A/Ns: Sooooo, that was longer than a two week delay [insert sheepish whistling here]. Granted, between packing up my entire life, moving counties, *and* the pure surrealism that is our world right now…I would argue the delay is an understandable one (and, according to the many, many, *MANY* comments full of support, encouragement, and patience, many of you would agree :) Thank you so much for your patience, guys. I have safely relocated and am now in quarantine, so I should have plenty of time to write.
Speaking Of: Time for an Anecdote! I was definitely hoping to get this chapter up last weekend, but on our first day of full-freedom-nothing-to-do-but-stare-at-the-walls-or-write, I sat down at my computer and went, okay let's write! And the muse said…
Muse: Let's stare at the walls.
Me: ….I'm sorry, what?
Muse: They're such an interesting shade of blue.
Me: …..*looks around Dad's office* Blue? That's not blue. That's white, if white thought it was blue.
Muse: I wonder what caused that divot.
Me: What divot?
Muse: Right there. See?
-THREE HOURS LATER-
Me: Hey dad, tell me about that time a rival assassin broke into the house and tried to kill you.
My Dad: …?
Me: That divot, in the wall in your office. Clearly that's from a rogue bullet. You obviously tried to patch it up with spackle but you must have been in a hurry. Was it date night or something?
My Dad: ...the Quarantine is getting to you, isn't it? It's only day three, honey.
(Funny side note: there was an actual ongoing joke among my friends back in highschool that my dad was a hitman. We told him our theory once and the next time he came back from a business trip, the first words out of his mouth were "I missed." XD)
Quality Warning: So I obviously struggled to get this chapter out, and I feel it's evident in the writing. I'm usually a first-draft-writer only with an editing pass for grammar tacked on at the end. I very rarely do a second draft or polish pass. But that means when I struggle with that first pass, I have absolutely no clue (or experience) with how to recover from it or fix it. Other than starting over, haha (…which I tried with this one ._.) But, I really didn't want to delay it any longer and, to be honest, if take two didn't go all that much better I'm kind of doubting waiting around for my third re-write will be all that fruitful.
Previously on TRSF… The boys have just returned to Bobby's from two days in Lafayette, Indiana where Gordon Walker set a trap for them. He took out Dean, who ended up in Heaven and decided to look for Cas in the process, and tried to take out Sam who wasn't so easy to kill. Dean found Cas, but not time to save him from Uriel's betrayal. Cas managed to best his brother in battle, but was still quite injured from Azazel's trap in Rivergrove and needed a healing trance to finish his recovery. Before entering the trance with the assistance of Chest!Cas, Castiel offered to bring Dean into his own head so he could speak with his sternum-riding friend.
Chapter Warnings: Cas and Cas have a chat while Dean desperately wants a beer and remembers why he doesn't *like* dreamland, because it gives him all the feels and makes him think about orphaned baby angel monsters. Wait, what?
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
The Road So Far (This Time Around)
Season 2: Chapter 68
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
The second attempt at hugging his friend was far more successful, and Dean – with his chin tucked over Cas's shoulder where no one could see his ear-to-ear grin or hands pressed to his friend's shoulder blades – marveled at the familiar feeling (the rightness) of that infamous trenchcoat beneath his fingers.
"It's good to see you, man." Dean pulled away before it got awkward, giving Cas a hearty tap on the shoulder. "I'm glad you're here."
And he was. So, so glad that the little sliver – the shadow – of his friend that he'd been carrying secretly in his chest for more than a year now was still with him. The last little vestiges of another time, another home.
"I had nowhere else to be," Cas returned with a quirk of his lips. A simple smile, yeah, but it made Dean's chest all warm and fuzzy. Must be the grace, finally happy to be reunited.
The hunter, rather than respond to that with anything even resembled feelings, looked around at their surroundings, once more taking in the bunker he'd only gotten a brief glimpse of before. It looked just like it should, down to the last book lining the shelves of the Library. God, he missed this place. It even smelled right.
"So…uh…the bunker, huh?" Dean asked, going for teasing and hitting more around the sheepish mile marker. Even he couldn't quite cover up just how much he'd been homesick for it.
His Cas looked around (and wait now, 'his' Cas was…well that was…okay, it wasn't wrong but it also was…uh…it just wasn't… He couldn't go around calling the guy 'his' to differentiate between him and…er…the other Cas. But shit, what to call him? Or her. Chest Cas? Past Cas? …Boy Cas? Dean had a feeling if Sam was here with him, that one definitely wouldn't fly. Or Dragon Lady, for that matter, cuz that would make Present Cas 'girl Cas'. He could see the feminism rant coming from a mile away, and wasn't sure who'd be bitching louder, his brother or the actual woman.)
There was a distant but fond smile on (his) Cas's face (damnit, not his) that made Dean feel stupidly happy just seeing it. He tamped down on that right away, cuz, come on. There were limits to how much mush one could handle in a single dream (no matter how much he'd missed his friend or thought he was dead, drained away like a battery to save all their lives), and they'd passed Dean's limit sometime around the man hug.
"This is the place that feels most like home," Cas supplied. He smiled up at Dean, that shy little grin of his he always got when he was nervous to admit something (usually because, well, feelings and Dean were a volatile concoction to start mixing). "For both of us. We are in your head, after all."
Ah. Huh, Dean hadn't thought about that. He'd figured they were in…er…Cas's? Could you even go into an angel's head? Dean was so used to Cas showing up in his like it was a natural thing that he'd never stopped to think if the reverse wasn't an option. Apparently it wasn't, given that they were once again messing around in his noggin. Such was life when your best friend was an angel. (Angels? As in plural, now that he was staring at two of them in his head? Did he have two best friends now, or just the one split across two times? Damnit, time travel was so friggin' confusing.)
"I hope you will one day to get to see the bunker and call it home, too," (his) Cas said, now addressing his female counterpart (Lady Cas? Uh…yeah, nope, that wasn't gonna fly either) who merely nodded at the possibility. Clearly no emotional attachment there (but, then again, that Cas (Lady Cas ('no, Dean, pick another name, damnit)) hadn't really hit the 'oh, I do have emotions and I shouldn't shove them so down deep that even my toes can't wiggle around those guys (in part because I'm a wavelength of celestial intent and don't have toes (wow, this anecdote is really getting away from us, here (focus Dean!)))' stage of rebellion just yet.)
"I hope so as well," Lady Cas (Damnit. Now it was stuck in his head and gonna be a thing) replied exactly like she was supposed to, which might have pissed Dean off any other day (how often he found Cas frustrating when he- uh, she…no, wait… nevermind, just Cas frustrating when the angel was busy being so other rather than anything remotely human). But today he had his old best friend and his (tentatively new best?) friend and his bunker. All that was missing was Sammy and a cold beer.
