back was against his own chest. He teased Dean's right nipple while he sucked a hickey on the left side of his neck.

Meanwhile, Dean had let his head fall back against Cas' shoulder, overwhelmed by the ecstasy. The new position allowed Cas' dick to be in a constant contact with his prostate, and each thrust had him gasping and moaning. He threw an arm back to hold on to one of Cas' tights, while the other grabbed his neck. He was in for a whole ride.

They were both too into it, their skins too hot to notice the sudden drop of temperature. All they cared about was the slick slide of their bodies together. And the angry yet distant shout of "Dean!" that reverberated in the room was lost to the constant stream of "Dean, Dean," that fell from Cas' mouth like a prayer.

The temperature rose again and the moment went unnoticed.

"Cas, Cas, I'm close," begged Dean his voice was horse and repeatedly broken by moans.

"I've got you, I've got you," whispered Cas while one of his hands went down to stroke Dean's cock.

The moan that Dean emitted evolved into a scream and he began babbling a litany of incoherent words. Lost in pleasure as he was, with his self-hatred being buried deeper with each of Cas' thrusts, all he needed was to be closer to the fallen angel. He didn't care anymore if it was something he didn't deserve, all he cared about was the want coursing through his veins. So he turned his head, and using the hand on Cas' neck, he pushed him in for a kiss.

It was the kiss what made it for Cas. The desperation and need for closeness that he could taste in Dean's mouth. It told him that the hunter still cared. It wasn't nearly enough, but for the moment it would do. Somehow, Cas was able to continue the kiss even as he came.

Dean didn't stand a chance. The grip that Cas was having on his dick became tighter, and after a few more strokes, he came with a shout.

They stayed in the same position for a while, panting while they recovered their breaths. When he felt like he could move again, Dean disentangled himself from Cas and went to grab the paper tissues from his night from his nightstand. He cleaned the come from his stomach and the one that had started dripping from his ass. He offered a couple of tissues to Cas so he could clean his duck and turned off the light. Without uttering a word, he positioned himself better on the bed and covered his naked body with the sheets.

At his side, Cas tucked himself in bed silently and turned off his light too. Dean turned his back towards the fallen angel and Cas had to contain the sigh. There was no more cuddling, no more sleeping together hugged to each other, no more sweet words or caresses and no more good-morning kisses. The void in Cas' chest swelled bigger. For the way that his breath constricted in his chest, he knew that he wouldn't make it for long without filling it with something. Anything.

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Sam had woken up early to do his daily-run. However, he was only human and he couldn't function properly with at least some coffee in him first. So with his hair still a mess -he hadn't even bothered to run his hands through it- and his eyes still half-closed, he went to the kitchen to brew some coffee.

He first felt the drop of temperature in the cold coffee that touched his lips, he then felt it in his skin. His breath froze in puffs in front of his face while he stood up with all his hunter senses suddenly sharp.

"...brother..." came an angry voice in the air "...waste..."

Something was eery familiar to Sam about the voice.

"...should kill him..."

Okay, that was it. He sprinted towards Dean's room and didn't even bother on knocking. There would be time for the mind bleach later, they had quite a situation in their hands now.

"Dean!" he called him as he entered the room.

"Dude, what?" asked Dean. As soon as his brain cells started to work he checked that the sheets were in fact covering him. "What's your problem with knocking?"

"No time. There's a ghost in the Bunker, Dean," Sam rushed to say.

"It doesn't make sense," said Cas, his face barely visible between the sheets and with a serious case of bed-hair. "The place is warded against ghosts. A ghost can't get in, and the only way for there to be one is for them to have died inside the Bunker or for us to gave brought in an object to which a ghost is attached to."

"Well, tell that to the ghost in the kitchen," said Sam.

"Isn't that great," Dean exclaimed angrily, the one safe place they had and it was haunted.

"Dean," Sam called him, "the ghost spoke, he sounded like-" but the hunter couldn't finish the sentence, the idea was too far-fetched.

"Turn around if you don't want to be mentally scarred for life," Dean ordered to his brother.

