|| Re-Introduction: If You Need Him, He'll Be There Again ||
[SPOILERS for Supernatural up to 5x22 in this post, and likely in the course of play with my Dean. Sorry.]
It's been two days since Dean left Bobby's, since Castiel appeared in the cab of the Impala next to him, told him he'd wanted this, and then disappeared probably forever. Everything still hurts even though the angel healed him - his bones and muscles remember the beating given to him by the devil wearing his brother's body, his eyes remember Sam disappearing into the earth, his heart remembers it closing behind. His ears remember the silence in the Stull graveyard, and his heart remembers the promise he made. None of it will ever stop hurting, and he's okay with that because behind it is a yawning, complete numbness waiting to take him, as empty as the seat beside him, as endless as the rest of his life stretching before him.
A life he promised Sam he'd try to live normally. No more hunting. No more deals. There's a checklist inside his brain - barbecues, PTA meetings, church on Sundays - and he agreed to all of it when he agreed to let Sam go. He refused the peace of Heaven, refused a place of honor in Hell, and Cas is right: what he's left with is free will. Sam's free will lead him to stop the end of the world by ending himself; Dean's free will let him. The best part about all of it, the real kicker is that now, well - now he doesn't even know where he's going.
Sam told him what to do with that, too; go to Lisa, he said, and Dean supposes that eventually he will. He can't go to her like this, though, he can't bring this grief to her, not as staggering as it is. He can't be the lost little boy that shows up on her doorstep. But he'd like to open that door eventually, see if she'll be "stupid" enough to take him back.
But for right now he's not ready to close the doors he'd have to in order to do that. He's not ready to end, even if he knows he already has: he drives on, stopping only for gas and to crawl into the back seat to sleep when he can no longer keep his eyes open or his arms straight.
----
It had been raining when Dean went to sleep; at some point during the night it clearly became snow, but that doesn't make much sense since it's freaking April in the middle of Tennessee. He could be wrong, though. He hasn't been paying as much attention as he should, so Dean squints out at the blanket of white on the ground, peels himself off the cold leather of the bench seat, and wastes a few long moments both hating and relishing the way his muscles ache dully before getting out to move to the driver's seat again. Time to move on. He can see straight again.
But the Impala doesn't start, and there's not enough actual emotion left in the hunter - former hunter he thinks with a pulse of hurt - to get really angry about that. She's had a rough couple of years, too, his girl. He pops the hood and gets back out to find the problem - except there is no problem. Twenty minutes later he still has no viable reason the reliable, beloved car shouldn't start, and he blows out a breath when he straightens up to look around.
There'd been a field to his left, before. He knows because he almost parked in it. Now there are trees, and when Dean twists to look back the way he came, the two-lane highway is a narrow, barely marked one-lane drive. He's not a hunter anymore, because he promised, but he's been one for almost three decades and he hasn't been one for less than three days, and he knows what's strange and what's not. So alright, he'll go looking for what the problem is in the area or a house or something, but he pauses by the trunk to move his duffel - and Sam's, god, Sam's is still back here like he'll be back for it at any time and goddammit he should've left it at Bobby's - and pull his Colt out from under the false bottom, checks the clip and shoves the cold metal into the waistband of his jeans one more time. Then and only then does he start walking.
Name: Dean Winchester
Fandom: Supernatural
Media: TV series
Typist: A.J./wyrish
Other relevant info:
Re-enter Dean! I have adjusted his canon point from 5x04 to 5x22, and he does not have his Mansion memories at this time. Please consider him to have disappeared when the Mansion collapsed but on autopilot prior to that; no body was found. He should reappear the same way he originally did: trudging his way across the lawn from the forest. Title and cut-text from the unofficial Dean theme song here.
The first commenter acts as a welcoming committee. All following interactions are deemed later in the day, when the character is settled.