One day, Dean was gonna show the bunker to his kid brother. Soon as that key showed up this end of Henry Winchester's trip through the time closet, he was taking Sammy to the Batcave, man. Just…Dean sighed as he did the math. Six more years. Just six more years and they could go home. Actual home, and not just a memory.
"Shall we begin the healing trance?" Lady Cas interrupted (who Dean would not think of as a fun sucker, here. He wouldn't. She just…contrasted starkly (or whatever Sam would call it. He knew words better) against his Cas (damnit, not his Cas, just Cas). Especially here, with the bunker and all its shared history as a backdrop). Dean supposed it wasn't really interrupting. Neither he nor the Cases were talking. And if they weren't talking but it was still an interruption, then that would make this a moment. Which it was absolutely not.
So Dean cleared his throat even as Cas smiled simply at his counterpart and agreed they should get started. The hunter rubbed his hands on the thighs of his jeans, weirdly fidgety and suddenly feeling out of place. Probably because he was once more stuck in dreamland without a clue as to what he was actually supposed to be doing. After the last time (and the times before that), it wasn't really his favorite scenario to reenact. "Uh, what can I do to help?"
"Nothing. I will assist Castiel in entering the trance." His Cas settled in one of the chairs beside the long library table, Lady Cas mirroring him. The two were practically bumping knees, and Dean stared at that. It was like…a family reunion somehow. That was weird. Man, dream thinking was weird. He remembered how messed up it had been in Dad's head, how difficult it had been not to blurt shit out, but man… hella inconvenient right now (who was he kidding? When was dreamland ever convenient?). "However, it may take some time."
Dean looked up from their touching knees to the matching pairs of ocean blue eyes locked on him. That…okay, that was disconcerting. Twin eyes, vessels that could have been siblings if it weren't for the clear race difference in Angela Garrett's (gorgeous, smooth, ruddy-red, sun-soaked, tropical wet drea-) skin tone.
"Uh…" the hunter cleared his throat, realizing he was staring. At both of them. It was weird having the two of them in the same place, side by side, and Dean couldn't even begin to reason why. Didn't want to. He was backing out of this while ahead of the grave he was digging himself with a shovel made from all the adjectives little Dean was supplying for Angela's skin. Yup. Backing right out; out of the conversation, out of trouble, right out the library door. "Right, yeah, I'll…er…I'll just…go grab a beer then."
Once Dean was in the hallway (managing to make it down the step and a half of stairs with only half tripping, minor flailing, and recovery like a pro) he spun on his heel, his back to the angels, and headed as far away from that conversation and those identical stares as possible. He could hear Lady Cas ask something as he retreated and absolutely refused to listen to what it was. Or to his Cas's deep, gravely chuckle that came in response.
"Right. Just gonna grab me a beer and stay out of trouble," Dean muttered as he picked up his pace to a light jog, just for a dozen feet or so to really clear out of hearing range. He practically growled his next words when he could still hear his stupid best friend's stupidly deep stupid chuckle. "In my own head. Awesome."
-o-o-o-
Cas watched Castiel; he studied the contours of Angela Garrett's face, the blue of her eyes, the strong hints of Indigenous descent in her skin and skeletal structure, likely one of the Polynesian islands. He could see why Dean was having problems looking past the human to the angel. The hunter always had had a weakness for beautiful women.
Castiel was watching Dean's retreating back, something between amusement and confusion (more like intrigue, Cas supposed) coloring her grace a myriad of pink, blue, and yellow.
"He's something, isn't he?" Cas asked, a wry lilt to his words that he knew this younger version of himself wouldn't quite understand yet. Suddenly he got why Dean – and so many other humans, really – had teased him so readily over the years. It was rather easy, wasn't it?
"He is the Righteous Man," Castiel answered, turning to the older angel with a question (incomprehension) in her eyes.
"Yes," Cas answered, that twist of his lips growing, although he could not deny there was likely a sentimentally there – a fondness – that was causing as much caution in his counterpart as was this line of questioning. "But he's more than that, too."
Castiel paused, contemplating his words and her own answer. Cas knew he was asking rather leading questions, but that was his goal, really. He felt somewhat like a teacher to this younger version of himself. How simpler – how less painful – her life would be if he could give her all the answers it had taken so many years (and so much anguish) to find out for himself.
But life didn't work that way, though, he knew. And he risked endangering the timeline if he pushed his younger self too hard.
"His soul…" Angela's blue eyes were distant, trailing after the hunter who had long since disappeared from visual range. Not that either angel needed human vision to check up on him in his own head.
"It's the brightest you've ever seen," Cas finished for her, because he'd once contemplated the same thing. Once said the same thing to a brother who hadn't understood. Who'd tried to tarnish that soul, hidden loyalties to the Devil, lied to and eventually turned on Cas as well. None of his other brothers had ever understood, either. Cas didn't think he was wrong, didn't think what he saw in Dean was a lie, but it certainly added to his many doubts about himself ('came off the line with a crack in your chassis') that he seemed to be the only angel in all of existence who could see it.
"It was the same for you?" Castiel asked. Her tone wasn't hesitant, but curious. This had to be quite the experience for her as well. He tried to imagine what he would have done, ten years and so many Apocalypses, crises, hunts, failures, and losses ago, had Dean Winchester showed up in front of him with a sliver of his grace and a doomed future.
She was handling it admirably, in his opinion. Not without her flaws, of course. Cas certainly knew they had enough of those. But in those early years – in her years now – he had done more good than bad. He had to hope Time would stay the same, at least in that regard.
"Yes. Even in Hell." Cas lifted his head, matching her gaze on that hallway Dean had disappeared down. He wasn't seeing the bunker, but fire and flame and hellspawn. A tower run by a master of torture and misery. A soul, with blade in hand and bent over another on the rack, shining still in that dark, bloody place. "The first time I saw Dean Winchester's soul, it was clear to me there was something different – something special – about him. Something worth saving."
"No matter the cost?" Castiel's question was quiet, so quiet Cas almost didn't hear it. But, then again, he really didn't need to. He knew the question, knew it by heart. Had asked it himself so many times, so many years ago. He still knew this angel (some days he still mourned the loss of her in himself). Knew all her fears and doubts.
"Yes." He turned to face Castiel. There wasn't much left to his grace, but Cas let it flow honestly. There was no point hiding from himself, after all. "You're going to find that there is a line between what you should do and what you're willing to do. I crossed that line more times than I should have. Many more. But… He and Sam are going to save the world. They're worth it. And after that…well, after that, you can decide for yourself what's worth the price."
Cas had made his choice. Standing on a driveway in Cicero, Indiana, on another plane of existence, watching his friend try for a normal life, with Heaven on the brink of a Civil War and the newly minted archangel already doubting himself…. He'd made the decision that Dean was worth any cost. And it had cost him. It had cost him everything.
