DVD Meme Part 1 + Pimpage!
Aug. 11th, 2012 08:04 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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***
And now, the DVD MEME!
For
robynize!
From Forks In The Road:
OH YAY! I wrote this for
electricskeptic for the D/C Christmas exchange, which was incredibly nerve wracking because she's one of my very favorite writers. "Hell or High Water" is hands down one of my top 5 stories ever.
I actually wrote the bones of his story months before in a never-completed
fandom_stocking fill where Cas would have been caught in a snare that fed on fear and to pull him out Dean would have to ~realize his love~ because my soul is actually made of cotton candy. I eventually realized the story wasn't working and put it aside but I still liked that core idea, and when
electricskeptic's prompt asked for Dean and Cas having to work together to escape from somewhere I first decided, "Okay, creepy forest" and then thought this could be the chance to use the "place that shows you your fears" idea.
And yes, I lifted Nexus from Star Trek.:)
I know the path I've chosen. I don't expect any ending other than destruction."
"Bullshit. That's giving up."
"It's reality." He stared off into the mist. "I've done so many things you're not aware of yet. I know the price I'll pay."
"All the more reason to knock it off now, Cas. Before you hit that point of no return."
Castiel actually laughed, a bitter, hopeless sound. "I passed that point so long ago I'll never find it again."
Cas is deep in Bad Decision Land by now. He's in deep with Crowley, the Purgatory plan in place and Cas knows that even if everything goes off without a hitch things he's spent the past year + lying to everyone.
Dean didn't know why, but the past year had come to a sudden, desperate head. "Find a different way. God knows there's no shortage here."
"There is no other. Not for me. This is the path I'm on, Dean."
There's always a way for Dean. Every time someone tells him "This is the only way" to do anything, even as early as John ordering Dean to shoot him with the Colt when Azazel possessed him, Dean refuses to buy it. Which is part of why Cas dragged him into this in the first place.
Dean grabbed Castiel by his coat and dragged him backward off the path and into the dense underbrush; Cas cried out when they crossed that threshold and Dean also felt a quick surge of pain, like a hard punch to the chest. "There. Now it's not." Dean was done with walking. He was done with destiny, with prophecy, with the no-win situation that had been the thirty odd years of his life so far. He was done with denying what it meant when he saw time after time that an angel's worst nightmares all centered around Dean Winchester.
I often write Dean as a very concrete thinker in a crisis: we're on this path and that's a problem? Fine, now we're not. He has no patience for dithering around about potential consequences and he's perfectly will to solve a problem with a new problem as long as something gets done. For someone who must have heard "Because I said so" from John thousands of times growing up Dean cannot handle it from anyone else.
You really don't know? echoed through his mind again. He wrapped one arm around Castiel's waist to hold him up. "You should've let Raphael burn me back there," Dean whispered into his ear. "Would've prevented everything. Saved yourself a lot of trouble."
Castiel shook his head. "I couldn't."
It shook Dean up that Cas would have traded the war for him. His self-esteem is low enough that we know he has a hard time wrapping his mind around anyone dying for him, we see that in canon over and over. He's been making a point of not looking too hard at this since Cas told him, distracting himself by keeping Cas upright.
Dean remembered the mocking, desperate eyes of that other Cas, the one he'd let slowly break and drown until there was only the shell left. He was done with that, too.
Dean has a horror of failing people. We see it over and over on the show, all the way back when he was a kid, and then there's 2014!Cas as a walking, drugged out indictment of how he's screwed up. Now here he is, having dodged that bullet, but Castiel's still falling apart just in almost the opposite way unlike then he can do something.
Castiel had claimed Dean was good at defying expectations but when Dean kissed him under those ghostly trees he felt like the only surprising thing about it was that it had taken so long to happen. Dean felt a tight weight slip from him, almost like how he'd always imagined it felt for a shifter to slip its skin. He wondered if that was all those possible worlds where he'd never had the guts to do this falling away. All he could muster for those other Deans was pity. "I'm not gonna let you burn either, Cas." He trailed the pad of his thumb along Cas' jawline
I use this ALL THE TIME, the thumb along the jaw line. If you ever get a fic in a blind exchange and happens, especially in a h/c or reassuring scene, you probably wouldn't lose money by betting the fic is mine.:)
before kissing him again and this time Castiel returned the kiss, a hard, breathless, desperate kiss as if all Castiel wanted to do was crawl inside Dean. Dean didn't know what the hell had been wrong with them all this time.
