Because it is
deancas coda, 6k, 15.18 (or a coda where Dean and Cas reunite and it has a very happy ending because I’m sappy)
Why does this sound like a goodbye?
It’s Sam who finds him. It’s Sam who hits the ground knees first and clutches his brother’s face, who finds Dean trembling, who looks at Dean with such terror in his eyes, because maybe he’s never seen his brother like this, never seen Dean so broken.
“What happened?” Sam asks, urges him with every fibre of his being, white-knuckled grip around his brother’s shoulders, but Dean’s lips won’t move, can’t move, even as Sam begs him.
Instead, all that comes out is a shaky breath. All that comes out is one last sob, something empty and unfinished, something that doesn’t do justice to fill the void in Dean’s chest, and then, voice breaking, Dean finally answers.
“Cas,” he says and it’s as if the world pitches itself into darkness and he covers his face with his hands again and tries to forget that he exists.
They do it because Dean’s fury knows no bounds. They do it because Dean won’t stand it, can’t stand it, won’t let the world end, won’t let Cas go because that stupid selfish bastard can’t just keep leaving Dean like that (hasn’t he told him that enough times?).
But God laughs. God sees the spark of defiance in Dean’s eyes, sees that flaring anger and all of its power, and he still laughs and he laughs and he laughs.
“You think you’re going to save him?” Chuck sneers, grinning cruelly even as Dean breaks him apart with Death’s scythe. “Bring him back? Please. Nothing comes back from the Empty, Dean. Not anymore. I’ve snapped away all the angels, all the demons, your nephilim. All my children. The Empty’s gone to sleep and it won’t ever wake up again because your one disobedient little angel is finally locked away.
“This my story,” Chuck says even as his body turns to dust, even as his voice withers with it. “And I wrote a horror story.”
Maybe they’re expecting the universe to collapse, to turn itself inside and out now that its balancing forces are gone. But the world doesn’t do that. The world keeps spinning, devoid of life, inhabited solely by two brothers who grieve.
The world is empty, Dean thinks, so why isn’t Cas here?
Dean starts dreaming. The rare instances when his eyes close, when he’s too tired to keep reading, when the tomes he finds in the library are too heavy in his hands, and when he can’t find a single word, not even one goddamned measly word that could be a clue about the Empty—at some point during those times, his eyes close and he dreams.
You changed me, Cas tells him each night, smiling through tears and every part of Dean’s body aches, every part of him wants and he pleads with himself to say something, to tell Cas to stay, to beg him not to go. He tries to move his arms, tries to hold him, tries to cradle Cas’ face in his hands, wipe the tears away from his cheeks, but maybe God isn’t really dead.
Because no matter what Dean does, no matter how much he wants to, he stands in the scene as before, unmoving, breathless, a memory.
Cas always says, Goodbye, Dean, and the smile he gives him breaks Dean into pieces and pieces.