He couldn't make that choice for his younger self, but he hoped…maybe she would choose differently. Maybe she wouldn't ever have to. Maybe, that way, Castiel would break the world less times in the name of an emotion it had taken too many years to identify and not even half that time to find futile. Cas hoped for her sake (for Dean's sake and the sake of the world several times over) that maybe this version of himself would not go so far. Wouldn't ever have the chance to, if Dean managed to change it all.
But that was many years and unknowns away. Cas was letting his personal regrets distract him from the task at hand. Right now they had an Apocalypse to derail, and this Castiel had to make all the same decisions if they were going to stop it.
"I worry that I…" Castiel broke off, turning away from her counterpart with a shame she couldn't yet put into words. He could, but he didn't. "What if I can't be what he needs me to be?"
What if I can't be you?
Cas wouldn't want her to be, if he was being honest. But he couldn't say that. This version of himself was not ready to hear it. The doubts she was experiencing were tentative, fragile things. Push them too far, add too much to them, and he knew she would collapse beneath them. He certainly had.
"You will be," he said instead, because that was something he had absolute faith in. That, and one more thing. "Even if you don't, even if you mess up, he'll still come for you, still take you back. That's what Dean does. That's what family does."
"That doesn't sound particularly healthy," Castiel said with an innocent frown, and Cas actually laughed.
"It's probably not." More than just probably. It was how he and the Winchesters had gone too far, pushed too hard, and broken the world a couple of times as a result. And they never seemed to learn their lesson. "But it'll get you through the Apocalypse." And that's what mattered. After that…the world would be Castiel's to figure out. Cas could only take her so far down that road.
At the slow churning of her grace, the way the swirls moved like sludge and struggled against the weight of her own emotions, Cas let his smile drop and put his hands on her knees. Her grace startled from the touch but her physical body did nothing more than look up at his.
"You are me, Castiel. And I'm you. We were told that angels do not change. We were created as we are, as we always have been, as we always will be." He paused, taking in a breath he didn't need but had learned to take many years ago as a human. "Do you believe that?"
"I don't know what to believe anymore." The answer was a miserable one (and an honest one) and Cas couldn't fault her for it. He smiled, a little of his own bittersweet sadness coloring his grace in blue eddies.
"Well…I believe that those doubts you're having? They're the first step. A sign that you can be what Dean needs." She looked up at him, meeting his human eyes almost tentatively. He knew what she was thinking. That she wasn't even completely sure she wanted that. Yes, she worried she wouldn't be what Dean needed, but she worried more that she wouldn't want to be what Dean needed. Cas had been there, too. "I believe you will be. And I'm you. So I'm probably right."
The humor went largely over her head, but he had known it would. Castiel stared at the older, broken version of herself, embracing emotion she could barely understand, and realized she could not see herself in this angel before her. But…she also could. She could see how they were the same and yet so different. And if what he said, if angels did not change, if she was born this way, born his way…
"Tell me about Naomi."
The words left her mouth before she could think them – or their consequences – fully through. The angel across from her stiffened, those veins iridescent white and light blue suddenly shifting into planes of dark grey and terrified indigo. Castiel almost apologized, but didn't. This was her future she was staring in the face. She needed to know.
(She deserved to know.)
Cas's shoulders sagged suddenly, the colors of his grace running together like a ruined watercolor.
"What did she take from us?" she asked again, the request as respectful as it could be of the burden it so clearly put upon her counterpart. (A burden she was growing fearful of, and that would not do. She could not be what Dean needed her to be if she was afraid.)
"Everything," Cas whispered, his grace turning pallid, dull and neutral. All the colors blurred together until nothing was discernible, nothing was left but a milky, agitated grey. "Too much."
She reached out instinctually – perhaps something leftover of what Angela Garrett would have done were she on the physical plane right now – and folded her hands around the larger set resting on her knees. Her brother, for lack of a more accurate word to define their unique relation, looked up to meet her gaze and grace with his own.
"Show me."
-o-o-o-
Dean decided to take a detour to the dormitory wing on his way to the kitchen (cuz this was his head and he could). This whole thing (being back in dreamland, all the stupid feels that came with it (and it was absolutely dreamland responsible for all that, thank you very much), two sides of the same damn angel staring at him with stupidly identical eyes, Cas most definitely making fun of him with that little amused smile) would have been eye-roll worthy if Dean hadn't asked to be here in the first place. Hell, it was still pretty eye-roll worthy. So Dean did that (and then did it again because, again, he was in his own head and he could) and opened the door to his room, sticking his head inside almost tentatively (which was ridiculous, cuz this was his head!). Just a peek, was what he told himself. Make sure it was still there (in his head…because…where else would it be?). But soon enough he was swinging the door all the way open and drinking in the familiar sight of his bed, his weapons on the wall, the photo of mom propped up on the nightstand. Home.
Damn, but did he miss this place.
He sat on the bed, listening to the familiar creak, and closed his eyes against the swell of homesickness. Dean could count on one hand the number of times he'd ever felt homesick, and three of the five of 'em were for his Baby. Green eyes (that were not glistening, damnit. Friggin' girly, chick-flick adjective right there) slid open, taking in his room bathed in warm, welcoming, artificial light. He just drank it in. Sat there for who-knew how long (Cas said it would take a while, and Dean knew the angels would come find him if he was needed) and drank it in.
Six years, and he'd be back. Just half a decade and an apocalypse later. Yeah, right.
The hunter climbed to his feet, ignoring how heavy he felt (stupid dreamworld, stupid dreamworld-enhanced feelings) and headed for the kitchen. He had a beer to get and some angel twins to return to.
The door to the kitchen (that golden twenty-three shining beneath the Aquarian star) was closed when he got there, but Dean didn't think much of it. Just grabbed the handle and pushed with every expectation that it would give. Only it didn't. Dean's shoulder thumped bodily into the very solid wood and the rest of him bounced right back off of it.
"What the-" the hunter frowned at the door, pressing one hand flat to its surface and the other jiggling the doorknob. The thing rattled but wouldn't turn: locked. "The hell?"
Dean frowned at it. He…hadn't even known the kitchen door in the bunker could be locked. He supposed there wasn't any reason to think otherwise; it was a door just like any of the others, and most of them locked. Still.
"That's weird…" He pulled his hand off the door, turned to leave, only to turn back with another frown as he stared at the kitchen entrance. His eyes dropped to the floor. The crack beneath the door was pretty damn small, but Dean was pretty sure the light was on in there. He dropped to the ground, but couldn't see through the micro-thin space for anything more than a couple inches. With a brow furled more in an annoyed pout than actual frustration, Dean climbed back to his feet. With a headshake, he turned back down the hallway. "Guess that's a no on the beer then."
Apparently his head was policing his alcohol intake as much as Sammy was these days (the kid had loosened up in the months since Dad's passing once Dean hadn't tried to drown himself into an early grave, but he still side-eyed the bottle anytime Dean went for something stronger than a beer).