I love first kisses. And I like this mental image of the two of them under misty trees, Cas barely on his feet but kissing Dean back with everything he has.
And of course this Dean would include canon!Dean with the pity. The big dummy.:)
***
For
rinnus!
Harsh Words:
One of my very first SPN fics! Although considering argument + near death experience = ALL THE GUILT, is one of my favorite tropes, not that surprising.:)
"Dumb son of a bitch," he whispered, the empty coat a heavy weight on his arm.
Observe Dean and his super healthy grieving process!:)
From the corner of the room came a very, very faint sound. "...Dean?"
Dean jumped up from the floor like a shot. He crossed the room and felt his legs almost give out when he found Castiel huddled and shivering in the corner, his suit soaked through with blood.
He looked up at Dean, somehow mustering the energy to look reproachful. "You...you were gone a very long time."
Poor Cas.:) And of course he can't find Dean, he just knew where he was staying, so he had to stay there and just hope he came back.
"Holy shit." He dropped to his knees, taking off his flannel overshirt and pressing it against the stab wound . "Holy shit, Cas, I thought you were dead."
"I lost my phone," he said as Dean helped him sit against the wall, as if that was vitally important information Dean needed to know. His skin was pale and clammy and his eyes huge, staring at Dean with a vaguely dazed expression. "I can't find it."
"Shh, shh," Dean said. "Don't worry about that. I'll get you a better one." He kept his voice very calm; if a lifetime of hunting was good for anything, it was learning how to talk someone through shock. "Just relax."
I've written 20,000 variations of this scene over the past few years. Dean patching up a wounded Castiel is one of my favorite things, both to write and to read.
BTW, if anyone ever doubts the power of a good beta, if only you could read this whole sections before
thinlizzy2 got a hold of it and did a lot of, "Oh honey, no." My betas have all been awesome and done so much to keep me from embarrassing myself in public.
Cas nodded. "He stole my coat," he said in a very small voice, as if he still couldn't believe that had happened.
Before I sketched out the rest of the fic I knew Ambriel would take Cas' phone and his coat because that's just an extra kick in the teeth. It's one thing to have your brother ambush you and do his very best to murder you, it's another entirely for him to then rifle through your pockets and start wearing your coat while you're lying there bleeding.
"Yeah, I know, but I got it back for you," Dean said, showing him the trenchcoat still draped over his arm. "See? Safe and sound."
He reached out to touch the fabric, his hand shaking. "Oh. Thank you." His brow furrowed as he tried to piece together information.
Dean/Cas/Trenchcoat OT3.:) (Look, I didn't promise highbrow commentary.)
"You...met Ambriel," he worked out slowly.
"That his name? Yeah, we met him, the smirking son of a bitch."
"Did you...." He shuddered, one arm cradling against his chest as the other fumbled for Dean's shoulder.
I got the name Ambriel from this site, one of a couple I trawl for angel names. I'd wanted an A name that ended with the -el suffix, and it amused me to have the Angel of Communications trolling Dean with Cas' phone.
"Steady, steady, Cas, stay with me here." Dean pressed his hand against the side of his neck, stroked his thumb along his jaw. "Relax, you gotta relax. I know it hurts. And yeah, we took care of him. He's not going to come after you again, promise." Dean remembered blood dripping from the tip of Ambriel's sword. "God, Cas," he whispered. "He said he'd put that sword through your heart. He said you were dead."
He shook his head. "Only wounded me. Didn't...stay to be sure." His lips twitched up. "Ambriel was...was always careless."
I needed Cas to actually have been stabbed and for Ambiel to have really thought he was dead – overwhelming overconfidence seemed like the best explanation and humility isn't really an angelic trademark on SPN. And of course it means Ambriel knew Cas was still breathing when he mugged him (no black wings yet) and just didn't care. Hell of a family Cas has.:)
"Yeah, lucky for us."
"Happened...so fast. Forgot he was fast." Dean felt him draw in a pained, shaking breath. "Re...regretted our quarrel. I spoke rashly. I....Dean...."
