SPN DCBB14: Worlds That Never Were (Chapter 1/5)

[the_diggler]

Worlds That Never Were ~ Chapter 1

Please see the fic masterpost for warnings and other information.





Castiel has many dreams. Most of them are the usual kind – ridiculous and nonsensical, twisting landscapes and winding journeys that lead to nowhere. Some of them are full of memory, full-blown and vivid as the day they occurred – or else, merely grains of truth woven into the absurdity of the usual dream to create some kind of bizarre amalgam of the two. But between memory and absurdity, sometimes there are visions, glimpses into other worlds – parallel worlds.

Sometimes these worlds are so different, it’s difficult to tell whether they’re real or just another dream, another nightmare. And sometimes they are so similar, they’re indistinguishable from memory, but for the repercussions of one tiny difference, one decision or action that went the other direction. But either way, there are always patterns, familiar themes that repeat themselves, over and over again, through many different incarnations. Fixed end points, destinies to be found, balanced precariously on the choices made along the way.

Castiel dreams of a world where it’s not Dean who dies at Stull Cemetery, but Dean’s half-brother Adam, a shape-shifter coerced into taking on Dean’s appearance in exchange for the release of his captive mother.

The results are the same, though. The sight of his dead brother so enrages Sam that his power spikes out of control, dangerously enhancing the powers of the mutant beside him – Lucifer. And with the erratic power boost from Sam, light pours from Lucifer’s body, blinding white and incandescent like never before.

By the time Castiel can get the real Dean to the cemetery, it’s too late. Sam’s power is completely destabilized, feeding Lucifer’s iridescence until it seems to gain a momentum all on of its own, spiralling out of control. Violent winds whip through the air, lifting Lucifer from the ground, up into the light radiating from his body.

Dean immediately sends out a neutralizing field, pushing forward against the wind to where his brother is hunched over on the ground, but it seems to have no effect, the winds raging on and on around them.

“Sam, it’s okay! I’m here!” he yells over the maelstrom, reaching out as he pushes closer. “Give me your hands! Just like when we were kids! Breathe with me, Sammy! It’s okay!”

“It’s not going to work, Dean!” Sam screams, not even the physical contact strong enough to ground him now. The very earth begins to crack and crumble beneath them, the air crackling with power as the light around Lucifer begins to expand.

“Dean!” Castiel yells out in warning. Even Michael finally seems to understand the danger, the calm of his steel facade crumbling like the ground around them as he staggers backwards against the onslaught, his super-strength no longer any match for Lucifer’s enhanced powers.

“Get us out of here!” Michael yells at Castiel. But it’s been a long time since Castiel’s followed any of his brother’s orders, and he’s not leaving without Dean.

He thinks he sees the moment when Michael finally understands he’s lost – the fury and indignation at Castiel’s choice. The choice Castiel’s made over and over again since he first met Dean Winchester.

But it’s only for a moment, as in the next second an arc of Lucifer’s light shoots towards Michael like lightning, eviscerating him where he stands. Castiel barely hears Lucifer’s victorious cackle through the roar of wind and trembling earth.

“I’m sorry, Michael,” Castiel whispers under his breath, mourning the loss of his brother, no matter how misguided his actions were. And it seems Castiel will soon lose another brother, as the light around Lucifer grows still brighter, bigger, burning the very air around them.

The maniacal glee on Lucifer’s face soon disappears as well, as he finally realizes the situation has escalated beyond his control. All Lucifer had wanted was to destroy Michael. He’d needed Sam to boost his powers enough to fight against Michael’s impenetrable strength, but he clearly didn’t expect this. He hadn’t known that the sight of Dean’s dead body would send Sam’s power so out of control.

Michael had known. It was his plan all along. It was only his arrogance that made him believe he would survive such an onslaught.

Lucifer’s light begins to overtake Adam’s body where it’s lying on the ground, still a perfect imitation of Dean, even in death. In split-seconds, it’s shredded to pieces, same as Michael. And if it was hard enough to look into a mere imitation of Dean’s eyes, open and fixed in death, it’s harder still to see this tangible vision of a fate that threatens to befall them still.

