Destiel One-shots

Pain

*Feels Warning* *Spoiler Alert For Season 12 finale*

Dean Winchester thought he knew what it was to feel pain.

He had watched as his father, his friends, his whole family, die before him.

He had watched as his little brother, his whole world, had died. He had held Sam in his arms, and physically watched the light leave his eyes.

Dean Winchester had died himself. Hundreds of times. He'd been shot, stabbed, hit by a car, clawed to death by hellhounds, and been brusied and tortured in thousands of different ways.

He'd been to hell- the one place you were guaranteed to learn true pain.

But nothing- NOTHING could have prepared Dean for what he felt that day.

The day his whole world came crashing down.

The day Cas died.

Cas died, and all Dean did was watch in utter horror as Lucifer stabbed his own brother in the back. Scream the word No at the top of his lungs because that's all he could possibly do.

Cas hadn't been the only casualty that day, but he was the one that hurt the most.

His death is the one that broke Dean Winchester.

He'd felt broken before, but this was something different. As Cas's body lay on the ground before him, wings spread out in the dirt, Dean felt his heart snap and shatter into too many pieces to pick up.

Sam didn't want to burn the body, just in case they could bring him back. But Dean wouldn't do that. Cas was gone. GONE.

Gone, just like Charlie. And Bobby, and Ellen, and Jo, and Kevin, and Crowley, and Kelly, and Gabriel, and every other damn person Dean had ever tried to protect in his entire life.

Just.....

Gone.

Sammy used Jack as a distraction from his grief. He stayed positive through it. But Dean couldn't. He couldn't do it.

Because every time he looked at Jack, he saw Cas die. He saw Cas die for a hopeless cause.

Dean couldn't take it anymore. Castiel's death was not one he could just bottle away deep down. Not like the others.

Cas had been there. Cas had ALWAYS been there, even before he had raised Dean from hell, the hunter knew he was watching.

Dean couldn't bring himself to drink. Or even to be angry. He was just... lost. Lost and done.

Done with losing everyone he held fear. Done with all the pain of his life. Done with the suffering.

Maybe that's what he and Cas became.

Done and Gone.

But Dean knew. He knew as he stood before the mirror, the knife in his hand, that he couldn't die. Billie had said it before.

He wasn't allowed to die yet. Not like this.

And the fact that Dean didn't even have control over his own end broke him even more.

He snapped, smashing the mirror. He screamed, grabbing an iron sword from his wall of weapons. And he grieved, smashing his room to bits. One swing for everyone he'd lost. Every time he'd suffered.

One time for everyone who had suffered BECAUSE of him.

For Bobby, he told himself as he slammed the sword into the side of his desk.

For Ellen.

For Jo.

For Kevin.

For Charlie.

For Crowley.

For Rowena.

For Missouri.

For Pamela.

For Kelly.

For Gabriel.

For Crowley.

For Anna.

Even for the people who weren't dead. The people that had this life forced upon them, and would be in pain for it.

For Jodi.

For Claire.

For Alex.

For Garth.

For Patience.

For Donna.

The desk snapped in two, and Dean turned his rage toward the dresser, letting out a cry filled with rage and fried and fury and an unimaginable amount of pain and loss.

For DAD.

FOR MOM.

FOR SAM.

Dean froze, his breath coming in pained gasps.

FOR CAS.

He swung, and the sword cracked in two under the dresser, and Dean yelled out, tears streaming down his face. He punched at the dresser, punched at it, not even carrying how much his knuckles were bleeding- not carrying how bad his fingers hurt because the pain in his broken heart was so, SO much worse.

Dean slammed his fists at the dresser, screaming in agony. He dropped to his knees, gasping and sobbing, his fists clutching his head as he cried.

He cried, letting out all the grief that had been bottled up inside him. All the emotion and pain he had hidden away over the years.

The door to his room burst open, but Dean barely noticed his brother entering the room.

Sam stared at the sight, overwhelmed, and part of him wanted to drop and sob too.

He rushed over, sinking to the floor and holding onto his brother, an anchor that Dean desperately needed.

They didn't say anything. There was nothing to say.

Dean just sobbed his heart out, his pain, his loss, it was too much to bear.

He'd been hanging over a cliff, holding onto a branch to keep him from falling. Cas was his branch, and it had snapped. Cas had died, and Dean had fallen off the cliff, fallen into an ocean of grief.

Sam didn't tell him that it was going to be okay. He knew better. They had stopped saying those words years ago, because nothing was ever okay for them. No matter how many times they saved the world, the pain in their souls was always with them and it never got easier. Never.

Cas, Dean called out in his head. CAS, he prayed, although he knew no one was listening.

CAS PLEASE. I NEED YOU.

He sobbed harder, and Sam tightened his hold around his brother.

No, Dean corrected himself. Cas, please. He begged. I love you.

At that moment, something changed in the universe. And in the darkness of the empty, Castiel awoke.