#empty earth

The caped stranger ran through the dark tunnel much too fast for them to keep up. It was only thanks to Jack's angelic senses that he saw the man come to a stop somewhere ahead. He managed to prevent Mary from crashing into the wall with a warning hand against her shoulder. A quiet curse near them meant John hadn't been spared from that fate.

A light appeared, and Jack saw that the stranger held a small flashlight between his teeth while drawing another one of those chalk sigils. The outline of a door appeared in the wall of the tunnel, and a short press of the man's hand sufficed for it to open outwards.

One after the other, they stumbled out into the blinding brightness of someone's heaven on a sunny beach. The ocean was impressive and slightly intimidating with its size and the crashing waves. Jack had only ever seen such a large body of water in the split second it had taken him to fly across it in his frenzied escape from his own guilt. Standing right in front of these massive plains of blue reaching all the way to the horizon was on a different level entirely.

"Close the damned door if you got any sense!" the stranger called out to them and Jack turned hastily to press the door closed behind John, watching it merge seamlessly into a changing cubicle.

The man didn't wait to see if they complied, already running further ahead through rows of white sun chairs and colorful parasols.

"Doctor Badass, wait!" Jack yelled, attracting the attention of a woman who must have been the owner of this heaven.

"Who the fuck are you people?" she asked them, sitting up on her sun chair. "You're ruining my vibe here."

Jack noticed only then how much they stood out on this beach, fully dressed among people in swimwear, running when everyone else was just lounging and relaxing.

"I'm sorry. We'll stop ruining… your vibe. We were just leaving," he hurried to explain, throwing a look at Mary and John behind him. Mary seemed confused, John annoyed, but the caped stranger didn't slow down, so Jack had no choice but continue their frenzied run.

They caught up with him in front of a wooden booth selling ice cream, where the man was creating another one of his strange chalk doors on the side wall. He waved them inside and they were once more surrounded by darkness.

"All right, enough of this nonsense! Who or what are we running from?" John asked, his voice echoing in the silence of the tunnel.

"Jack, you said Dean is hurt? Where is he?" Mary talked over him, and the worry in her voice was audible.

Jack never had a chance to reply to either of these questions, though, because Doctor Badass cut him off.

"Listen, there's a time for answers, but this ain't it. Gotta shake off the God Squad before they can track us to Homebase."

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The knowledge that she didn't even have her magic to fall back on if something went awry this time was a grasp of coldness in her neck. These corridors matched the ones from her memory far too closely for comfort, whispering of how helpless she'd been during the frenzied run for her life back then. How she was even more helpless now, without her powers. Nobody had made any attempt to disarm her, and she was glad for it, lifting the angel blade a little higher in a semblance of safety.

She sensed a lingering gaze on her and looked up from her morose thoughts to be met with Sam's eyes, softening at whatever he'd seen on her face. It should probably worry her how proficient he'd gotten at reading her—that she'd even allowed anyone close enough to be able to. But when dimples appeared on his cheeks in the shadow of a smile, she couldn't find it in herself to listen to that worry.

This—this thing between them was new territory for her. Loath as she was to admit ignorance, she didn't have the slightest idea how to handle it. After the centuries she'd lived, there weren't all that many things left that still had the ability to throw her for a loop like this.

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He lost his shoe - she lost hers, too.

===

Jack + Crowley:

He lost his family - he found a demon. He lost everything - he found a nephilim.

===

Castiel + HunterCorp Dean:

He lost his body - He lost his world. He found a new one.

===

HunterCorp Sam and Dean:

He didn't lost the man bun - his hair is sacred. He lost his soul - what the heck!

===

Michael + Adam:

He lost his purpose - he found his guide. He lost his body - he found his soul. ===

He lost his sword - he found this guy. He lost nine years - he found this fry. ===

Meg + Balthazar:

She lost her name - she found an angel. He lost his way - he found an army.

===

Mick + Ketch:

He lost his life - he lost his job. He found his courage - he found himself.

===

Gabriel + Ash:

He lost his grace - he found a void. He lost his life - he's cool with it.

===

Kevin + Naomi:

He lost his mind - he found a ghost. She lost the host - she found a mind.

===

Mary + John:

She lost her past - she found the future. He lost his wife - he found his doom.

===

Chuck + Amara:

He lost control - he found enemies. She lost herself - she found a prison.

===

Note: Several of these combinations are not meant as romantic pairings. They just ended up in the same place at the same time in my story. Or they don't even interact, but their character arcs either have something in common or are polar opposites. You know.