"A bit late for that," commented Sam, but turned around nevertheless to give some privacy to Dean and Cas to get dressed.

"What's a friggin' ghost doing in here anyway?" Dean asked while he zipped up his jeans.

"I don't know, we should check the death records," replied Sam.

"No, first we need to arm ourselves."

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They had went to the garage where the Impala was parked to grab the salt shotguns from the truck and a couple of bags of rock salt. Then, with their guns hanging at their backs, they went to the Bunker's library to try to find something in the records as to who must have died in the Bunker to be haunting it now -despite it made no sense for the ghost to have remained quite for so long.

Cas had gotten separated from the brothers while he pulled out old leather books and checked them. Suddenly, the temperature dropped and before he had time to react, he was pushed against the shelves. Several books started falling over his head, one of them hit him with more force than that given by gravity. Before his consciousness started to slip off, he managed to scream Dean's name.

He heard a shot, and then worried hands were picking him up from the floor.

"Are you alright, Cas?" Dean asked concerned, a hand resting on the ex-angel's cheek.

Before Cas could answer a book hit Dean in the back.

"My son won't be a faggot!"

Dean turned around and briefly saw the figure that had appeared. It dissolved after Sam came with his shot gun and shot it.

"Dean, was that...?" Sam asked unbelieving.

"That was dad," Dean whispered as astonished as his brother. The surprise didn't let the words that John had shouted to truly sink in.

"...a disappointment!" John's ghost shouted in the distance where a shelve exploded and sent books flying in every direction.

"Dad calm down!" Sam shouted while he tried to aim his gun at his father's ghost.

"I didn't went to Hell so my son could turn into a damn sissy," said John reappearing a few meters in front of the boys. He was as they had last seen him alive, but his expression was angry, with a certain madness attached to it. His eyes were fixed on Dean.

"Dad..." the hunter exclaimed brokenly. His father's words reopening old wounds that he thought they had been long closed.

John moved fast, with that speed only a ghost had. He grabbed Dean by the neck, cutting his oxygen supply. "What are you going to do? Are you gonna start crying like the fucking pussy you are?" he said with a kick to Dean's stomach.

Dead did want to cry, but if it was for John's words re-enforcing what he had always felt or for the way that his lungs fought for air, he didn't know. An entire life of feeling like he wasn't enough and a lack of hope, made him think that maybe to die wouldn't be such a bad thing.

A single shot from Cas made John disappear.

"What a disgusting man," he commented.

"Dad's ghost is in the Bunker I don't know how, but we gotta get our of here," said Sam while kneeling down to to help Dean to get up.

"'ust ge' to the Impala," coughed Dean.

Dean wanted to drive but one stern look from Sam had him in the passenger seat with no more than a few complaints. He wanted to drive because it always helped him to clear his thoughts. This way John's words kept drilling his mind and mining what little self-esteem he had. He coughed in a poor attempt to fix the damage that his father's choking had produce into his airways. He knew ghosts after a while went mad but the fact that his father had tried to kill him wore him down.

His father had tried to kill kill him.

He was not stupid, he knew that John had never been the poster boy for father of the year. But he had never wanted to hurt him so badly as to having his life in the line. Not even when he was a kid and John would return to their motel room drunk and angry at life and had taken it out on Dean.

So now his father wanted to kill him? And for what? Just because he was with Cas? Because he had held on to the one good thing that had happened in his fucked up life? John could shove his disappointment right down his ass.

"Fuck you, Dad," he exclaimed under his breath.

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They decided to stay over at a motel at the other side of Lebanon. At what they thought was a reasonable distance, outside the range of any ghost residing at the Bunker. They registered in one room and the receptionist wished them a happy New Year's Eve while he handed them the keys. Dean had tried to shake off the supporting arm that the fallen angel had over him, but Cas, the ever-stubborn mule, had won.

Sam closed the door and turned to Dean.

"Are you fine?" he asked concerned.

"No, Sammy, we ain't having a let's-talk-about-my-feelings talk. So drop the ball now," Dean answered angrily, his voice still hoarse.

"Dean..." Cas warned him.

The angel could say a lot of things with just his name and a tone, and Dean always understood them.

