ᴛʜᴇ ʀɪɢʜᴛᴇᴏᴜs ᴍᴀɴ ( ᴊᴇɴɴɪғᴇʀ ᴀɴᴋʟᴇs ) (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
righteously) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
entrancelogs2013-12-14 10:35 pm
righteously) wrote in entrancelogs2013-12-14 10:35 pm
Entry tags:
- dangan ronpa: chihiro fujisaki,
- good omens: aziraphale,
- homestuck: john egbert,
- ouat: emma swan,
- ouat: henry mills,
- penumbra: philip,
- supernatural: adam milligan,
- supernatural: castiel,
- supernatural: crowley,
- supernatural: dean winchester,
- supernatural: ellen harvelle,
- supernatural: meg masters,
- teen wolf: allison argent,
- teen wolf: derek hale,
- the caster chronicles: lena duchannes,
- the dark knight rises: john blake,
- warehouse 13: h.g. wells
Happy Holideans Guys
Who: Dean Winchester, Emma Swan & COMPLETELY OPEN
Where: Literally all over Wonderland
When: Dec 15-24
Rating: R for language, violence, adult themes
Summary: When Emma agreed to acompany Dean on his stupid suicide mission of inevitable death and idiocy, neither of them prepared for the mistletoe. Or, you know, the freaking time travel.
The Story:
The Arrival
They ran out of canned food. All of the stockpiled supplies had been growing steadily more scarce, but it’s probably the cans that finally triggered Dean’s decision to push through with the back-up plan brewing in his mind for the last several weeks. There was beef jerky- god damn, they had beef jerky by the friggin’ score, but with so many mouths to feed, it wouldn't last. There were hunters- actual game, what was left of the animals in the forest and the fish in the ocean were being picked off one by one for sustenance in much the same way that the Jabberwock was picking them off for sustenance.
Soon, there would be nothing. Soon, they wouldn't just have to worry about losing those last few precious lives to the roaming beast, but to starvation. Dehydration. Sickness.
Tom’s been stirring up talk about a second trip to the core, but morale is low. It was a stupid plan the first time around, it’s even more stupid with so many fighters taken out of the game. With so many injuries, with so few extra lives to spare and, more importantly, with the Jabberwock more strong than he’s ever been.
In the end, it’s not a difficult decision to make. Not by a long shot. Too many people are gone already, and waiting for more to go is stupid. He’s not going to do it.
Michael’s there, the Archangel, an ever present beacon of power and possibility, and though things are different now than they were back home- hell, different now than they were years ago in Wonderland’s less horrific years, there was always small part of him that protested the very notion of giving in.
That small part’s been ground to dust.
It’s a no-brainer. Dean says yes.
It’s a small piece to a bigger puzzle, a bigger and, admittedly, probably doomed plan. Cas had been able to take the Jabberwock down in the beginning. It had taken effort, a great expenditure of grace, but he'd been able to slay the beast over and over again to grant them a temporary reprieve. After it swallowed the Vorpal Shield, that bastard ground him into dust. Michael is stronger, though- a thousand times stronger, at least he would be in his true vessel. If they could get rid of it for good together, or, Christ, even just put it down temporarily, long enough to give Wonderland a chance to gather it’s strength, it might fix everything.
If it meant burning Dean out of his body, so be it. If it meant risking losing his remaining lives in the process, he was so far beyond the point of caring.
It would have to be done in secret. The fewer people who knew, the fewer people likely to stop him and the fewer to possibly get caught in the crossfire. He kept it to himself, kept it from Jo, from Sam, from Ellen, from anyone and everyone likely to put their fucking fingers in the mix and make things messy. He'd keep it from everyone if it were feasible, but it simply isn’t. He needs someone to take over in the event it doesn’t work, needs somebody to help him get to where he needs to be, and that someone is Emma.