(In other words, I just threw characters together into one pic on a whim because It Seemed Like A Good Idea At The Time.)

I know, I know, I'm crazy for making so many of these, lol. But I injured my leg and can't walk right now, so I needed the distraction.

And I kept thinking "But what about these characters? Don't they deserve a poster, too?"

Castiel POV During their escape from the Empty, communication with Dean had felt so easy, so natural. It had almost managed to make him forget about his deep-seated worry over a future where his feelings had been lain out in the open for Dean to see. For him to know the secret that Castiel had kept so closely guarded for years.

Over time, keeping that part of himself restrained had become second nature to him. It had been an immense relief to finally drop all caution. To put into words the truth that had been weighing him down for so long but that also filled him with purpose like nothing else in his existence had ever managed to do.

In that moment, saying it out loud had been incredibly freeing—if only because he'd died knowing that which he'd always taken for a dark, shameful secret to be hidden away would be able to save Dean's life in the end. He was aware what a double-edged sword the truth was, but at the time it hadn't mattered.

He'd taken that risk in the certainty that he'd never have to face the consequences. That he'd never have to see the rejection in Dean's eyes, because he knew fully well that sight would have the capacity to ruin him. All of that stopped mattering, though, the moment Dean was thrown into deadly peril yet another time. In the face of Chuck's wrath, Castiel hadn't dared to hope he'd find Dean alive.

Well, perhaps 'alive' wasn't an accurate reflection of their current reality either. But at the very least, Dean was in a state that was within Castiel's power to fix.

He placed one hand against Dean's cheek, the other over his shoulder. His own relief was too overwhelming to remember his temperance. Nothing mattered other than to mend, to fix, to heal. To restore the person who had taught him what it meant to care.

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Excerpt from Chapter 7 Dean POV Dean turned around, his hand on the hilt of his own useless angel blade in his jacket, but he couldn't see the rift between realms anymore that had brought him here. Nothing but blackness. He clenched his jaw, had to trust that Sam would find a way out of that situation, that he and Jack were alive and safe. They had to be. Sam was the best damn hunter he knew, so if anyone could manage, it was him.

Cas. The thought electrified his body, sufficed to set it into motion on its own. He ran over a floor so smooth under his soles that it reminded him of marble. Keeping his balance at this speed without seeing anything took some getting used to, but the sheer energy pulsing through him kept him from stumbling.

"Cas!" he yelled, but found that he couldn't hear a single sound in the Empty. His throat formed the shape of the name again, with the same result. Screw it. They didn't need words, never had. Cas! A prayer. A summoning.

The deepest, darkest basin of his mind had kept Cas' last words to him out of reach, but now it all came back to him, dragged to the surface forcefully. It was a gasping, thrashing thing that had been close to suffocating. Never before had hope burned like acid in his lungs.

He couldn't breathe, had to fight off a ripple of panic at the thought that there wasn't enough air in this place. Dark, everything was so fucking dark. He should have been lost, but something drenched him in an impossible certainty about where to go, carried him forward like an invisible compass.

CASTIEL! his mind cried out with everything he had. The wordless answering call ran through him like an earthquake, rocking him from inside in a familiar sensation that burned strongest in his left shoulder.

There had never been any doubt about the way, but what had been a mere sense of direction now changed into his gravity in this unplace. He couldn't have resisted the pull even if he had wanted to. The muscles in his legs strained in what felt like the fastest he had ever run. He stopped abruptly when he sensed rather than saw a shift in front of him in a realm that had no use for human eyes.

Excerpt from Chapter 13 Sam POV The clattering of a skull rolling over the wet stone tore Sam out of his haze. He'd accidentally kicked it with the tip of his boot, tripping in his exhaustion. He stopped, lifting his head up into the drizzle of rain from a non-sky in perpetual darkness. His lips parted, letting the raindrops run down over them, but it did nothing against the parched feeling in his throat. A hand touched his left shoulder, the uninjured one.

"Sam, you have to take a break. Even I am starting to feel this in my bones, and I'm dead."

Trying to catch his breath, he used the illumination from one of Limbo's constant lightning flashes to look back the way they had come from. The palace was nothing but a barely recognizable shadow somewhere at the horizon, across a vast plain of uneven rock. Sam nodded and let himself be dragged to the side. They hadn't quite reached the cliffs yet, but outcrops had begun to line their path.