My pattern tends to be beating on Cas physically while beating on Dean mentally (with some exceptions, Who If I Cried Out being the obvious one) and this is just a very low key example of that, Cas apologizing first after almost dying.:) But it also shows that argument was part of what made him drag himself to Dean's room.
There's a third one I should be posting tonight (for Torn!). If anyone else wants DVD commentary, just ask here or at the original post, either's good!

Come and join
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FAQ/Rules/Schedule
Sign Ups: Author | Artist
What are you waiting for? Go, sign up! *shoos*
***
And now, the DVD MEME!
For
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
From Forks In The Road:
OH YAY! I wrote this for
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
I actually wrote the bones of his story months before in a never-completed
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
And yes, I lifted Nexus from Star Trek.:)
I know the path I've chosen. I don't expect any ending other than destruction."
"Bullshit. That's giving up."
"It's reality." He stared off into the mist. "I've done so many things you're not aware of yet. I know the price I'll pay."
"All the more reason to knock it off now, Cas. Before you hit that point of no return."
Castiel actually laughed, a bitter, hopeless sound. "I passed that point so long ago I'll never find it again."
Cas is deep in Bad Decision Land by now. He's in deep with Crowley, the Purgatory plan in place and Cas knows that even if everything goes off without a hitch things he's spent the past year + lying to everyone.
Dean didn't know why, but the past year had come to a sudden, desperate head. "Find a different way. God knows there's no shortage here."
"There is no other. Not for me. This is the path I'm on, Dean."
There's always a way for Dean. Every time someone tells him "This is the only way" to do anything, even as early as John ordering Dean to shoot him with the Colt when Azazel possessed him, Dean refuses to buy it. Which is part of why Cas dragged him into this in the first place.
Dean grabbed Castiel by his coat and dragged him backward off the path and into the dense underbrush; Cas cried out when they crossed that threshold and Dean also felt a quick surge of pain, like a hard punch to the chest. "There. Now it's not." Dean was done with walking. He was done with destiny, with prophecy, with the no-win situation that had been the thirty odd years of his life so far. He was done with denying what it meant when he saw time after time that an angel's worst nightmares all centered around Dean Winchester.
I often write Dean as a very concrete thinker in a crisis: we're on this path and that's a problem? Fine, now we're not. He has no patience for dithering around about potential consequences and he's perfectly will to solve a problem with a new problem as long as something gets done. For someone who must have heard "Because I said so" from John thousands of times growing up Dean cannot handle it from anyone else.
You really don't know? echoed through his mind again. He wrapped one arm around Castiel's waist to hold him up. "You should've let Raphael burn me back there," Dean whispered into his ear. "Would've prevented everything. Saved yourself a lot of trouble."
Castiel shook his head. "I couldn't."
It shook Dean up that Cas would have traded the war for him. His self-esteem is low enough that we know he has a hard time wrapping his mind around anyone dying for him, we see that in canon over and over. He's been making a point of not looking too hard at this since Cas told him, distracting himself by keeping Cas upright.
Dean remembered the mocking, desperate eyes of that other Cas, the one he'd let slowly break and drown until there was only the shell left. He was done with that, too.
Dean has a horror of failing people. We see it over and over on the show, all the way back when he was a kid, and then there's 2014!Cas as a walking, drugged out indictment of how he's screwed up. Now here he is, having dodged that bullet, but Castiel's still falling apart just in almost the opposite way unlike then he can do something.
Castiel had claimed Dean was good at defying expectations but when Dean kissed him under those ghostly trees he felt like the only surprising thing about it was that it had taken so long to happen. Dean felt a tight weight slip from him, almost like how he'd always imagined it felt for a shifter to slip its skin. He wondered if that was all those possible worlds where he'd never had the guts to do this falling away. All he could muster for those other Deans was pity. "I'm not gonna let you burn either, Cas." He trailed the pad of his thumb along Cas' jawline
I use this ALL THE TIME, the thumb along the jaw line. If you ever get a fic in a blind exchange and happens, especially in a h/c or reassuring scene, you probably wouldn't lose money by betting the fic is mine.:)
before kissing him again and this time Castiel returned the kiss, a hard, breathless, desperate kiss as if all Castiel wanted to do was crawl inside Dean. Dean didn't know what the hell had been wrong with them all this time.