She had tried to argue against it, tried to use logic to point out why it wasn't worth the risk, but it hadn't lasted long. He had trusted her for a reason; she understood what it meant to be a leader, to go forward and take a chance because the payoff would be beyond worth it if you could pull it off. That didn't mean she liked it. Dean was more than a friend and more than someone to take orders from: he was family now, more like family than just about anyone she'd ever known. Orphans were forced to build their own families, and if they were lucky, sometimes they made a friend like Dean who fit the bill completely, someone who could offer understanding and solidarity like no one else, someone else who knew what it felt like to lose and to grow up too fast and to make the best of what you had.
The idea of this going south and losing him, losing their leader, losing one of the best friends she’d ever had made her stomach drop and her chest feel tight. If it worked, it would be damn near a miracle, though she was hesitant to use the word. She never gave her approval, not really, but she let him know that he could trust her. Trust her to help him through it, trust her to pick up the pieces if it failed or if he didn’t make it back. Meanwhile, she’d spend as much time as she could trying to convince him to take another course, trying to figure out alternatives. She knew what taking the risk could earn them, and she wasn’t going to forcibly stop him -- she respected his decision -- but damn if she wasn’t going to try to get him to change his mind in the eleventh hour.
In the end, they go anyway. Gearing up is a grim affair, done in the silence and secrecy of Dean’s private quarters, tucked away in the back of the refuge. It’s the middle of the night, the civilians and refugees are sleeping. The resistance patrols are circling the small perimeter of the sanctuary they’ve carved out of sweat and blood. They slip through the cracks, through the woods, through the rubble and the dying gardens without a word or a sound. Even footsteps in the grass seem muted in this place.
The entrance hall and lobby, once a grand affair, is dirty and dingy and cracked. Dean can’t help but to sweep his eyes over it as he crosses the entranceway, doors broken in and swinging wide. They could be fixed, but why bother when the beast would simply break them down again and again?
It’s silent, deceptively so. His hands are tight on his gun as he pauses to listen, ears sharpened by Michael’s burning him dormant in the back of his mind. They’re waiting, saving it, saving his last few minutes with the angel tucked into a space too small for him while Dean steers the ship. As soon as Michael takes over, that energy will explode into something grand and heavenly, something burning bright and overpowering, but not yet.
His jaw tightens, and his eyes flick to Emma. One firm nod signals that the coast is clear, the need for words erased by time and familiarity.
She doesn’t like this any better now that they’re here, but as they cross the threshold, the deal is sealed. There’s no going back now, no chances to duck out and find another option. All they have left is to go forward, to follow through with this stupid plan she has no choice but to go along with. Dean is just as stubborn as she is, and they have a job to do. She couldn’t talk him out of this, but she can help him try to protect everyone here. Try to free Wonderland from tyranny and make it someplace everyone can live again, not just survive.
The signal is enough, and she moves forward with her gun pointed at the floor in a two-handed grip. She’s brought the replica of her father’s sword she managed to pull out of the closets all those years ago as well, sheathed at her hip, but it’s more of a good-luck charm than anything. A comfort. If she’s close enough to the Jabberwocky to use it, then it’ll already be too late. She’ll be dinner, and she’s running out of deaths.
She moves forward through the front foyer in time with Dean, their footsteps slow and deliberate, careful not to break the too-heavy silence that’s bearing down on them. Any moment, she expects that the Jabberwock will pierce it, slice through it like it’s nothing, sense them or smell them and somehow just know that it’s no longer alone. They’re on its turf now, and the beast has every advantage that comes with playing on the home field. Still, it’s not the Jabberwock that makes her stop dead in her tracks when they turn the corner.
It’s the mansion itself.
The cracked and crumbling ruin the mansion has become is gone, lush carpets and whole, unbroken mirrors in its stead. Garlands, holly, doors still on their hinges and none of it looking like its become the stomping grounds for something as ravenous as the predator that’s taken over Wonderland has proven to be. She relaxes her hold on her gun, just a hair, turning her head alone to narrow her eyes at Dean in question. What the hell is going on here?
His brow furrows as it tracks over the garland, over the wallpaper, over everything. Slowly, he looks to Emma. Meets her eye, and tightens his grip on his gun.