Maybe he could ask Cas about it. Yeah, they were in his head, but Cas was sorta a resident there too, so maybe the angel would know what was up with Dean's subconscious beer-blocking him. The hunter made his way back towards the library, still in no rush and allowing himself more to stroll through the memories of his home (which, admittedly, would have been nicer with a frigign' beer in hand).
"Hey, Cas, did you know the kitchen-" Dean pulled up short, cutting his own words off as he rounded the corner back into the library only to catch sight of the two angels. They were…uh, close. Like, knee-bumping, hand-holding, forehead-pressing close. Dean cleared his throat, but neither angel seemed to hear him. Neither one opened their eyes or so much as twitched.
The whole thing seemed strangely intimate and, considering they were the same guy…. Aaaaawkward.
He cleared his throat again, to similar results.
Okay. Well… despite Dean's definitely-don't-know-what-to-do-with-this reaction, he didn't really want to intrude. He'd been friends with Cas for eight or so years now (nine, including this re-write of history. Did that count? Dean figured it should count), and there were still plenty of things about angels he didn't know shit about. Like communing with one, apparently.
That must be what this…uh…closeness was. Yup. He was going with that.
You'd have thought one of the angels would have maybe warned him it would look like the cover of the world's most cliché romance novel, though. Not that Dean knew what the cover of any romance novel looked like.
The hunter coughed awkwardly again, not for the angels this time but his own wandering thoughts. Frickin' dreamland, man. Still, neither Cas noticed so Dean decided to wait them out. He sort of tip-toed over to one of the arm chairs sporadically placed between the bookshelves lining the walls, and settled in. He was only a dozen feet away from the angels, but he figured the space was appropriate for not-intruding-on-ridiculously-tender-angel-moments. Not that either angel cared about space.
Or tender moments, he was pretty sure.
Well, maybe his Cas. Lady Cas ('nope, we're still not calling her that, Dean') was too new in her introduction into humanity to even know what a moment was. But his Cas probably did. They'd had enough close calls, enough almost-ends to be able to share a hug when they all survived or pass a quite word between one another about how damn wrecked they'd be if the other person hadn't pulled through. Those, Dean supposed, could be called 'tender.' You know, if your name was Samantha and you liked chick flicks and sleepovers and braiding each other's hair.
Cas had changed a lot in those eight years, though. A hell of a lot. Dean was reminded of it often; pretty much any time he interacted with Lady Cas these days ('Present Cas, This Time Cas, anything but Lady Cas, Dean. Angela and Sam are both gonna kick your ass, you idiot'). The hunter was lucky, so far that he hadn't really pissed the angel off, expecting her to be the friend he knew and instead getting a friend that was nearly a decade old to him. Back in his timeline when he'd first met Cas (the same version of Lady Cas he had now), Dean had hardly called the angel a friend. More like a stick in the mud with a stick up his-
Well, that had obviously changed over the years. And Lady Cas wasn't nearly as much of a dick as his Cas had been back then. Well…sometimes, she was. Okay, more often than he'd like, but still not nearly as much as his own timeline experience with his angel. Dean reluctantly had to admit that the Dragon Lady was probably helping out there.
(She would never, on pain of death or torture or another forty years in Hell, get him to say it aloud, though.)
Dean frowned, leaning back in his chair as he tried to think of when his Castiel had become Cas. And not in name; the hunter was pretty sure he'd started calling the guy 'Cas' almost from the get go (truth was…he hadn't been entirely sure he'd get 'Castiel' right and it had seemed easier to purposefully piss off a terrifying, supernatural badass that could snap him like a toothpick than to do it accidentally just because Dean's tongue couldn't handle anything more complicated than a single syllable when put on the spot) But Cas-the-Angel-whose-full-name-I-might-not-actually-be-able-to-get-out-without-mangling-it-something-awful-and-who-might-throw-me-back-in-Hell-if-I-do did eventually become Cas-my-best-friend, and looking back on it, Dean wasn't sure when.
It had been… the human frowned, a memory floating to the surface that he was less than happy to recall. That stupid room Zachariah had stuck him in right before everything well and truly went to shit (a Baroquian nightmare come to life). (Dean didn't actually know what the hell 'baroquian' was, but that's what Sam had called it later once Dean finished telling his brother all about his cameo on 'The Suite Life of Zach And Cas'.)
The hunter's honest-to-not-God-but-anyone-else first thought was that he couldn't have considered Cas a friend at that point. The asshat had spent the month leading up to that nightmare acting like more of a dick than he ever had before (ever since his pals had dragged him back up to Heaven for some bible boot camp), and Dean had been so fucking done with him.
But…maybe that was it. Dean got pissed at people he didn't like, sure. Murderous, even. Zachariah had more than deserved that angel blade to his gullet, and damn but did Dean hope he got to be the one to deliver it again this time around. But he'd never been even half as mad with Zach in that stupid, awful, fucked up room as he had when Cas was there, mouth sealed up in a thin line, following his Boss around like a whipped puppy, eyes telling Dean to give up already and fall in line behind him. Dean hadn't wanted to kill Cas then, not like he'd wanted to kill Zach. He'd wanted to slap the angel until he came to his senses and helped him.
Because Dean only ever got that mad at the people he cared about.
"Huh," he mumbled, green eyes flickering to the two angels, still sitting with their foreheads pressed together, eyes shut.
So he couldn't pinpoint the exact moment he'd started thinking of Cas as a friend (maybe that dream, on the dock at that mountain lake, when Cas had told him they needed to talk…had risked everything to tell him the end of the world was coming, even if he hadn't gotten it out then and wouldn't again for months because of what his asshat family had done to him up in Heaven?) but it had been a lot earlier than the hunter would have thought. And that room, when Cas had finally listened, had finally seen what Dean was trying to smack him over the head with, finally faced up to what his own people were doing (stopped being a coward) and saved Dean, got him to Sam (maybe not in time, but he'd died trying, damnit), that was probably the moment Dean had realized Cas was the closest thing to a best friend he'd ever had (and immediately lost, of course, because he was a Winchester, and they didn't get nice things (at the time, standing in Chuck's living room pulling teeth out of the man's hair, he'd thought, 'well, that would have been nice had it lasted. Figures.').
When Cas had come back…it was the first time Dean had ever seen a miracle he actually believed in. And not in the cheesy, chick-flick way (and anyone thinking it can piss off) but in the honest-to-God-we-need-a-miracle-or-we're-all-dead way that something (someone) had actually pulled through for them (though Dean still sort of refused to thank God for it).
He wondered when this Cas (Lady Cas (no, not 'Lady' Cas, damnit)) would reach the same point for him. Maybe she already had? He didn't think so (and felt guilty for thinking it). But they certainly seemed to be off to a better (Better? Maybe just different) start than he and his Cas had.