Castiel arches a wing over the real Dean, trying to shield him from the brunt of Lucifer’s power for as long as he can. Lucifer radiates so bright, it’s even begun to unveil the dimension that keeps Castiel’s wings invisible, creating giant wing-like shadows in the blinding light. He could already feel his wings on fire before, but now Castiel can actually see them slowly burning away.

The grass around Sam’s knees begins rapidly growing and contorting into abnormal shapes, his power creating mutation all around him – save for the space around where Dean kneels, his neutralizing power fighting to cancel out Sam’s mutation enhancement, trying to keep the grass alive and healthy. It’s no use, though. Everything around Sam begins to curl up and shrivel until the entire ground is brown and dead.

“Dean, you need to go!” Sam yells.

“No! I’m not gonna leave you!” Dean yells back, shaking him.

“Cas, get him out of here!” Sam ignores his brother, appealing to Castiel.

“No!” Dean whirls around to glare at Castiel, eyes wild and desperate.

“Dean, if we stay much longer, I won’t be able to fly us out of here at all! And I won’t leave you!” Castiel shouts over the din.

A dry sob escapes Dean’s throat, his hands clenching uselessly around Sam’s arms.

Sam nods at Castiel, a heavy resignation settling in his eyes before he turns back to his brother. “Let go, Dean,” he says.

“No, Sam! No!” Dean pleads.

“It’s okay, Dean. It’s gonna be okay. Let go.”

“Sammy!”

“Bye, Dean.”

Castiel can wait no longer. With one last nod from Sam, he grabs onto Dean, opens a portal, and flies.



Dean lands hard on unforgiving concrete, crashing to his knees in sudden silence, the furious winds from before gone, leaving his ears ringing in the abrupt absence of noise. Squinting open his eyes, he sees that the blinding light has vanished as well, leaving him in a dimly-lit street that his sight needs a moment to adjust to. He finds himself in what looks like the same empty neighborhood, amongst ramshackle buildings in Kansas City, though the night sky is dark, and the ground isn’t trembling beneath him. But it can’t be. It can’t be the same place. Because his arms are empty. Cas is gone. Everyone he’s ever known and loved is gone. He is completely, utterly, alone.

Dean feels a heavy hollowness settle in his chest. Distantly he knows what he feels makes no sense, because how can he be so full of emptiness? It trickles down slow, to the very tips of his fingers and soles of his feet, weighing him down until it’s too hard to even move his lungs to breathe. Maybe he doesn’t. Maybe he stops altogether. Maybe that’s what he wants.

His body protests, sucking in deep, shuddering breaths that seem overly loud in the quiet. He doesn’t know how long he’s been kneeling there, collapsed in the middle of the street, but as he picks himself up off the ground he belatedly realizes it must not matter. He hasn’t heard anything but silence, let alone the movement of any people or cars.

He can feel himself shaking, trembling as he makes his way down the street, and wraps his arms tightly around himself, trying to pull himself together. Shock, he thinks at first. And his teeth begin to chatter as his body temperature drops. But when he really starts looking around, trying to work out where the hell he is, he starts to suspect it’s more than that.

There’s more than just litter lining the sidewalks and roads. There’s rubble. Glass and mortar, crumbled to near dust on the streets. And when Dean looks up, he sees the tops of some of the taller buildings are completely destroyed, collapsed over the ones around them. Dean realizes the taller buildings must’ve taken the brunt of an explosion, providing some kind of protection for the surrounding structures, leaving them mostly standing.

But more than that, there are strange shadows on the walls. Like burn marks. They remind Dean of the pictures he saw in school when they were learning about World War II and nuclear bombs. Mushroom clouds of smoke and light – so bright it burned up every living thing in its path in a moment, leaving only shadows, forever burned behind. Light just like Lucifer’s. And when Dean starts to see frost, webbing across any shards of glass that remain, Dean wonders if he’s landed in some kind of nuclear winter, the fallout of Lucifer and Sam’s power combined.

Did Cas somehow send him to the future? It would explain how he escaped the blast, safely skipping over it completely to land long after it happened. Cas once told Dean that he was able to bend time on occasion, though it wasn’t easy. It had something to do with time and space being the same dimension or something. Cas had tried to explain it when Dean had asked about his powers, but as soon as Cas had started talking about partial differential equations, he’d lost even Sam in the conversation. So Cas had just ended up saying, “Time is fluid, Dean,” and left it at that.