"What do you want me to say, huh? You want me to cry about how my father called me a faggot and tried to kill me? Or how the kicking ain't something new? Because I won't cry, Sammy, I'm not a girl."

"He kicked you before?" Sam asked horrified.

Before Dean would have protected Sam from the truth but he was too damn tired to care.

"Kicking, hitting, punching or whatever he felt like whenever he was pissed and drunk," admitted Dean.

"You never told me," Sam said on the verge of tears.

"You were a kid," was Dean's answer.

"So were you," Cas intervened, "he didn't have any right to hurt you."

"Well, he didn't get the memo," Dean said nonchalantly.

"He deserved Hell," Cas sentenced with his eyes full of hate.

"Hey, don't talk like that about my dad," Dean warned him, his shoulders tensing.

"He was a horrible man," stated Cas.

"He was my dad," insisted Dean.

"And you're my-" Cas held his tongue. In the more than three months that they have been together they had never defined what they were. They hadn't done it when things were fine and they new side of their relationship was still tender. Even less after Garth had died and has taken away the more beautiful aspects of their relationship. So Cas didn't dare to put a name to what they were, he didn't want to say something wrong, or worse, to actually find out.

"I'm your what?" Dean demanded to know.

And in the need of an answer Cas went with what he knew was safe.

"You're my family, not by blood but by choice," he said. "I've seen and held your soul in my own hands. No one deserves what he did to you, especially you."

But Cas couldn't cure with words alone what years of self-hate and a bad uprising had done.

"And what would you have me do? Admit that it was unfair and that I was screwed ever since the very beginning?" and his eyes got filled with tears that he refused to spill.

"It wouldn't hurt you for a change," said Cas.

Dean tried. "I can't, I can't," he cried and a treacherous tear fell down his left cheek.

"You were always a sissy faggot," John Winchester said appearing at the doorway of the room.

"What the Hell?" exclaimed Sam turning around and cleaning the tears that being witness to his brother's pain made him spill.

Somehow, John's ghost had followed them, meaning only one thing, he was attached to something that they had carried with them. Sam didn't have a clue what it could be considering they left most of the stuff at the Bunker. But he didn't had much time to wonder what it could be when the ghost of his father was focused on seriously injuring his big brother.

"You won't hurt him again, Dad," he thought while he grabbed the small rock salt shotgun he had in his bag. He had always known that Dean's childhood hadn't been perfect. He had known that his brother was at the receiving end of John's anger. And he had always resented his dad for it.

He hadn't been able to be a witness to that, and he couldn't stand watching his dad abusing his brother, and worse, his brother taking it and accepting it, making excuses for his father. That's why he had ran away at every chance he got. He just couldn't stand it. But he had never known that the abuse had been more than just verbal. Or maybe he had known, but for the sake of his own sanity or conformity he had elected -subconsciously or not- to ignore it.

Well, time to correct that.

"Come on, Dean, let's go," he said grabbing his brother by the arm and dragging him out of the room. "Let's clean the car. We leave everything that he may have attached to here."

"What about the people in the motel?" asked Dean.

"They're safe from Dad, you aren't," Sam said leaving no room for discussion.

The brothers emptied the car, while Cas stayed vigilant in case John Winchester decided to appear. Thankfully, the sight of a white man holding a shotgun wasn't rare, though Cas "hippie" clothes gave an unfitting contrast. But the sight of two men carrying varied and many weapons into a motel room was. When they were over all that was left in the Impala were some candy wrappers, some recipients with fuel, rock salt and a couple of iron sticks that they had acquired from the Bunker, and thus, they were safe. Dean has to even leave behind his favorite gun.

They drove until they were outside of Lebanon and until they could feel that they were safe, and they could breath easily, the tension slipping away a bit. Dean parked at a side road and sighed. Neither of them spoke for a while, and no one said a word when Dean stepped out of the car. He closed the door and leaned over the car. He looked at the horizon where the sun was slowly starting to set. Cas stepped out of the car some time later. He leaned next to Dean.