Dean was just starting to lament how much this entirely internal and quickly-down-spiraling conversation could really use a god damn beer when the two angels in the center of the room stirred. The hunter sat up as the Casses pulled apart. His angel looked…well, way too pale and about as depressed as Dean's train of thoughts had been getting (shit, was he somehow influencing this world with his thinking? It was his head, after all). Lady Cas was…
Shit. She was shaking.
"I can't go back," she whispered, almost too low for the hunter to hear. Dean started to get out of his seat, but Cas caught his eye and shook his head ever so slightly. Slowly, the hunter sank back into the armchair. "I won't."
Cas caught her hand again, just one this time, and wrapped calm, calloused fingers around softer, trembling ones. He knew she was talking about Heaven, and understood. Once he'd learned of Naomi, once he'd felt her touch first hand, sat in that chair and wished to God he would just die, he had never wanted to go back, either. He'd run away and hid, first in a hundred Biggerson's across the nation, then in Metatron's lies, and finally in the bunker itself with a laptop full of Netflix.
Eventually, he supposed, he'd hidden behind Lucifer, too. He'd never really stopped hiding, regardless that Naomi was dead.
"Perhaps it's for the best," he answered quietly. She likely shouldn't return to Heaven. Not with this timeline's series of events or even the better circumstances (the lies) of his own. Cas still wanted to believe, even now, with all that he had seen and done, that some of his brothers were worth saving. Almost wanted to tell this younger part of himself that she should try to save them (Rachel and Samandriel. Balthazar. Even Hannah, for all her betrayal had stung in the end, was still worth saving in the angel's eyes). None of them deserved the fate he'd brought down on their heads; banishment from Heaven, the loss of their wings, death for so many of them.
But that was not this Castiel's burden to bare. Nor her risk to take, should Zachariah or someone higher up, like Naomi, catch wind of her disobedience. Besides, if Cas could guide her on a better path than his own now, he could perhaps still save his brothers from the fate he'd sealed for them in his world. His last penance.
"You have work to do here." He released her hand, somewhat pleased to see the rippling of her grace steadied. It was more a dull agitation now rather than the full panic she'd been experiencing once he'd shared his memories of Naomi – of what she'd done to them – with her.
"There is more you did not show me," Castiel said rather abruptly, raising her gaze to his. Her blue eyes and the grace behind them held a challenge. There'd been large gaps in the scant, handful of memories he had shown her of the angel who could tamper – who had tampered – with her mind. Events, she sensed, that had less to do with Naomi, but were still in his past, which meant they were in her future. "You held back."
Of course he did, Cas couldn't help but think. Almost scoffed aloud at the notion. "You don't need to see it."
And she didn't. He could not imagine this version of himself, young and naïve, still believing in her Father and her brothers, learning of everything that had come to pass – everything Castiel had let come to pass, had made come to pass – and not run from it. From him, from Dean or Sam. From a fate she had every right to fear.
A fate that, if Cas had any influence in, would not be hers. At least not beyond an averted Apocalypse.
If anything, her grace grew grimmer. She knew the basic outline of what he was hiding – and why he was hiding it – and she thought he hid it to keep her on a course. But there was one thing she seemed quite stuck on, so sure of, that Cas disagreed with.
"I am not your future, Castiel," he spoke steadily, calmly, and tried to convey his honesty – his true sincerity and intent – behind the words. He would be so disappointed – so saddened and anguished – if she ended up like him. Instead, he turned his gaze to his charge, his best friend and arguably his favorite human in all of creation. Dean stiffened under those eyes (filled with so much damn emotion and intensity, he really wasn't ready to figure out the parts of this exchange he was clearly missing). "The Winchesters are. And you will make your own choices from here, not mine."
While Dean frowned at that (and how cute it was, the hunter so offended by Castiel's 'chick-flick' affection. The angel had long ago learned to find amusement in that rather than the sting of rejection or yet another human thing he'd gotten wrong), Cas turned back to his counterpart. She was watching Dean as well, but Cas could read the uncertainty in her eyes. There was no affection there. At least not yet. Maybe not ever, if they messed this up.
She looked away.
"There is nothing wrong with doubt," Cas reiterated, looking first at her and then down at his own hands. Hands that had wielded a blade – held so many lives in his hands – with both crippling doubt and terrible certainty. "There's nothing wrong with being afraid."
"They're not exactly traits of a Warrior of God."
This time Cas did snort at his younger self's words.
"No." They most certainly were not. It had taken him years (and a lot of tutelage under Sam and Dean and Bobby Singer) to realize that what angels embodied as traits of a devout warrior were mostly lies and ignorance. Humans, though, they were the ones who'd gotten it right, messy as it was. They were far closer to what angels should be. "They're traits of something more."
Dean, who was now at the point where he couldn't figure out if he was going to gag from the conversation or the uncomfortable warmth in his chest (watching Cas not only console his younger self but profess (ridiculously) that Dean and Sam were pretty much the answer to just about everything (had he mentioned it was ridiculous?)), cleared his throat loudly.
Cas eyed him all the more fondly for it, like he knew why Dean was interrupting, and the hunter decided he was in full rights to be annoyed by that. Damn warm and fuzzy angel.
"We should begin the healing trance," the older angel declared instead, finally pulling away from his younger counterpart to sit fully in his own chair. Dean thought he looked like a dad finishing up a pep talk with his son (er, daughter?). You know, the kind that mortified the kid but left the parent all proud they'd done their civic duty?
Of course, that led Dean to thinking about this Cas giving his younger self 'the talk', which had him snorting out loud. Which drew two sets of identical blue eyes to him.
"Uh…yeah, you should, uh…" Dean offered his most charming of the 'whoops, ignore me over here' smiles and wished, yet again, for that beer. "Go on, start the healing thing, or, whatever."
One angel eyed him with a cute little frown, the other an annoying amount of sympathy. Damnit, why had Dean even wanted in on this angel confab again?
Cas turned back to the other angel, a stupidly knowing and teasing smile on his face. Lucky for Dean, Lady Cas wouldn't likely understand why. She straightened in her chair (a silly thing to even say, considering Dean wouldn't have thought she could have sat straighter to begin with, but apparently she had been all but slouching in angelic body language) and placed her hands wide apart on either kneecap. Cas, meanwhile, reached forward with one hand and splayed it across her chest, right over her sternum and collar bones. The other formed his standard two-fingered touch to her forehead. The younger angel closed her eyes with a deep, fortifying breath.
And then…they just sat there.
Dean gave it a second, then another couple more, then glanced around like someone else might be there to comment on whether or not this was how it was supposed to go. The seconds stretched into a minute and Dean found himself wishing (again) that he at least had a beer or a drink or hell, even a lemonade, to pass the time.