He’d never seen Cas actually do it, though.

He’d never seen Cas’ halo before.

He’ll never see it again.

Dean shudders violently, swallowing down the hiccupping sound that threatens to escape his throat, telling himself that it’s just the cold wracking through his body. He needs to keep moving. He needs to find shelter.

Stumbling through the deserted streets, he finally comes to the conclusion that the area he’s in is completely abandoned. He wonders if it has something to do with the fallout of Lucifer’s power, that the radiation has made the place uninhabitable or something. There’s usually rats scurrying around the depths of the alleys in places like this, at the very least. But he can’t even hear any insects. And the weeds in between the cracks of the pavement are all brown and dead.

Just like the ground around Sam before--

Dean sucks in sharp breath. Whatever radiation is left won’t matter to him. His neutralizing power will protect him from the kind of abnormalities that would usually result from nuclear exposure.

Eventually Dean finds an old warehouse that seems to be mostly intact. There’s rubble on top of it, where the building next to it has collapsed over it, taking the brunt of the blast and protecting it. So the warehouse itself is still standing. What’s more, there are no windows on the front of the structure. All the other buildings with windows had the glass blown in, exposing them to the cold. But that also means the warehouse is dark as hell inside, and Dean has to pull out his phone to see in the dark that instantly closes around him.

He’s not surprised to see that he has no signal.

Not that there’s anyone left for him to call

Dean keeps moving. He may not have any signal, but it’s not wise to waste his battery either. And it’s getting colder.

A few minutes later, he discovers he isn’t the first one to have come across this safe haven. There’s a nest of old blankets in the corner that sure smell like someone lived there for a while, so the building must be more stable than it looks.

Next to the blankets, there are also a couple of large trashcans, filled with the ashes of burnt debris. Dean scrounges around for more fuel, picking up litter and old pieces of furniture to burn for warmth and light. There’s not enough to get both bins going, so he’ll have to do with one, but he manages to get the first burning steady enough to last through the night.

The cold still bites at him though, so he buries himself in the blankets as well. They smell rank, and they’re covered in dirt and the crusted remains of what could be blood, but it sure as hell beats nothing. Dean hunkers down, staring mindlessly into the flames, too tired to care, too tired to complain… Too tired to stop the thoughts running through his head anymore.

Maybe if he’d gotten there sooner, he could’ve stopped this. Maybe if he’d just been smarter he could’ve worked it out – would’ve realized it wasn’t really him in Chuck’s vision, lying dead at Michael’s feet, but Adam. And then Sam wouldn’t have gone to Lucifer, and agreed to help him destroy Michael.

Then again, maybe if Dean had made more of an effort with their estranged half-brother, kept a better eye on him, the kid wouldn’t have been such a vulnerable target in the first place. Or maybe if Dean had just played along with Michael’s plans earlier, Michael wouldn’t have had to resort to such desperate measures. Then at least his brother would still be alive. Both of his brothers. And Cas

Dean swallows hard against the sob threatening to escape his throat, dimly aware of the wetness on his cheeks.

Maybe… maybe

Maybe it really would have been better if Dean had insisted on staying with them, so he could’ve died too.



“Dean.”

“Mmm?”

“Wake up, Dean,” Cas murmurs lazily, pressing loose open-mouthed kisses against the back of his neck.

“Don’t wanna,” Dean grumbles, snuggling back into Cas’ embrace. He’s so comfortable here, pressed against the line of Cas’ body, wrapped up in the soft nest of Cas’ wings with their legs tangled together, warm and cozy in their bed. He doesn’t ever want to leave. He feels safe here.

“Dean,” Cas murmurs again, and Dean can hear the smile in his voice, feel the curve of Cas’ lips against his skin. And when he presses back again, he can feel Cas’ interest stirring to life in the cradle of Cas’ hips.

