Gemminycricket

And then, of course, the ultimate kicker. Amara arrives in all her frightening power and gets ready to fuck Lucifer’s shit up, and before even really acknowledging her Dean just calls out to Cas??? In that voice? So desperate and yearning and hopeful. And his eyes glisten with emotion??? Like, I sound like I’m joking or exaggerating but they’re literally shiny with moisture??? Like he might cry if pushed the barest bit? 

AND THEN!!! Amara looks at Dean like he’s kicked her or something? Like she’s realized that her hold on Dean isn’t nearly as strong as she thought it was. He called out Cas’ name before hers. He yearns for him more than he wants her!!!!

SO SHE TAKES HIM!!!!! And then the scene changes and Dean is literally on the floor of the bunkers war room, beers strewn about. (Which, huh, that’s familiar!!!)

And he has this whole really sad, harsh change of tone when he’s talking to Sam about respecting Cas decision to let Lucifer in and fight Amara that way. But that’s just him saying screw the policy!!! Screw the self sacrificing bullshit!!! Dean wants to bring Cas home. And he says it! BUT THAT’S NOT THE END OF IT!!! The scene changes again and it’s Casifer and Amara and Amara is telling Lucifer her plan to use him to draw God out and she has tears in her eyes. 

In his lucid moments during the days leading up to his passing, in which Dean was just as sharp and as bright as he was fifty years ago, he remarked that people must think he’d robbed the cradle with a “hot piece” such as Castiel hanging around him.

“You don’t mind that I’m a wrinkly, senile, crotchety old bastard?” Dean had asked, more than once, but he had always said it with a smile. And Castiel would smile back, replying with the same answer the answer many times, in many ways:

“You’re not senile.”

“Old, but not a bastard.”

“I thought I was the crotchety one.”

“I don’t mind.”

Then Dean would smile, and it would light up the room, and Castiel would wonder again how he came to deserve the focus, let alone the affection, of such a man.

“It’s not about deserving, Cas,” Dean had said, half-whispered in the middle of the night a few short months after they had begun to share the bed they laid in. “It’s… fuck, well I don’t know what it’s about. But people don’t get what they deserve, not most of the time.”

Castiel frowned, furrowing his brows. “They should,” he grumbled.

“Well if people got what they deserved, they’d… I don’t know, Sam would’ve actually become a lawyer, stayed in school. Jo, Ellen, Bobby, they’d all still be here. I’d get mauled by a werewolf or something, go out with a bang, and Baby,” Dean said sternly, as though chastising the universe itself for such an injustice, “Would never get so much as a scratch on her.”

“You think that’s what you deserve?” Castiel’s voice was soft, not wanting to disturb the still of the night, but steely as he considered even the possibility of Dean’s violent end.

Dean registered that, swallowing, “I don’t know. I guess I just never thought I’d even make it this far. Hunters have the shortest lifespans of any human subspecies,” Dean cracked a smile, but his heart wasn’t in the joke. Castiel knew Dean was doing the math in his head. He knew Dean was mentally recalling how long it had been since Bobby left for heaven. Tallying up the number of people who were gone because of self-sacrifice, mistakes, pure dumb luck. Counting exactly how many years he had outlived his own mother.

You know, I was reading Cas's confession to Dean in 15x18 again, just the speech, and I'm still amazed by how intense, poetic and insanely deep it is.

In just three minutes it shows us how unconditional are Cas's love and devotion for Dean, how much attention and time he spent observing him, listening to him, looking directly into his soul. He never left his side, he never doubted him, not for a second, even and especially in his worse moments. He's the only one who truly, truly, never abandoned him in his whole life, no matter what, no question asked.

People tend to forget it, because Cas is not usually loud, he doesn't yell or gets angry every time Dean does or says something.. well, typical of Dean.

He doesn't force Dean to hear something he doesn't want to hear unless it's really necessary. He's always so careful with him, almost tender, a word of support where it's needed, a hand on the shoulder, a look across the room. He takes care of him in thousands of different ways: a friend when he's needed, a warrior where there's a fight to be won.