He pressed a hand to his forehead in a sudden dizziness. Rowena's grip on his arm tightened, steadying him as she led him into the opening to a shallow cave. He stumbled over to the far wall. As soon as he reached it, his knees just gave in and he sank down, leaning his back against the rock and closing his eyes.

"Sam?" she asked, her voice soft again in that way that was so unlike her. It sounded smaller than the person she was.

"I'm...," he said, then stopped when he realized what a miserable croaking sound had just escaped his mouth instead of an actual word. He cleared his throat before trying again. "I'm fine." He opened his eyes to give her a look that he hoped was reassuring, though it probably ended up as more of a grimace.

The sparse light from the exit behind her outlined her form as she stood there in the middle of the cave, balancing on shoes that were barely functional without their heels, her clothing and hair clinging to her in wet disarray.

"Liar," she said and the hint of a smile flitted over a face darkened by bruises and smeared mascara.

"Takes one to know one," he shot back, the corners of his mouth twitching weakly.

"I won't deny I am a woman of certain talents, and persuasion happens to be one of them."

Sam snorted softly at that and leaned his head back against the wall. They spent a moment in silence and his eyes shut again on their own accord. "I just... just need a minute," he murmured, each word a sting in his sore throat. Read Empty Earth on AO3

2. Destiel only:

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A Word in the Mists

Words: 23,968 (finished) Rating: Mature Relationships: Dean/Castiel, Dean&Jo Bang/Fest: DeanCas HorrorFest (2024)

Tags: Canon-Adjacent AU, Ship at Sea Setting, Case Fic, Monster Hunt, Pre-Relationship, Mystery, Suspense, Isolated from the Outside World, Apocalypse, Angst, Sarcasm, Fear of Drowning, Castiel and Dean Save Each Other Point-of-View Characters: Dean Summary: Mist as far as the eye can see. A gloomy ocean that seems to swallow up the sunlight like broken dreams. An old, rusty ship that creaks with every inch of movement. And a crew that could compete in an award for grumpiest people alive.

Dean really hates pretty much everything about this case, and would love nothing more than to call it quits and turn this ship around... if there wasn't the little issue of the disappearance of thousands of people across ten different ships on the open sea.

Saving lives is what he does. But he has to question if he isn't doing more harm than good when the disappearances begin on his own ship—and he still hasn't even figured out what kind of monster they're dealing with.

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Indeana Jones and the Tear of Pele

Words: 32,679 (finished) Rating: Explicit Relationships: Dean/Castiel Bang/Fest: Dean/Cas Reverse Bang (2024)

Tags: Canon Universe, Post-Season-11, Beach Vacation, Adventure, Hawaiian Mythology, Humor, Angst with Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Magic, Mystery, Fallen Angel Castiel, Castiel's True Form, Mutual Pining, Idiots in Love, Dean in Denial, Dean Makes Up Ridiculous Excuses for Touch, Castiel and Dean Save Each Other Point-of-View Characters: Dean, Castiel Summary: What starts as a relaxing beach vacation in Hawai’i turns into a journey of self-discovery for Castiel and Dean.

To save the world from the Darkness, they both faced what they thought to be their imminent demise and came out the other side very much still alive. So now they have to ponder the really big questions, such as what a bucket list is, what place in the world a fallen angel has, and how Indiana Jones ever managed to keep that hat on his head.

The island seems to have a way of making the barrier of touch crumble to dust until they're sliding toward the edge of something new and fragile between them that neither of them dares to put a name to, lest it might disappear.

When what really disappears is Castiel, there's very little Dean wouldn't do to get the angel back.

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Forest Fever

Words: 8,586 (finished) Rating: Explicit Relationships: Dean/Castiel, Dean & Castiel, Sam & Castiel Bang/Fest: Dean/Cas Stab Fest (2022) Tags: Canon Universe, Post-Ep 12x10, Monster of the Week, Case Fic - Lite, Hunting, Forests, Mystery (a little), Hallucinations, Angst with Happy Ending, Romance, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, Castiel/Dean First Kiss, Castiel/Dean First Time Having Sex, Angel Grace, Team Free Will Point-of-View Characters: Dean, Sam Summary: After the crushing events of episode 12x10 "Lily Sunder Has Some Regrets", Castiel is low on grace and morale. In an attempt to restore at least one of these two, Sam and Dean take him on a hunt. Things start going wrong when Sam gets injured and Cas seemingly disappears. They get worse when Dean turns from hunter to prey for something feeling far more at home in this dark, rainy forest than he does. Read on AO3 ✧ Excerpt ✧ Text Trailer ✧ Art ✧ Making-Of

