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It’s after dark, and the world has never seemed so alive.
The sleek metal of the Impala is cold where Dean sits. It’s been a couple hours since he turned off the engine, and the chill of the night had swooped in quickly, caressing him with phantom touches.
Above him, the sky is filled to bursting with stars. Their glow is overwhelming – each individual cosmic pinprick is fighting for attention, their faint, faraway pulses of light straining to be seen.
Dean’s not really sure how he ended up here. One second, he’d been driving along the dark and winding highway, and the next he’d found himself swiveling his car onto some random narrow dirt road.
He doesn’t know why. There’s nothing out here. He’d driven it to the end, and now he’s in a clearing in the middle of nowhere looking up at the sky like some teenage girl in a romcom.
Dean knows he should leave. Duty calls – there’s a potential hunt a couple states away, and he can’t waste time getting there. People could die. It’s literally a life or death situation.
But he can’t tear his eyes away from the sky.
Just a little while longer, his mind whispers.
And so, he stays.
He recognizes some constellations, and makes up others. It doesn’t seem possible that there are so many stars. This far from the light pollution of big cities, it seems like a billion new ones have crammed their way into the universe all at once. The expanse is dizzying.
He breathes in the peace, the quiet. It fills his lungs, spreads through the rest of him. The world, the universe, soaks into every pore of his body. He exhales.
Out of nowhere, a star streaks across the sky, blazing a path through the night. His eyes follow it – the arch, the trajectory. It seems to get bigger.
It’s getting too big. Too close. The size of a person – one who’s just spontaneously combusted. Within the blazing light, Dean catches an ink-black flash. Wings, maybe.
A crash shakes the Earth.
What the hell.
His heart is thumping in his chest, threatening to burst. He hates fate, hates destiny, but… well. Maybe he’s on this stupid dirt road for a reason. The star – or person, or… whatever – crashed nearby. A couple miles, max. He can still see its fading glow.
The sky forgotten, Dean slides off the car, takes a deep breath, and follows the light.