Instead, he found his mind drifting back to his earlier thoughts, about Cas reminding him of a parent. He supposed that wasn't the most absurd thing to think, given the situation. Cas, as an older version of himself sitting in front of a younger, more naïve, and clearly more worried Castiel, was kind of like a parent. More a parent than a sibling, considering what Dean knew about angel siblings and how they really weren't anything like family at all. Given the way Cas had clearly been trying to comfort and guide his younger self, despite clear hardships he bore on his own shoulders and didn't want to pass along to her, Dean could see the parental side of this.
Cas would have made a pretty good dad, Dean mused, thinking on the guys awkward but sincere interactions with most humans he came across. Especially Claire. Dean had never really given it much thought, before. He'd thought about what kind of dad Sammy would make, unlikely as that had seemed after Jess died in his timeline and the two were split up in this one. For a while, though, Dean had thought 'maybe someone else will come along for him,' but it hadn't really happened. Sam had been too angry, to devoted to hunting (revenge) to let anyone in. There'd been a few who had tried, a few who Dean had even thought stood a chance. But ultimately, Sam had been too angry, too bullishly committed to his 'destiny' as a hunter (the 'destiny' that had gotten Jess killed – and if he didn't fulfill that destiny, what had her death even been for?) that he'd shot himself in the foot on the dating front. A couple of times over, actually. He'd started to come out of that eventually, years and years later. And Dean had thought, for a minute, maybe there'd been something there with Eileen, but he guessed Sam had never gotten the chance to go down that road. Amara and the end of the world had made sure of that.
Dean wondered for a moment where Eileen Leahy was right now, and if he should try to find her. Probably not, considering she'd spent most of her life in Ireland and he didn't actually know when she'd made it Stateside.
Not that any of that mattered to Dean's current train of thought (which he was going to say came out of an abundance of boredom and lack of beer?). He doubted Sammy was ever gonna be the 'settle down and have kids' type this go-around, either. He was pretty sure, despite him and Jess staying in contact this time around, that Sam already knew he could never go back to his Stanford life. Dean would get him there if it was what he wanted – he swore to every damn last deity out there that if Sam wanted back in that life, he'd figure out a way – but he was pretty sure his brother would turn him down a second time.
(It was too bad, Dean thought almost lazily, picking at a loose thread in his jeans rather than the beer label he didn't have. He would have made a damn awesome uncle. He'd made a shitty dad, but he'd have been a good uncle. And raising a kid in the bunker would have been something else. Chasing some little tyke through the halls, cooking him all sorts of culinary masterpieces in the kitchen (when his dad wasn't looking, because heaven forbid the kid eat something that wasn't rabbit food). Teaching him (or her, Dean was an equal opportunity uncle) to shoot their first gun in the armory. Sometimes Dean almost regretted that part missing from their lives. It had been hard after he'd let Ben go. Harder, still, once he'd learned he and Sam were Legacies. Something about the title, Legacy, just made you wonder what you'd leave behind when you finally bit that last bullet. Made you want someone to leave that title to. Dean would have made an awesome uncle to a little Legacy with Sammy's puppy dog eyes and floppy hair.)
He'd thought before about how good a dad Bobby woulda made (had made, blood or no blood). Dean knew the man had lost his wife before the two of them could consider starting a family. Although he'd never asked Bobby if he'd wanted one. He knew his surrogate father had daddy issues of his own. And he knew from first hand experience there was nothing more terrifying than thinking you might turn into your old man. (Somehow, given how Bobby had raised him and Sam over the years, Dean still suspected the answer to that question was an obvious one, daddy issues or none.)
But he'd never thought about Cas's potential as a father. Probably because he was an angel, and if Dean had ever mentioned it aloud, he'd have gotten the Cas-version of a lecture on how angels didn't procreate (or some other droll reasoning on why there were no little Cassies flying around in all their chubby baby fat and diapered glory). Then again, Cas had taken on somewhat of a parenting role in Claire's life, once it became obvious she very badly needed it. They'd had plenty of talks, Dean and Cas, about trying to guide a troubled kid through their teenage years. (Of course, once Claire had Jody and Dean had made sure Ben and Lisa were safe from him and all the dangers his life brought with it, then the two hunters had been supplementary parents at the best. One stuck with nothing but memories and regrets, the other fulfilling a responsibility born mostly from guilt). But Dean had never asked if Cas actually wanted to be a parent (or even liked it once he'd taken on the part). He'd been eager as hell to help with Claire, but Dean had never asked if that was because he thought he should or if he actually wanted to take on the role.
Watching the two sides of Cas now, having seen Cas walk his younger self through something that had clearly been traumatic (Dean didn't know why Lady Cas was suddenly adamant about never returning to Heaven, but given that Cas had shown her something, Dean could hazard a guess or two (and was, frankly, relieved. Even if that relief came with some guilt)), Dean's opinion on Cas as a father was shifting. He couldn't help but wonder (again, because he was apparently bored out of his mind and not nearly buzzed enough) if Cas had wanted to be a dad, especially after so long among humans.
He'd have made a good one, Dean decided. Maybe an awkward one (for sure. The hunter could just picture the poor guy with an infant. Football hold and eyes so wide they were nothing but rings of white set in his face). He snorted to himself at the image.
Not that Dean could exactly picture a situation in which a baby landed in the angel's lap. He wasn't actually thinking of Cas 'procreating', as the angel would most definitely call it (Dean woulda called it sowing some angel wings or doing a little cloud jumping. Making baby angels. Doing it like they do on the Divine Channel. …Alright, that last one needed a little work. Regardless: all semi-lude things that would have made the angel blush. Which Dean was only now realizing he would take rather perverse pleasure in. Why did he even know what Cas looked like when he blushed in the first place?) Although, at least in terms of ending up with a baby in the bunker that wasn't somehow his or Sam's direct result of being red-blooded, healthy young men (hey, Dean knew what could very well happen when bumping uglies), they did work in a field that had a lot of accidental death. He supposed weirder things had happened than an angel-turned-almost-human adopting a human orphaned by a monster.
"Dean."
The hunter startled, realizing he'd gotten lost in his thoughts – thoughts of Cas and kids, and wasn't that weird? – and focused back on the present, particularly the trenchcoat-wearing, black-haired, kid-less angel standing in front of him.
Shit, had he been thinking out loud again in his own head? (…Was that even a thing? It was his head, damnit.) Cuz those were weird thoughts and he so did not need Cas wondering why he was thinking about the guy adopting little monster babies.
Wait, what? No, that's not what he'd been thinking about-
"Dean," Cas repeated, this time with a fondness in his voice that seemed reserved only for when the hunter was being ridiculous.
"Uh, right. What's up?" Dean sat upright in his chair, glaring ever so much at the angel's overly amused expression. Damnit. The hunter's gaze slid behind him, where Angela – Lady Cas – was now asleep in the library chair, breathing away peacefully.