"I always tried to please him, you know?" Dean said. "But no matter what I did it was never enough. I didn't look after Sam well enough, I wasn't man enough, I wasn't responsible enough... Hell, even when I did everything as he wanted it wasn't enough."

Cas said nothing, he knew that Dean didn't need advice or anything of that kind, he just needed someone to listen. Sam got out of the car to listen too, and even though Dean noticed it, he didn't care and continued.

"I tried to be a good son. I did everything I could. But I couldn't, it wasn't enough," and tears had started to fall from Dean's eyes. "He never told me he was proud of me. Only when he was about to die," he paused the confession aching in his heart. "Sometimes he would come depressed after a hunt, and I tried to comfort him, to be a good son. Sometimes it was enough, but sometimes it wasn't, so he would go to a bar and come back drunk. That was when he beat me. I locked Sammy in the bathroom or I'd make sure he was asleep, and I took whatever it was without complaining. Better me, than him, right? And for many years I believed him, I thought it was my fault because I wasn't a good enough son."

"And when Sam went to Stanford things got worse. He didn't beat me up anymore, but he still lashed out on me. I wanted to leave, but I couldn't. I couldn't leave him alone. I guess part of me was still waiting for his approval. I was never strong enough to stand up for what I wanted."

"The worst part is that after all this time, I'm still looking for his approval. I know he's a ghost now and that ghosts get twisted. And it shouldn't hurt this fucking much, but it does!"

Dean begun sobbing and Sam couldn't take it anymore, he walked around the car with tears in his face and hugged his brother. He wanted to fix all the years of abuse. He wanted to repair all the emotional damage. But he knew his brother couldn't believe his words, so he just said the most obvious thing.

"I love you," whispered Sam against his brother's ear.

Dean laughed in a broken sob, "I know."

When they drew apart, Cas held Dean's hand between his. A look was more than enough. With his brother's hand in his shoulder and his angel's in his hand, Dean felt a bit better.

But once more, the temperature dropped suddenly.

"You won't turn Sam into a faggot too!"

John Winchester hadn't always been a horrible man. There was a time where he was a normal kid who had lost his father. Had Mary not died, then he would have been a normal husband and father. He would still not have taken the award for father or husband of the year, as he had already had a tendency for getting drunk and leaving home to be with his friends. But the damage he would have inflicted upon his children wouldn't have been so great.

As it was, after Mary's death he became a broken sick man. He focused on revenge and he neglected his sons. He over-cherished Sam for being the last thing that Mary had left him and being the baby for whom she had died for. And though he had always loved Dean, he had resented him. He was too alike his mother. Not only physically, but also emotionally. The same sensitive soul, the same way of caring for others. Maybe if things had been different he would have accepted more those sides of his son. But this way, those were characteristic he had to crush. So he slapped Dean into what he thought a real man was. But Dean never stood a chance, because when he saw his son imitating him, he begun to resent that mirage of Mary being lost.

So Sam became the golden boy and Dean the scapegoat where all his frustrations went. He had thought he was doing well, what was best, but his was a broken and mentally ill man.

Being a ghost made everything worst.

"Keep away from him, you pervert!" if he meant to address it to Cas or to Dean, no one knew, but Dean's heart clenched nevertheless.

Sam was shocked, they had left everything behind so how could then the ghost had followed them here. When his brain did the math it took him a while to catch up, he turned to look in distress at his brother.

Dean didn't notice, because that last stab of pain had been the last. He wouldn't stand it anymore. He walked a few steps towards his father and he shouted at him.

"Why won't you leave us alone?! What's more is gonna take!? Can't you leave us in peace?! We got rid of everything and you still follow us to nag into our lives! Fucking let us live!"

"Dean," Cas called him who had also figured out what it was.

"Dean, we didn't get rid of everything," said Sam. "We bought the-" but he couldn't be the one to give the news to his brother.

It took Dean a few seconds. "No," was all he said.

It was too much, too hard. His father had gone too far. He was taking from him one of the last good things he had. It wasn't fair, no!

John Winchester was attached to the Impala.

They knew what they had to burn now.