But every time he speaks, he sucks the breath out of us, because his words are always so accurate, because he just knows exactly how Dean is feeling, why he's acting that way, where all the anger, fear and guilt come from. He always knows how to reach him.

So yeah, people who don't watch closely forget that this angel gave up on everything he believed was true the moment he put a hand on Dean in Hell. Forget how Cas literally built his body and soul from scratch, how he looked into every corner of Dean's mind, how he knows every thoughts, every dream, every secret, how he literally touched all the trauma, the regret and the love hidden behind the surface.

And then Cas says something like: «Dean feels things more acutely than any other human I've ever known», and «I'm not exactly a role model»/«That's NOT true», and «You're THE MOST selfless, loving, caring human being I'll ever know», like it's nothing, like it's obvious, and you just know. How Cas really gets Dean, really sees him, understands him intimately. Ten thousand times better than anyone else has ever done.

His devotion is absolute, his love isn't something suddenly born, isn't just a spark or mere fascination.

His love is as deep as Dean's soul is. It's divine, it's eternal, it's unbreakable. And man, did people try to break it.

Neither of them could exist without this kind of love. This love is what has driven them and the story for all these years, it's craved into their existence, it's part of the world.

Even more, it's the only thing that's real in this world. The only thing Chuck couldn't control.

It's inevitable, just something that is, and nothing could ever change that. Not Death, not God, not the Empty, not the horrible ending they got.

Explanation 1 of 2 in my mind as to why Castiel wasn’t in that hallucinatory nightmare punchline of a 15 year long hate crime finale

Bonus:

Don’t mind me, just thinking about last season’s finale when Jack told Cas “I know you’re here because you love me, and I want to love you back. It’s just I can’t.”

And Cas responded by saying “You can’t yet.”

Cas died never having once heard that he was loved, and yet that didn’t stop him from always giving it fully. The angel with too much heart, as one of his angel brothers called him. How was it that Ben Edlund put it? “There’s a crack in Cas, the crack through which amazing things come.”

Of all those amazing things, it turns out in the end it all came down to love. Everything Cas did, he did for love. Love for humanity, for his friend Sam, for his son Jack and ultimately the all consuming love he felt for Dean. 

Which makes it that much more heartbreaking that he never got to hear someone express their love back to him. That being said, I’m sure he knew Jack loved him - it’s part of the reason being there for Jack helped him feel less adrift in the world, and gave him a purpose. It gave him a role in their family and made him feel like he belonged. Jack and Cas have seen each other as father and son from before Jack was even born, and apart from that short period of time when Jack lost himself, there’s always been unconditional love on both sides there.

That brings us back to Dean. I think Cas knew that Dean loved him, I mean after everything they’d been through, how could he not? Remember the whole mixtape incident when Dean got mad because “he came into my room and he played me?” That could have only worked if Cas knew there was a certain level of love and trust between them. The whole mixtape exchange was about as honest as they could be with each other in that moment, which made it equal parts cathartic and frustrating. 

The thing is, Cas felt a different kind of love for Dean. The kind of love he didn’t think he was allowed to feel - angels aren’t supposed to love humans that way, remember? Even if he ignored that, he wasn’t exactly an ordinary angel anyway, it’s not like Dean would ever feel the same way. It’s not like he felt that kind of love for Cas, right?

(Cas hasn’t been privy to Dean’s perspective for the past 12 years like we have. He hasn’t seen the things we’ve seen.)

And yet despite all that, in his final act, Cas decided that it didn’t matter. His fears about his love not being reciprocated, that the Empty taunted him with, shame, rejection, none of it mattered. Cas could love enough for the both of them - Dean taught him how. 

Cas’ run on the show may have ended like it started, saving Dean Winchester, but Cas most certainly did not end up the same being that he was when he started. You see all those years ago he saved Dean for duty. This time he did it for and with love. 

Lucifer: *uses Jess to get Sam to let him in*

Lucifer: *uses Cas to get Dean to let him in*