Damn, how long had he zoned out for?
"I thought you were getting a beer." Cas's eyebrows were pinched downward at his empty hands, glancing at one, then the other, and then raising a questioning eyebrow Dean's way.
"Yeah, uh…kitchen was locked." Dean climbed out of the chair, stretching and popping his back as he did so. But Cas was frowning at him.
"Locked?"
"Yeah. Must be my subconscious or something. Sammy's been kinda on me about drinking since dad died again. Can't blame the kid." Dean walked around Cas, not really noticing how the angel's frown only increased, blue eyes losing focus in a blank sort of way behind Dean's back. The hunter walked over to Angela's body, but didn't touch her. He didn't want to accidentally wake her up after all the work Cas must have done to get her into this healing trance thing (or whatever it was). "Should we get her to a bed or something?"
He turned when Cas didn't answer him right away, but the angel was staring off at something in the distance. Dean followed his gaze, but only saw the library.
"Cas?"
The angel shook his head slightly, eyes coming back to focus on the hunter. Then he held out his arm and Dean looked down to find an ice cold beer gripped in his hand. "This is a dream, Dean. You don't need the kitchen to get a beer."
"You couldn't have mentioned that earlier?" the hunter groused, but he smiled like it was Christmas and swiped the beer with childish joy. He popped the cap using the table, then leaned against the edge of it and took a refreshing, much needed sip. "So what were you two talking about?"
At his glance and slight nod in Lady Cas's direction, Cas glanced down at the sleeping angel as well. "She is having doubts."
"Oh." Dean frowned, then tried not to frown and failed miserably because he'd already been frowning to start with. He lowered the bottle. "About…me? Uh, us, I mean. Me and Sam?"
Real smooth recovery there, Winchester. Real smooth.
The look Cas pinned him with was fond, yet again, and Dean wondered why the hell he was blushing in response to it. "No. Doubts about Heaven. About herself, and what she can be."
"That's…good, isn't it?" Dean hazarded. Doubt is what had eventually led the angel standing in front of him to join Team Free Will. Doubt kinda had to happen for an angel to question orders. Dean needed this Cas to start having those doubts.
"Yes, it is. But it doesn't make it any easier. Or less terrifying."
The hunter winced, realizing he'd stepped right into that. Right, he'd always been pretty terrible at considering Cas's feelings around the whole Apocalypse mess (and, let's be honest, well beyond that, too). Cas was always one of his blindspots, one that Sam had eventually had to sit him down and talk to him about. Dean partially blamed the angel himself for it; how was the hunter supposed to factor in Cas's feelings when the early-days Castiel had insisted he hadn't had any? (And okay, that might have been an excuse for the first year, maybe two years of their friendship, but the other six? Yeah, Dean had just been an ass for the rest of it and he knew it).
"I'm sorry," he said before he could weasel his way out of saying it. It was surprisingly easy to talk yourself out of an apology, no matter how much you knew it needed to be said. Cas raised an eyebrow at him and Dean ducked his head, picking at the label on the beer bottle to avoid that piercing gaze. "I told you she wouldn't lose her home, wouldn't have to leave Heaven this time. That I'd change it, and I…"
Failed. Totally and completely failed. He hadn't even been able to keep that promise for a year, let alone the length of the Apocalypse stretched out in front of them. Seriously, some days Dean wondered why Cas had even bothered sending him back.
"It's not your fault." The angel crossed the distance between them, coming to lean against the edge of the table beside the hunter. He shrugged, which seemed incredibly passive given what Dean was apologizing for. "I don't think there is a version of these events where she could have sided with you and Sam and not leave Heaven because of it. It was never an option, Dean."
The hunter flinched and Cas didn't know if it was from the harsh honesty of his words or the cruelty of pointing out yet another thing Dean was helpless to change. It was, in fact, Dean getting pretty damn tired of making promises he apparently couldn't keep. To Sam, to Cas. To who knows who else.
"It was a choice, one she made willingly," Cas reminded him, trying to soften the blow. The angel leaned over enough to bump his shoulder to Dean's and the hunter smiled half-heartedly at the gesture, less sure about the words that came with it. "One I have no doubt she would make again."
"Yeah?" His immediate response was more bitter sarcasm than a serious question, but Cas answered it anyway.
"I would have."
It shouldn't have made him feel better. It really shouldn't, because Cas shouldn't be willing to throw himself on top of the grenade that was the Winchester lifestyle again and again and again, and Dean sure as hell shouldn't want him to. Should be able to tell him – her – them – not to. But, god help him, Dean did feel better hearing it.
"Perhaps, this time, do not betray that choice by giving up in the future and praying to Michael?" Cas offered, making Dean immediately grimace. There was a smirk on the angel's face to take away the potential cruelty of the words, so Dean tried not to let them dig little burs into his heart and tug. He mostly failed, because he was Dean Winchester; guilt was a friggin' building block to his very soul.
"I won't," he promised, expression solemn and, he hoped, enough to convey just how much he meant those words. He was going to keep making promises, damnit, and he'd find a way to keep them too. "I'll stay the course, no matter where it goes this time around."
Hopefully, that course wouldn't include selling his soul, a trip to Hell, or the need to ever become the Michael Sword because they weren't going to let the Apocalypse get started this time around. But, Time had sure proven herself a cold-hearted bitch, so Dean was now leaving all doors open at this point. At least, he was here in dreamland, where he could almost admit those possibilities (fears) aloud, with the only other person still alive who would understand them.
Cas smiled softly again, an expression that all but screamed, 'I believe in you' and was way, way too close to chick-flick territory for Dean's comfort. He cleared his throat.
"Uh, so…" he fumbled for a change of topic away from the warm and fuzzies (because there had been entirely too much of that going around so far). Dean realized realizing he still had a beer in his hand and used it as both a distraction and a way to stall until his brain decided to reconnect with his tongue. When he lowered the bottle again, he used it to gesture to the sleeping angel. "She gonna be okay?"
Cas glanced over his shoulder at the steadily breathing woman. "She has successfully entered the healing trance. So, she will be in time."
"She, uh…" Dean rubbed a hand through the stubble of his chin, so much shorter in the dreamworld than it had been only minutes ago in Bobby's guest bedroom. He really needed a shower and a shave in the real world. And a week's worth of sleep, but he figured that was asking too much. "She said it might be a couple of weeks?"
He tried not to sound hopeful (pleading, more like) that Cas would correct that time table to something significantly shorter. It's not that he thought his Cas might know better but…no, maybe that was exactly what he was thinking. Or, at least hoping. His Cas was older and more experienced…right?
"She's badly hurt, Dean," his friend answered, expression full of remorse and regret, but his voice had an edge of scolding.
