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In the end, Dean did it alone, so late in a July night that even the bugs weren’t buzzing anymore; he’s the only thing awake on this five mile stretch of land, by design.
Sam had dug and dug and dug for lore, of course, because Sam knew how to push through things. Dean- He knows himself by now, at least, knows that it’s not cowardice that leaves him feeling paralyzed and breathless between distractions and failed attempts. Anger, maybe, like usual, wrathful blowouts where he knocks over chairs and storms out of the library like he could find answers anywhere else.
Or love. Or love. He tries not to think about that one as much, but it’s been coming to mind constantly, nowadays.
The moon is new- he sets things up by flashlight, clicking it off when he has the small table assembled and prepared neatly- a crystalline bowl that he had liberated from Death’s library vaguely reflecting shining bits of starlight as he lights a candle and then immediately snuffs it out, pouring the single drop of melted black wax into the center. It’s followed by the liquid he keeps in a small vial around his neck, offered by Rowena last night as he’d despaired over the last piece missing.
“I’ve only got the one,” She’d said lightly, and his hands were barely steady enough to catch the lightly tossed trinket. “So if you don’t show up with your angel back on your shoulder don’t expect Christmas presents.”
He pours the oil in, watching as it burns away the wax, the color leeching into viscous waves until the slick of it looks familiar, so dark it almost doesn’t reflect the sky. He takes the small bag out of his pocket and shakes it in- careful to let the dust settle evenly, a thin coating of sulfur and nothing more. This had been the easiest to procure- find any demon and you can pick up the stuff they shake off and leave behind.
The blanket of night starts to crash in on him, heavy pressure and absolute stillness giving him the feeling that he is standing in the middle of a cyclone waiting to start. And he takes one more breath of real air before he finds the smaller bag in the opposite pocket and grips it tight.
Flakes of rust slip in, scraped from the shoulder of his jacket. The first few cling to the edge of the bowl, unguided by the trembling in his hands as the dead atmosphere starts to cocoon him, but one finally lands in the mixture, and he finds his eyes closing.
———
Dean drives down an empty highway. It is night day some sort of twilight, rosy clouds scraped thin over a sky half purple, half grey, all faded like it knew about endings. The rumble of Baby around him is soothing, the twisting of blacktop almost an oil spill stretching through trees mountains plains of some shifting endless wind tide born on the sway of wheat. He turns to remark on the smoothness of the ride, eyes searching for
With a sleepy blink he shakes his head again, hand finding the volume, turning it up in increments until it sets the edge of his teeth to vibrating with the beat and bass and lull of familiarity. One song crescendos and he can’t help the joyful shout from his voice, beating his hands palm flat against the dashboard to syncopated cadence as he tries to carry either the tune or the rhythm and only barely succeeds at either. He turns to goad
The sky is washed husky blue, darker and darker as the light slips away entirely, and Dean’s hands adjust the mirror, because he’d been reaching for something and he couldn’t figure out what else might
The gold waves of hypnotic farmland slip into whispering shadow stretches across unending horizon, but it’s so
He blinks, he shakes his head and he
He blinks, it’s heavy, right? Too heavy? The sky-
His lungs burn with stale air again as he slams his foot to the brake without thought for steady driving or even Baby’s well-being. He’s bringing in lungfuls with the force of a car crash against his ribs, fingers white knuckling over the comfort of his steering wheel.
“Yeah, you thought this would be that easy?” He mutters, wiping away the sweat on his face and noticing vaguely that he’s starting to feel warm. “I don’t roll over, bitch.”
The sudden clarity wipes the haze away and he starts looking , finally. The endless road almost seems to fold in the distance, his world becoming smaller. He steps out of the car, patting the illusion of Baby with fondness even for the lookalike, watches the post-sunset sky finally settle on dark . And then he looks around again, and there’s no field. No Baby. No sky.
“Dean, Dean, Dean.” The voice is raspy, familiar. A chill moves straight from his spine to coiling in his throat, tight and suffocating. “You walk into my house, you turn on all the lights, you try to set off the fire alarm. Well, maybe not fire-“
He spins, readying himself. Nothing prepares him for the sight of Cas. Not-Cas. Cas with eyes too wide and a smile that slips past creepy to crazy, except that he’d seen Cas’ crazy. This- was possibly one of the most otherworldly beings he’d ever confront. This was something so far out to lunch it was buying tomorrow’s breakfast.
But it was still wrapped up like Cas.
“No, not fire,” it was still rambling, eyes fixed on him, but behind the blue, suitably empty . “But you certainly do seem to throw everyone into a tizzy.”