Whatever this is, it isn't good.
--
This is a catch-all for both Dean and Emma. They'll have their own subthreads to keep things organized!
Where: Literally all over Wonderland
When: Dec 15-24
Rating: R for language, violence, adult themes
Summary: When Emma agreed to acompany Dean on his stupid suicide mission of inevitable death and idiocy, neither of them prepared for the mistletoe. Or, you know, the freaking time travel.
The Story:
They ran out of canned food. All of the stockpiled supplies had been growing steadily more scarce, but it’s probably the cans that finally triggered Dean’s decision to push through with the back-up plan brewing in his mind for the last several weeks. There was beef jerky- god damn, they had beef jerky by the friggin’ score, but with so many mouths to feed, it wouldn't last. There were hunters- actual game, what was left of the animals in the forest and the fish in the ocean were being picked off one by one for sustenance in much the same way that the Jabberwock was picking them off for sustenance.
Soon, there would be nothing. Soon, they wouldn't just have to worry about losing those last few precious lives to the roaming beast, but to starvation. Dehydration. Sickness.
Tom’s been stirring up talk about a second trip to the core, but morale is low. It was a stupid plan the first time around, it’s even more stupid with so many fighters taken out of the game. With so many injuries, with so few extra lives to spare and, more importantly, with the Jabberwock more strong than he’s ever been.
In the end, it’s not a difficult decision to make. Not by a long shot. Too many people are gone already, and waiting for more to go is stupid. He’s not going to do it.
Michael’s there, the Archangel, an ever present beacon of power and possibility, and though things are different now than they were back home- hell, different now than they were years ago in Wonderland’s less horrific years, there was always small part of him that protested the very notion of giving in.
That small part’s been ground to dust.
It’s a no-brainer. Dean says yes.
It’s a small piece to a bigger puzzle, a bigger and, admittedly, probably doomed plan. Cas had been able to take the Jabberwock down in the beginning. It had taken effort, a great expenditure of grace, but he'd been able to slay the beast over and over again to grant them a temporary reprieve. After it swallowed the Vorpal Shield, that bastard ground him into dust. Michael is stronger, though- a thousand times stronger, at least he would be in his true vessel. If they could get rid of it for good together, or, Christ, even just put it down temporarily, long enough to give Wonderland a chance to gather it’s strength, it might fix everything.
If it meant burning Dean out of his body, so be it. If it meant risking losing his remaining lives in the process, he was so far beyond the point of caring.
It would have to be done in secret. The fewer people who knew, the fewer people likely to stop him and the fewer to possibly get caught in the crossfire. He kept it to himself, kept it from Jo, from Sam, from Ellen, from anyone and everyone likely to put their fucking fingers in the mix and make things messy. He'd keep it from everyone if it were feasible, but it simply isn’t. He needs someone to take over in the event it doesn’t work, needs somebody to help him get to where he needs to be, and that someone is Emma.
She had tried to argue against it, tried to use logic to point out why it wasn't worth the risk, but it hadn't lasted long. He had trusted her for a reason; she understood what it meant to be a leader, to go forward and take a chance because the payoff would be beyond worth it if you could pull it off. That didn't mean she liked it. Dean was more than a friend and more than someone to take orders from: he was family now, more like family than just about anyone she'd ever known. Orphans were forced to build their own families, and if they were lucky, sometimes they made a friend like Dean who fit the bill completely, someone who could offer understanding and solidarity like no one else, someone else who knew what it felt like to lose and to grow up too fast and to make the best of what you had.
The idea of this going south and losing him, losing their leader, losing one of the best friends she’d ever had made her stomach drop and her chest feel tight. If it worked, it would be damn near a miracle, though she was hesitant to use the word. She never gave her approval, not really, but she let him know that he could trust her. Trust her to help him through it, trust her to pick up the pieces if it failed or if he didn’t make it back. Meanwhile, she’d spend as much time as she could trying to convince him to take another course, trying to figure out alternatives. She knew what taking the risk could earn them, and she wasn’t going to forcibly stop him -- she respected his decision -- but damn if she wasn’t going to try to get him to change his mind in the eleventh hour.