Cas chuckles low and throaty at that, tickling Dean’s earlobe with his breath before his lips close around it, sucking and nibbling just the way Dean likes. Helpless against the onslaught, Dean can’t stop the low moan that escapes his throat. It won’t be long before he gives in altogether and rolls over, pressing Cas back against the pillows and claiming Cas’ smiling lips with his own. And then Cas will smile that special smile, the one only for Dean, and say, “I love your kisses most of all.”

Then Dean will kiss him again, because he loves the way Cas kisses him as well, like he gives himself over to it entirely, no going halfway, losing himself completely whether it’s tender and soft, or deep and claiming.

Dean can see it now. So many of their mornings have started that way. He just has to wake up, and roll over, and Cas should be there right there, waiting for him.

But he doesn’t want to. He doesn’t want to move at all. He knows, somewhere in the back of his mind, that it won’t play out that way this time.

“Cas,” he whimpers, afraid to open his eyes. He just wants to stay here in the dark of their bedroom at the bunker, wrapped up in the endless night of Cas’ wings.

“I said, get up!”

A boot connects with Dean’s ribs.

“What are you doing here?”

Dean no longer has any choice. The soft embrace of Cas’ wings is abruptly replaced with the smelly cocoon of old blankets as he’s rudely awaken by the sharp pain in his side.

“Come on, move it. Up!” the boot jostles him again. Dean growls as he pulls himself out of his nest, hunching over to protect his smarting ribs. When he finally opens his eyes he sees two men in black paramilitary gear, radiation masks covering their faces, and he remembers where he is. Or rather, isn’t.

“Papers,” one of the men says, holding out his hand expectantly. Dean eyes their guns warily, noticing the tasers on their belts. Given the right ability, a lot of mutants are able to dodge or evade regular bullets, but electricity is a much more effective means of knocking out a mutant’s powers temporarily. Either way, Dean’s powers are mostly passive. The odds aren’t in his favor. Not while he’s lying on the ground like this. But maybe if he can get on his feet and be patient, he’ll find a good moment to take them out and make a run for it.

“Uh…” Dean stalls, patting himself down and pretending to search his clothes until he can come up with a plan. But he’s got nothing. “You know what, guys? I’d love to help you, but it looks like I left them in my other pants?”

“Looks like we got ourselves a comedian,” the second guy sneers.

The first guys rolls his eyes and grabs Dean’s arm, hauling him up. “Come on, shifter. You’re coming with us.”

“Shifter,” Dean echoes, confused, as he gets string-tied and pulled outdoors. There are two more soldiers waiting there with heavy artillery, and Dean curses internally, his chances of escape becoming even more slim.

“Get in the truck,” one of the men barks at him as they approach a tank-like vehicle.

“What, no dinner first?” Dean snarks, annoyed at the man-handling.

“Cute. We’ll see how they like your sense of humor at the camp, Mr. Winchester.”

Dean blanches in surprise. He’s so thrown that the soldiers know his name, he barely even thinks to put up a struggle as they throw him in the back of the truck, let alone ask what camp they’re talking about.

At least there’s a thin strip of window along the truck’s walls, so he can see where they’re going. As they’re driving out of the city Dean finally notices them – the signs plastered on the walls that he’d missed the night before, unable to see them in the dark – Quarantine signs announcing the area off-limits. But the further they drive the signs begin to thin out, only to be replaced by signs that are just as intimidating, announcing a government decreed curfew at 10pm, and that all mutants must carry registration papers at all times.

Huh. Papers. So that’s what tweedle-dum and tweedle-dumber were talking about. The government finally passed that goddamn Mutant Registration law. Lucifer’s blast must’ve given them the perfect excuse to go through with it. So that probably means “the camp” he’s being taken to is some kind of internment camp for unregistered mutants or something.

Dammit. This is exactly the kind of scenario most mutants feared. And it’s exactly why Dean and his brother worked so hard to keep the more violent, fringier mutants in line. A few rotten apples gave the rest of them a bad name, and gave regular humans the fuel to justify their prejudice and fear.

And that was exactly the kind of situation Michael was looking to exploit. Lucifer sought power through chaos, but it was always Michael’s intention to seize control by providing order. Subjugation through “protection.” And this Big Brother level of military enforcement reeks of Michael.

If this is the future Dean was going to land in, Cas shouldn’t have even bothered keeping him safe for it. Dean doesn’t want to see this – all the years of fighting, everything he’d struggled to hold on to and lost – all of that, for nothing.