Dean spun around again, searching the nothingness around him for a sign, a vague movement- nothing. He picked a direction, and threw himself down it in a quicktime march, barely hearing the soft following footfalls.
“Really, it’s not too much to ask for common courtesy.”
He skid to a halt as he- it popped up directly in front of him, throwing himself backwards to avoid collision. It laughed.
“I just want to chat, Dean. Relax a bit.”
“So you can throw me back into a dream?” He snorts, fingers searching his pockets for the black knife of scraped stone that he’d folded in a shirt that had once been Kevin’s. A prophet’s wrappings. It was amazing, the things you could stumble upon- study and learn when God himself wasn’t controlling your narrative.
“I’d rather just throw you out,” it practically hissed, circling him once. “Of course, that grave dirt in your pocket isn’t going to let me, but it’s what I want to do.”
“I’m here for Cas-tiel,” he says, stumbling over Cas’ full name like the Shadow didn’t know , didn’t come to this meeting present-wrapped in his skin. “And I’m not leaving without him.”
“I may not be able to throw you out,” the being shifted, face changing, Cas’ features falling away to the dark, unfeatured humanoid that it must be underneath. “But I will not make this easy. ”
It disappears into the darkness around them, and Dean just sighs to himself, the relief from the prickling on his skin immediate.
Wax from a black candle, oil from the wings of an angel, sulfur from a demon. The pure crystalline bowl that seemed less made than simply shaped that Death had held onto. Blood, to find him. Combined over the grave of someone Risen. Sam had found plenty of graves that might work, but Dean knew where he would have to do it.
His own grave dirt from his first resurrection. He had three leather pouches stuffed with it for good measure, one in his jacket pocket, one in his jeans, one in his shoe, stuffed uncomfortably into the toe. The anchor that would hold him in the empty until-
Well. Until he left or he didn’t. He swiped again at the sweat beading on his forehead, despite how cool the Empty was. His breathing felt strained thinner, like whistling in bursts instead of heaving full breathes.
He kept walking. The book had said there would be a demon- the empty, the Shadow- to tempt you out or into death. And then you would feel the pull once it left you, once you were out of it’s range. But there was no tug, no guiding force, just him in the darkest spot of existence, starting to shiver feverishly as he kept looking.
And then, like it had always been there and he’d only just remembered, he felt his attention pulled to his left. He stumbled that way, already feeling lightheaded, already feeling the effects of a slow motion vacuum on the human body. Well- ‘body’. He was mostly sure he still had a physical form collapsed over the table topside. Regardless, he was feeling the effects and the journals he’d found had not lied.
At first, all of the moisture evaporating out of your body. Your blood starting to boil by slow degrees even as your skin started freezing. The decompression. Space was vindictive. At least when you were actually in space, it happened fast, but this- well. He had time to search for Cas while he asphyxiated.
The pull wasn’t an actual feeling, as he took the next step forward and the next step forward. If he could see, it would be like seeing light from the end of a long tunnel, like hearing a song playing from another floor. If he focused, it burned.
“I won’t let him go easily.” It spoke from beside him, and he jumped as the insistent awareness of Cas ceased .
“You‘ll live longer if you do.” He said, the threat a second nature thing slipping off his tongue. No possible follow-through, all hard edges and bristled anger.
“With the little knife in your pocket?” It coalesced again, this time with bright red hair, and he found himself staring down into Anna’s eyes, if Anna’s eyes had ever looked that unfeeling. He swallowed the sick feeling back down to his stomach. “I expected more from you, to be honest.
“It’s what I’ve got.” He said, voice hard. “Take it or leave it.” He wasn’t planning on trying to kill the Shadow. But the blade should at least be able to hurt it.
“You could leave it. I could even curl you up next to each other for eternal slumber.” It cocked its head, Cas’ mannerisms on Anna’s body on the Empty’s roiling apathy below the surface. “If suffering through ebullism doesn’t get you first.”
And then it was gone again, and the non-atmosphere surrounded him properly again. His deepest breath was a light, thready thing with a rattle like a deathbed cough somewhere in his chest. His mouth was starting to feel swampy, the saliva passing the point of his own body temperature. And there was where he felt Cas, so he took the next struggling step.
Sam would kill him if he actually died here from slow motion explosive decompression. Eileen would find a way to lecture him whatever afterlife a death in the Empty got you. Jack- well, Jack hadn’t been back since Chuck was defeated, so fuck if Dean knew how he’d deal.