In the end, they go anyway. Gearing up is a grim affair, done in the silence and secrecy of Dean’s private quarters, tucked away in the back of the refuge. It’s the middle of the night, the civilians and refugees are sleeping. The resistance patrols are circling the small perimeter of the sanctuary they’ve carved out of sweat and blood. They slip through the cracks, through the woods, through the rubble and the dying gardens without a word or a sound. Even footsteps in the grass seem muted in this place.
The entrance hall and lobby, once a grand affair, is dirty and dingy and cracked. Dean can’t help but to sweep his eyes over it as he crosses the entranceway, doors broken in and swinging wide. They could be fixed, but why bother when the beast would simply break them down again and again?
It’s silent, deceptively so. His hands are tight on his gun as he pauses to listen, ears sharpened by Michael’s burning him dormant in the back of his mind. They’re waiting, saving it, saving his last few minutes with the angel tucked into a space too small for him while Dean steers the ship. As soon as Michael takes over, that energy will explode into something grand and heavenly, something burning bright and overpowering, but not yet.
His jaw tightens, and his eyes flick to Emma. One firm nod signals that the coast is clear, the need for words erased by time and familiarity.
She doesn’t like this any better now that they’re here, but as they cross the threshold, the deal is sealed. There’s no going back now, no chances to duck out and find another option. All they have left is to go forward, to follow through with this stupid plan she has no choice but to go along with. Dean is just as stubborn as she is, and they have a job to do. She couldn’t talk him out of this, but she can help him try to protect everyone here. Try to free Wonderland from tyranny and make it someplace everyone can live again, not just survive.
The signal is enough, and she moves forward with her gun pointed at the floor in a two-handed grip. She’s brought the replica of her father’s sword she managed to pull out of the closets all those years ago as well, sheathed at her hip, but it’s more of a good-luck charm than anything. A comfort. If she’s close enough to the Jabberwocky to use it, then it’ll already be too late. She’ll be dinner, and she’s running out of deaths.
She moves forward through the front foyer in time with Dean, their footsteps slow and deliberate, careful not to break the too-heavy silence that’s bearing down on them. Any moment, she expects that the Jabberwock will pierce it, slice through it like it’s nothing, sense them or smell them and somehow just know that it’s no longer alone. They’re on its turf now, and the beast has every advantage that comes with playing on the home field. Still, it’s not the Jabberwock that makes her stop dead in her tracks when they turn the corner.
It’s the mansion itself.
The cracked and crumbling ruin the mansion has become is gone, lush carpets and whole, unbroken mirrors in its stead. Garlands, holly, doors still on their hinges and none of it looking like its become the stomping grounds for something as ravenous as the predator that’s taken over Wonderland has proven to be. She relaxes her hold on her gun, just a hair, turning her head alone to narrow her eyes at Dean in question. What the hell is going on here?
His brow furrows as it tracks over the garland, over the wallpaper, over everything. Slowly, he looks to Emma. Meets her eye, and tightens his grip on his gun.
Whatever this is, it isn't good.
--
This is a catch-all for both Dean and Emma. They'll have their own subthreads to keep things organized!
December 23rd
Despite his early attempts to connect with the ghost, Sam tries to do what he can out of Dean's sights, to converse with the others, to keep their friends chin's up as much as he can, to gather information and try, try to figure out a way that they don't all end up shadows of their former selves, just as these ghosts have. It's too much, he realizes, but doesn't say aloud, to think that the place that had become their one real hope for a brighter future, for a real life, would soon become so much worse than anything else they'd ever experienced.
It isn't working. A few days before Christmas, Sam makes a point of locating the shade of Dean, even if it's just to accost him. To say what he knows Dean would say to him if their situations were reversed, if Sam was the one literally haunting around with a fowl expression and a foreboding message (of course, because he doesn't run into his own ghost, he doesn't realize that he, too, is brooding somewhere). He finds Dean in the bar, somewhere he thinks the other man has been avoiding up until now. Shutting the doors behind him with a purpose, to announce his presence, Sam hovers near the doorway. For now.