Dean’s so busy lamenting his fate, it takes a while to realize something else about the signs is very, very off. At the bottom of each sign, in smaller print, there are government issue dates. And they just don’t make any sense.

All the dates are from long before Lucifer’s blast.



The sun is going down by the time they get back to “the camp,” which is literally an old summer camp the next state over in Illinois, converted into some kind of internment facility. Just like Dean suspected. But he imagines the large “Welcome to Camp Chitaqua” sign would be a lot more inviting if it were’t for the heavily armed guards patrolling the perimeter fence.

Dean is immediately led to a trailer for “processing,” where all his clothes and belongings are taken from him, before he’s hosed down and scrubbed clean of any “lingering radiation.” Then he’s given a plain jumpsuit and slippers before he’s thrown back outside into some kind of general holding area. There are several other people milling around, some of them obviously mutants, but not all. Mutant sympathizers maybe? Dean tries to talk to a few of them, work out where he is and what’s happening, but as soon as they really look at him they freeze up and don’t want to have anything to do with him.

But then, just when he’s about to start busting some heads for answers, Dean sees a familiar bearded face in the throng.

“Chuck? Is that you?” he asks, coming closer. Chuck’s eyes go wide when he sees Dean.

“Oh my God. It really is you!” Chuck gapes.

“Oh man, I never thought I’d say this, but it is good to see you, buddy,” Dean exclaims, hugging him.

“Good to see me?” Chuck squeaks. “What about you? You died, Dean! I saw you, dead at Michael’s feet! But here you are! And I saw this happening too but I thought it couldn’t possibly be a vision, it had to be just wishful thinking or something. But it’s really you! How is this possible?”

Dean raises his eyebrows. At least now he knows why the soldiers thought he was a shifter before. Everyone believes he’s really dead.

“It wasn’t me you saw in your vision, Chuck,” he explains. “It was Adam. He was a shape-shifter.”

“Oh thank God,” Chuck breathes in relief. “I mean, that’s terrible. For Adam,” he quickly amends, “but yay you?”

“Yeah, I guess,” Dean huffs a bitter laugh.

Chuck stares at him for a second, chewing on his lip nervously at Dean’s reaction. “I’m sorry, Dean,” Chuck says quietly. “Maybe if I hadn’t said anything, Sam wouldn’t have gone to Lucifer to help him fight Michael, and none of this would’ve happened. It’s all my fault,” he says.

Dean doesn't know what to say to that for a second, clenching his jaw shut and just blinking at Chuck. But then Dean really looks, and sees the weight of that guilt in Chuck’s eyes, that he somehow created this fucked up world. Dean sighs.

“It’s not all your fault, Chuck. They would’ve got to us one way or another,” he replies. In fact, Dean’s starting to wonder if all this was inevitable. That they’d just been deluding themselves into thinking Michael or Lucifer wouldn’t catch up to them sooner or later.

“So… Where have you been all this time?” Chuck asks.

“I… don't know,” Dean frowns at the question, remembering the puzzling dates on the signs. “Hey, Chuck? Can you tell me what day it is?”

“Uh, Thursday?” Chuck answers.

“No, what date?”

“Sometime in August, I think? Why? Is something supposed to be happening? Oh my god, is the Resistance coming to get you?” Chuck hisses excitedly. “Is that the plan? I heard they had a new prophet-type mutant with them, but they should’ve intercepted your transport long before you got here if they’d known. But maybe Kevin didn’t believe any visions he had of you either, or something else happened to him--”

“Resistance? What?” Dean interrupts. “Wait. What year is it?”

“2014?” Chuck’s face scrunches up in confusion. “Dean? Are you okay? Did they hit you on the head when they brought you in or something?” Chuck asks, expression filling with concern.

“That doesn’t makes sense…” Dean trails off, frowning. “When did all of this,” Dean waves a hand at the camp, “happen, if Stull Cemetery was just yesterday?”

“Dean, Stull Cemetery happened years ago,” Chuck replies.

“What? No… that’s…” Dean trails off. If this isn’t the future, then, “Where the hell am I?”