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The Little Issue with the Mission to Perdition

Words: 16,460 (finished) Rating: Teen Relationships: Dean/Castiel, Jack & Amara, Background Sam/Eileen Bang/Fest: Dean/Cas Reverse Bang (2023) Tags: Canon Universe, Post-Ep 15x19, Jack and Amara Try Fixing Things Together but Make Everything Worse, Jack and Amara Family Bonding, Empty Rescue, Angst with Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Castiel/Dean First Kiss, Team Free Will 3.0 Point-of-View Characters: Jack, Amara, Dean, Sam, Castiel Summary: Chuck is defeated and his power now belongs to Jack and Amara. They struggle with adjusting to their newly-shared existence, and with big questions such as, how can (almost) all-powerful beings avoid becoming what Chuck was?

What even is all that power good for when it doesn't allow Jack to save someone from the Empty who absolutely deserves being saved?

Who thought it was a good idea to hand all that power to two beings who, together, have spent less years on Earth than the average human child?

...And why is there suddenly black goo everywhere? Read on AO3 ✧ Excerpt ✧ Text Trailer ✧ Art

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Empty and (Un-)Out

Words: 2,666 (finished) Rating: Teen Relationships: Dean/Castiel Bang/Fest: none Tags: Canon Universe, Episode 15x18, Humor, Crack Treated Seriously, Misha's Un-Coming Out, Bishagate, The New York Post Article that Claimed Castiel Confessed to Sam, Castiel's Confession Scene, Castiel/Dean First Kiss Point-of-View Characters: Dean Summary: My (probably insane) way of dealing with Misha's un-coming out. Read on AO3 ✧ Excerpt ✧ Text Trailer ✧ Art

3. Samwena only:

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A Metal Pursued by the Witless

Words: 46,556 (finished) Rating: Explicit Relationships: Sam/Rowena, Sam & Rowena Bang/Fest: SPN RarePairTober (2022) (Prompt: "Fool's Gold") Tags: Canon Universe, Post-Ep 13x19, Magic, Witchcraft, Curses, Adventure, Action, Romance, Humor, Angst with Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Mutual Pining, Travel to Exotic Location Point-of-View Characters: Sam, Rowena, Dean Summary: Rowena shows up at the bunker after she has been targeted by a lethal curse with the sole goal of destroying her. Under the shadow of this ticking timer of doom, she and Sam are left with a handful of days to prevent a slow, painful death. The search for a cure sees them on a last-minute flight to Central America. (Or my attempt to escape the cold and gray of real-life winter by traveling to faraway places in my mind.) Read on AO3 ✧ Excerpt ✧ Text Trailer ✧ Art1 ✧ Art2

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Regarding Sam

Words: 7,292 (finished) Rating: Teen Relationships: Sam/Rowena, Rowena & Amnesiac Dean Bang/Fest: Sam Winchester Rare Ships Week (2023) (Day 6: Missing Scene / Episode Tag)

Tags: Canon Universe, Episode 12x11, Missing Scenes, Angst with Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Life-or-Death Stakes, Magic, Witches, Rowena Realizes She Cares, Pre-Relationship, Sam Being a Prisoner, Amnesiac Dean Being Chaotic, Humor

Point-of-View Characters: Rowena

Summary: When they hear Sam's blood-curdling scream over the phone, Rowena is far more affected than she thought possible. She has to make up her mind whether or not to turn her back on the Winchesters in their dire need—and how far exactly she'll go to save them. (Or my version of what happened in episode 12x11 between Sam's scream and the moment we see Dean wake up in the Impala, plus two additional new scenes at other blank spaces where the episode faded to black. And all of that from Rowena's point of view!) Read on AO3 ✧ Excerpt ✧ Text Trailer ✧ Art

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Dibs on Samuel

Words: 2,194 (finished) Rating: Teen Relationships: Sam/Rowena Bang/Fest: SPN Royalty of Hell Weekend (2023) (Day 2: Queen of Hell) Tags: Canon Universe, Episode 15x08, Rowena/Sam First Kiss, Angst with Happy Ending, Angst and Romance, Hurt/Comfort, Ruler of Hell Rowena, Sam Using Magic Point-of-View Characters: Sam Summary: Now that the fact had sunken in that Rowena wasn't gone forever, that she was only a spell away, he couldn't let it go. He had to return to Hell. Read on AO3 ✧ Excerpt ✧ Text Trailer ✧ Art