Dean immediately backtracked, guilt flaring. "I didn't mean-"
"I know," Cas interrupted him with a look. That classic tilt of his head and piercing gaze, arms by his side and trenchcoat stiff like a statue. An awkward nerd angel tax accountant you really didn't want to get on the wrong side of. God, Dean hadn't realized how much he'd missed his friend, even the version of him that was busy giving him a lecture. "I'm not accusing you of anything."
The hunter huffed, looking down at his feet but staring at the bottle in his hand. When he looked back up, there was a smirk in the corner of his mouth full of self-deprecation. "Except maybe a lack of patience, huh?"
Cas smiled that rare smile. The one that had been Dean's first clue, so many years ago, that the angel did, in fact, understand sarcasm. "Maybe that. I know this isn't easy for you."
Dean followed Cas's gaze back to Angela and dropped his hand from his chin to pick at the label on his beer. He'd have it shredded to little bits on the library floor in no time, at this rate. "Yeah, not like I know a thing about this stuff."
The angel raised an eyebrow at him. The one that said he was missing something that was obvious to everyone else in the room (which, at this point, was only Cas. So that wasn't really fair, now was it?). "I meant it isn't easy because you care."
Dean's brain stuttered at his friend's correction. Then, as the words hit home, he found his face flushing from the discomfort of a genuine compliment. Damn. Almost forty and he was still no good at hearing one of those and believing it.
"We should leave her to rest," Castiel spoke softly, and Dean startled at the tone for reasons he could not explain.
"Should we, uh, get her to a bed or something?" They could put her in Cas's room. Dean honestly didn't know if a healing trance needed a bed (well, clearly not, but would it help?) or if they should even still be hanging out in his head. Of course, it had been Cas's – Lady Cas's – idea to bring him into this in the first place, so he couldn't imagine he was hurting things by still being there (again, it was his head, damnit).
"It isn't necessary, but it would be the human thing to do." There was something about the way Cas said it, the smile on his lips as he transferred his gaze from the sleeping angel to the human hunter, that had Dean setting down his beer and sliding his arms under Angela's body. Cas grabbed the bottle for him as Dean lifted her out of the chair. He took a sip as he headed towards the dormitory wing, Dean following with the younger angel secure in his arms (trying to ignore the weird way his chest ached happily at this whole thing.)
(Stupid chest. Stupid dreamland. Stupid Dragon Lady getting into his head (literally this time) and ending up, repeatedly, bridal style in his arms. He was fireman carrying this woman next time, damnit (no, he wasn't, cuz there wasn't going to be a next time, double damnit).)
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A/Ns: Aaaand I had to cut it off there, because *of course* the dream ended up being two chapters. Just this first part of it is almost two chapters long ._. Because of course it is. Did I really think it would be anything else?! (don't answer that)
(ha...ha...ha...it's like we got back-to-back chapters as a reward for our 100th chapter after all, jut in the shape of one chapter! Yaaaaay *head thud* *head thud* *head thud*)
Second A/Ns: I don't know how I feel about this chapter in the end. It was a BEAST to write. A lot of chapters half write themselves, but this one did not lend me a hand AT ALL. It was one of those chapters that I felt I had a lot of different cool ideas but I never got as deep or on point with them as I wanted. So the writing feels…oddly shallow to me. I actually wrote the whole thing twice. The first time I could not keep Chest!Cas from being a morose, depressing mess. The second time I managed a much lighter tone for, oh, about half the chapter and then that morose bastard popped right back up. Oh, and Dean was ALL OVER THE PLACE. Sigh. Apparently this was not meant to be the light-hearted warm and fuzzy dream conversation, but a depressingly deep and angsty one instead (with warm and fuzzies forced into all the cracks because I'm a stubborn author who refuses to be shoved into a corner by my own characters, darnit!).
The Bunker Key: In the in-between of Henry taking the key in 1958 and showing up in 2013, the key didn't exist on Earth. So Dean's gotta wait until 2013 (and it's Dec 2006 right now). Time for fun facts 1) As you all know, the key is sitting in Bobby Singer's desk right this friggin' minute (because I'm a no good dirty rotten author) but Dean doesn't know that and 2) The British Men of Letters could get them into the bunker at any time because they have a key too (but the boys didn't find out about the BMOL until Season 12, so he doesn't know that's an option either!) and 3) I haven't actually figured out how the key works, because, like…they'd need more than one to keep coming and going from the Bunker as much as they do on the show (and it used to be a whole gaggle of members coming and going). So here's how I'm treating it: The bunker is on magical lock down until the key is used, then it's just normal warding and you can come and go as long as you aren't nixed by the warding (I imagine they added clauses into it for Cas and Jack and Crowley and Rowena at times). If it was just on normal warding level, I think Dean could figure out a way to break in. But since it's on the scary-key-only-no-other-way-in lockdown, Dean's screwed until the key shows up. (Also, I have only watched Season 8 once and my research on the bunker key has been spotty so far, so if I missed how this works in cannon, someone let me know!)
Fun Fact #665: The key will show (back) up before 2013, I swear! Things you gotta remember about your favorite no good dirty rotten author: I'm verbose as f*** and I definitely play the long game XD
(Okay, but, for real. The key's coming back, I promise. I'm gonna say "soon" and you all just have to remember that's a *relative* term in this 600,000 word beast, yeah?)
EileenLeahy: I really liked this character on the show and I was so annoyed when they killed her (yet another cool female character offed way before her time). I also really liked her and Sam as this cute thing that was just maybe getting started (and this, coming from me, who does not like romance. Eeew, romance!) I don't know if she'll come into this story to be honest, but I haven't forgotten about her either :D It would be especially cool for Sam now, since he's learning to sign for Andy. But I have other plans that will probably take this story away from Eileen's direction, so…unclear at the moment whether she'll make it in.
Dean as a Dad: I wanna make this super clear; I thought Dean did a pretty damn good job as a dad to Ben, in spite of going through the toughest year of his life. And I think if he hadn't chickened out and cut ties with them, he would have kept being a pretty good dad. So the narration here saying Dean was a shitty dad is all Dean's opinion of himself.
Cas as a Dad: Is a direct poke at Season 13. Since this is only covering 1-5, it is *veeeery* unlikely that Jack will ever get to make an appearance in this story. But I do try to poke at things now and then, especially when I can't actually include them due to timing or because Dean never lived through Season 13 in this version of events so he doesn't get to reminisce about Cas being a dad.
Reviews: I started getting back to people last night only to realize HOW MANY REVIEWS/COMMENTS we had last chapter. Holy Crap-a-mole. I...didn't even get halfway through *one* of the two sites, haha. I'll keep going tonight (once I get this posted) but I am so so so so happy and honored and ridiculously touched with your guys' outpouring of support, for both this story and my move. Thank you so much!
Up Next: Dean and Cas get to have a chat, one on one. Aaaand...that's...that's all I can tell you cuz it's not written yet *head thud* *facepalm* *head thud*