“Camp Chitaqua?” Chuck answers in that perpetually nervous way of his. “The government calls it a refugee camp, but they’ve been interrogating everyone they bring in for information. They’re looking for anything to do with the Resistance. Their headquarters, specifically. Lucky I never really knew anything about the bunker, otherwise I’d really be in-- Uh-oh,” Chuck stops abruptly, mid-ramble, looking over Dean’s shoulder with wide eyes. Dean turns around to see a dark-haired woman charging up to him with a furious expression on her face.

“Oh you think that’s funny, do you?” she snaps, swinging at Dean.

“Woah, lady!” Dean exclaims, pushing Chuck in front of him.

“Risa,” Chuck supplies out of the side of his mouth.

“You’re going to get all of us in trouble pulling a stunt like this!” she yells, much to Dean’s confusion. “Take his face off! Dean Winchester was a hero!” she yells, swinging again.

“Hero?” Dean scoffs. He would be laughing if he wasn’t so busy trying to duck. Lucky for him, a couple other inmates rush forward to hold her back.

“Come on, Risa, relax. You don’t want to draw any unnecessary attention,” a big guy hisses into her ear as she struggles against his hold.

“Yeah, Risa.” Dean says, collecting himself. “I mean, I would help you out if I could, but there’s no changing this face. I’m just this pretty,” he grins.

It’s the wrong thing to say. The big guy holding Risa back roars at that, whirling around and landing one right on Dean’s jaw.

Dean sprawls onto the ground, hitting the dirt hard. And before he can even pull himself together to get up again, the man is jumping on his back, pummelling him in the kidneys. Dean grunts, trying to hunch in on himself and protect his sensitive organs while manoeuvring himself into a stronger position to flip the guy around and fight back. But by the time he finally manages to do it there’s a full-fledged brawl happening around them, and guards are streaming into the containment area to break apart the fighting. As soon as Dean gets up, he barely misses a ball of energy aimed his way, throwing up a neutralizing field just in time to extinguish it. The big guy Dean was fighting with before nods his thanks, then throws himself into the fray, turning his attention to the guards instead.

The guards seem outnumbered though, and Dean wonders how they think they’re going to subdue everyone, especially when the inmates have mutants on their side. There’s a dark-skinned woman with arms made of fire, shooting streams of it from her palms. Another man transforms himself into an elephant, stampeding the guards in his way. And there’s another who seems to be able to manipulate the very clay of the earth, forming a giant golem from it to fight for him. The human guards don’t stand a chance against those kind of powers, even armed with shock-rods.

But then the guards begin to multiply, appearing out of thin air right before Dean’s eyes. He realizes that not all the guards are human after all. And that throws him for a loop. Because he thought the mutants were being oppressed here. Why would there be mutant guards as well? Unless they’re human sympathizers?

Dean’s surprise is quickly eclipsed when he realises it’s not actually more guards that are appearing, but the same guard, copying himself. And Dean recognizes him. It’s Cas’ old friend Balthazar, the guy they used to call “multiple man” … for various reasons. But he’s nothing like the decadent rogue Dean had come to know. Dean never thought he’d see Balthazar in anything other than his usual ridiculously deep v-neck shirts, let alone the thick and heavy uniform of whatever paramilitary organization that’s running this place. He’s ruthless. Single-minded and efficient as he rounds up the inmates. With not even a word of playful banter that was typical of the man. The rest of the inmates are quickly captured or knocked out.

Unfortunately, that frees up a lot of the human guards to gang up on Dean. While he can throw off Balthazar’s clones with his neutralizing fields, his powers don’t work against bare fists. Dean only manages to get a few blows in, before he’s being grabbed by the arms and yanked to his knees.

“Settle down,” one of the men snarls at him, brandishing a high voltage shock-rod in his face. Dean holds his palms up in surrender, backing off. He can taste blood in his mouth, and his head is spinning in that way that tells him he’s on the verge of passing out anyway.

So he’s not entirely sure he’s seeing right when the crowd parts to let someone through.

“Commander!” the guards snap to attention.

“What is the meaning of this?” that all-too-familiar voice growls, and Dean’s heart thuds to a stop in shock.

“…Cas?”

~ next