I love first kisses. And I like this mental image of the two of them under misty trees, Cas barely on his feet but kissing Dean back with everything he has.
And of course this Dean would include canon!Dean with the pity. The big dummy.:)
***
For
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
Harsh Words:
One of my very first SPN fics! Although considering argument + near death experience = ALL THE GUILT, is one of my favorite tropes, not that surprising.:)
"Dumb son of a bitch," he whispered, the empty coat a heavy weight on his arm.
Observe Dean and his super healthy grieving process!:)
From the corner of the room came a very, very faint sound. "...Dean?"
Dean jumped up from the floor like a shot. He crossed the room and felt his legs almost give out when he found Castiel huddled and shivering in the corner, his suit soaked through with blood.
He looked up at Dean, somehow mustering the energy to look reproachful. "You...you were gone a very long time."
Poor Cas.:) And of course he can't find Dean, he just knew where he was staying, so he had to stay there and just hope he came back.
"Holy shit." He dropped to his knees, taking off his flannel overshirt and pressing it against the stab wound . "Holy shit, Cas, I thought you were dead."
"I lost my phone," he said as Dean helped him sit against the wall, as if that was vitally important information Dean needed to know. His skin was pale and clammy and his eyes huge, staring at Dean with a vaguely dazed expression. "I can't find it."
"Shh, shh," Dean said. "Don't worry about that. I'll get you a better one." He kept his voice very calm; if a lifetime of hunting was good for anything, it was learning how to talk someone through shock. "Just relax."
I've written 20,000 variations of this scene over the past few years. Dean patching up a wounded Castiel is one of my favorite things, both to write and to read.
BTW, if anyone ever doubts the power of a good beta, if only you could read this whole sections before
![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
Cas nodded. "He stole my coat," he said in a very small voice, as if he still couldn't believe that had happened.
Before I sketched out the rest of the fic I knew Ambriel would take Cas' phone and his coat because that's just an extra kick in the teeth. It's one thing to have your brother ambush you and do his very best to murder you, it's another entirely for him to then rifle through your pockets and start wearing your coat while you're lying there bleeding.
"Yeah, I know, but I got it back for you," Dean said, showing him the trenchcoat still draped over his arm. "See? Safe and sound."
He reached out to touch the fabric, his hand shaking. "Oh. Thank you." His brow furrowed as he tried to piece together information.
Dean/Cas/Trenchcoat OT3.:) (Look, I didn't promise highbrow commentary.)
"You...met Ambriel," he worked out slowly.
"That his name? Yeah, we met him, the smirking son of a bitch."
"Did you...." He shuddered, one arm cradling against his chest as the other fumbled for Dean's shoulder.
I got the name Ambriel from this site, one of a couple I trawl for angel names. I'd wanted an A name that ended with the -el suffix, and it amused me to have the Angel of Communications trolling Dean with Cas' phone.
"Steady, steady, Cas, stay with me here." Dean pressed his hand against the side of his neck, stroked his thumb along his jaw. "Relax, you gotta relax. I know it hurts. And yeah, we took care of him. He's not going to come after you again, promise." Dean remembered blood dripping from the tip of Ambriel's sword. "God, Cas," he whispered. "He said he'd put that sword through your heart. He said you were dead."
He shook his head. "Only wounded me. Didn't...stay to be sure." His lips twitched up. "Ambriel was...was always careless."
I needed Cas to actually have been stabbed and for Ambiel to have really thought he was dead – overwhelming overconfidence seemed like the best explanation and humility isn't really an angelic trademark on SPN. And of course it means Ambriel knew Cas was still breathing when he mugged him (no black wings yet) and just didn't care. Hell of a family Cas has.:)
"Yeah, lucky for us."
"Happened...so fast. Forgot he was fast." Dean felt him draw in a pained, shaking breath. "Re...regretted our quarrel. I spoke rashly. I....Dean...."
My pattern tends to be beating on Cas physically while beating on Dean mentally (with some exceptions, Who If I Cried Out being the obvious one) and this is just a very low key example of that, Cas apologizing first after almost dying.:) But it also shows that argument was part of what made him drag himself to Dean's room.
There's a third one I should be posting tonight (for Torn!). If anyone else wants DVD commentary, just ask here or at the original post, either's good!