Dean would kinda consider killing himself to try and save Cas both a worthy death and a failure, so he focused on the pull again, on the end of a line he couldn’t see.
And then- his tongue was starting to feel swollen and burning, his skin reddening. Each breath could be called a huff, but he stumbled forward again as he saw something .
A curled up lump, under a familiar tan trench coat, worn soft and almost holy by the years. Dark hair. Dean suppressed a sob and collapsed to his knees next to Cas, his Cas. Reached out and shook his shoulder, turned him over.
“Can you even get him out, in the state you're in?” The Shadow squeezed in next to him, out of disguise, knee to knee, leaning almost tenderly over Cas’ head. “It’s no shame to admit you can’t.”
“Fuck off,” Dean said, already untying his shoelaces with fumbling, thick swollen fingers. He shook the bag loose and rolled it into the palm of his hand before tossing it straight at it. Of course, it caught it, but it was enough of a distraction for Dean to clumsily pull out the knife, coated in embalming fluid, and run it straight through the bag.
The grave dirt split and spilled, but there was enough on the blade as he lodged it into the Shadow’s chest that he knew it should work. It was a gamble- his hunter’s instinct more than any lore, but he hoped that if he got the grave dirt inside-
The Shadow’s head snapped backwards, formless but wailing with unimaginable pain. Without hesitation, Dean leaned forward in response, tugging Cas towards him as his left hand grabbed the other two bags, throwing the blindly away and then bracing, arms reaching and wrapping and holding -
Whatever the tug was that drew him to Cas, it was tenfold, a thousandfold, indescribable force drawing him back to where his body was. He could still hear the ringing shriek-wails of the Shadow, feel Cas’ form but it was slipping he was slipping-
His fingers tightened, and he knew that if it were a normal place his fingers would be tearing straight into Cas’ shoulders, his chest would be crushed between his forearm where he had him in this violent embrace. For a moment, Dean Winchester saw bright, unending white, and he was sure that he must have died, burnt up in whatever trajectory the Empty to Earth had.
Except he opened his eyes again. Brightness, white light spilling from every corner of wherever he was, a wave of feelings too large and incomprehensible for words bowling him over.
Be not afraid.
Like a thousand boulders crashing, or possibly millions of bells ringing, or the outcry of every bird Dean had ever heard. All at once, and more, and more, and more.
Softer this time.
Be not afraid, Dean.
“Cas,” he gasped, body protesting as air- or whatever, in this space- slammed back into his lungs. “Cas!”
I’m here. How-?
Dean didn’t answer the trailing question, stuck as he was gazing up into the light. “Where are you?”
He realized, blinking stupidly, that that was a stupid question. Wherever they were, he could still- the light was Cas. Of course it was.
I’m trying not to burn you to a crisp, Cas’ voice echoed back, sardonic and confused. Unless you would rather see my true form and die?
“I don’t,” Dean tried. “I don’t think it’s an issue.”
He was staring into the center now, watching watching watching as swirls of light became swirls of color became movements of wings. Flashes of shapes beyond or inside or hanging over morphed like water, vaguely animal as he swore he saw in the same second the heads of lions, odd blocks of geometry, ribbons that curled into revolving rings. Each part his eyes tried to focus on shifted in the next breath like an exploration.
Pardon?
Cas’ voice was louder, but Dean could listen this time. He laughed out loud, feeling his eyes streaming tears. He wasn’t sure why. “I can see you.”
You can-
With a sound like a gong, Dean’s head split, and he tried to stand, immediately taking a dive back down to the dirt. Dirt? He risked opening his eyes, thin slits of light shooting daggers directly into his brain.
“Uuuuvhghhhhgh,” he groaned, because he could, head pounding. The sky was blue, bright and sunny. There was grass under his body, a softer cushion than he thought it would be.
“Sleep, Dean,” He heard distantly, like sound coming through water. “I’m sure I can have Sam explain what you did so I can be angry at you when you wake up.”
“Cas,” he tried to say, but his face was heavy and fuzzy, his mouth not responding, his eyes slipping closed.
“I’ll be here when you wake. I promise, Dean.”
A hand cradled against his cheek. He tried his best to follow, almost unaware of covering Cas’ hand with his own. He had to ask. To know. He was out of it enough for the words to slip free. “For’ver,” He forced out against the unconsciousness trying to claim him. “Stay. Forever.”
He managed to pry his eyes open, feeling delirious with pain. Above him, Cas stared down at him with something awed in his eyes. Something full.
“Forever,” Cas said solemnly, and Dean lost the battle against sleep.