"You damn son of a bitch," Dean said, he wasn't screaming anymore. He was far too angry for that. "You damn son of a bitch. You just had to- take away- you just had to," he spluttered under his breath while he walked towards the trunk of the Impala and opened it.

"You aren't good enough for that car," spat John.

Dean's hand closed tightly around the hood of the trunk while he coiled in anger. He turned around slowly to face his father.

"Fuck you, Dad, fuck you! I didn't deserve any of the crap you put me through, any of it. I always did everything I could to please you, everything. But it was never enough. I didn't deserve to be your punching bag, I didn't deserve to be the recipient of all your frustration."

"You always were a good for nothing. I raised Sammy well, but you were always a lost case," even as a ghost John knew that he didn't need punches to do harm.

"No, Dad! You didn't raised Sam, I did!" snapped Dean. "It was your responsibility, but I did it! I was four years old! I deserved a childhood, not to became a father! But you were too absent to do your fucking job!"

"I was looking for the demon that destroyed our family!" replied John screaming, glitching in his anger.

"No! Azazel killed mum, but you destroyed our family!" Dean corrected him.

That seemed to be the final straw for John, who disappeared to appear right in front of Dean and tried to carve his heart out. He only had to scream in pain for a few seconds before Sam slashed him with an iron stick that he had took out from the open trunk.

Sam hated his father at the moment. He hated him for what he had done to him and his brother, he hated him for what he had done to their relationship as brothers and he hated him for all the traumas he had caused. He hated that they had to burn the Impala, because of what the car meant for him, but especially for Dean. But above all he hated the fact that he was so alike his father, it scared him. But he was a better person than John, wasn't he?

"Let's get over with it," said Dean taking the large cans of fuel.

"Are you sure?" Cas asked him concerned.

"You got a better idea?" he sighed. "I just want him out of my life."

Sam took the can from Dean's hands. Dean took another can and Cas did the same. They were going to do this together, as a family.

They threw fuel over the seats and the display, even the motor and the trunk. Then they threw rock salt and Dean took a set of matches from his jacket. John's ghost reappeared at the other side of the car.

"Do it," and it wasn't a challenge. For that brief moment he was just a father wanting the best for his son. And he knew the best was him gone.

"Sir, you're a horrible person and you clearly don't deserve Heaven," said Cas.

John ignored him and just stared at Dean. The hunter didn't part his eyes from his Dad either.

"Go to Hell, Dad," he lit the matches and threw them into the Impala.

The car caught fire immediately the flames rose high thanks to the fuel and soon there was the smell of burnt leather. John's form glitched a couple of times and then disappeared forever.

Dean said to himself that it was just the heat of the fire stinging in his eyes, but he wasn't such a good lair. Truth was that the Impala had been his home since Mary had died. It was the one place that he could always return to. And now he was watching it burn.

A lifetime of memories where being lost under the flames. From a childhood spent in the backseat with Sam to nights watching the stars. From defeating Lucifer to sex in the Impala with Cas. And while he watched a place that he called home burn for the second time in his life something broke inside of Dean.

Sure, confronting his father had set many things right. But this was a man without any hope left losing yet another thing he loved. He wanted to fall to his knees and cry but he wouldn't do it, he couldn't. He would behave like a man. Not for what his father would say if he saw him, but because it was his default mode when things got to hard to deal with. And things had passed that point a long time ago.

The flames hadn't died yet when the clocks all around Lebanon pointed at twelve and the year 2014 begun.

It was a long walk back to the Bunker.

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A/N: Okay, despite that I do have several excuses that kept me away from writing, I don't have excuses for taking so logn to update because I had this chapter almost ready since the beginning of the year. So I'm extremely sorry.
Now, regarding the chapter, I don't know if I wrote it a bit too far off with John. I don't think that John was this homophobic when he was alive, the point is that being a ghost incrases all of your charasteristics, so John's homophobic side is trul increased.
I tried to give Dean a somehow cathartic experience. A part of him will be healed by facing John, but another part of him is destroyed by seeing the Impala burn.
And as you may have noticed this chapter has a special name, it's the begining of the four parts of the finale, so I guess that I can say...
WELCOME TO THE END