"I can't do this anymore," he says, flatly, hands curling into loose fists at his sides. "Dean, whatever happens--happened--you can't shut me out. Not like this."
no subject
Deep down, he thinks Sam would be disappointed in him. Disappointed in the person he's become, disappointed in his failure to keep this from happening. Disappointed in the fact that the place that slowly became their home ended up a hell of a lot like their actual home, just another broken down piece of shit wrapped in bacon and pain and apocalyptic chaos. Five years ago, they joked about Martha Stewart after a family-wide Thanksgiving dinner. Two weeks ago they ran out of canned freaking ham.
Today, Dean ends up in the place he's always been destined to end up- in a bar, waiting for the end to come, having failed every person that ever mattered to him.
So when Sam's voice carries across the room and pierces through his armor, all he can do at first is close his eyes and wallow in the fact that this moment was inevitable. He's done such a good job keeping people at arms' length, such a good job at making it abundantly god damn clear to anyone and everyone from this time that they don't matter, and it's all about to amount to nothing, he can feel it in his bones. For a minute, he's got to wonder if he's even got the strength to bother trying it now.
Five years is a long time, and Dean's stubbornness spans forty.
So, yeah, he's definitely going to bother trying now. For all the good it will do.
He steels his gaze, and glances over his shoulder. Shoots Sam a hard, unimpressed look. "We're not having this conversation. You might as well turn around and march your happy ass back to your roving gang of busybodies, because it's not happening."
no subject
Which is probably how the Sam that this Dean knows gets to be the broken wreck that he is, but the present Sam doesn't know that. Doesn't let it occur to him. And when this Dean shoots the look and the suggestion at him, he only steps in farther, setting his jaw.
"Just that you'd describe anything about me as happy tells me how screwed up you are," he says flatly, shifting his weight from foot to foot. "Look, I know you remember how things used to be in Wonderland. It's-- It was our new home, right? And happy, yeah, it was happy. But that doesn't mean we didn't go through a ton of crap back home. We've been through this before, the whole inevitable future of Hell stuff, and--"
He slows to a stop, drawing a deep breath, searching those all-too-familiar features for something of the man from five years ago.
"You've given up fighting before." Sam is quiet now, and not chastising or judgmental, but gentle. "And then you kicked it into gear when none of the rest of us could. So?"
no subject
His expression remains flat, doesn't twitch at Sam's gentle probing, eyes hollow and dark and unmoved. "You think I've given up."
A humorless laugh eaks its way out of his chest. Then another. He scoffs derisively, shakes his head, and tears his eyes from Sam.
"You don't know me." It's muttered emptily, and he turns his attention back toward his beer. They could have some heartfelt exchange, some passionate fight, or Dean could just... not bother, and that sounds like a far more appealing alternative.
no subject
And he pauses, looking away, breaths even and seemingly holding back a whole slew of things that were building up to burst out of his mouth. The younger Winchester waits, counting down mentally, trying to keep it together. Because he can't blame this guy for what's happened, but he'll be damned if he lets the future residents bring down damnation on them before they even get their own chance to save everyone.
"After everything," he begins again, in a low voice, glare sharp and unwavering. "Everything we've both been through, you're gonna let this be the thing that knocks you down for good? Christ, Dean. We've both been to Hell and back, been through crap that hurt just as bad on Earth, and now--"
He can't seem to get the words right, can't exactly string together all of the demands and questions and strongly-worded statements that're buzzing around in his head like a swarm of angry hornets.
"... I'm scared, man. I don't want this to happen, not here." Like lightning, the angry and world-wearied man is gone, and it's the face of the college kid who just lost his girlfriend, desperate and afraid. "I don't want all that to fall down on our heads. But there's gotta be something more to do. If you can't-- If you don't have any other stops to pull for your time, try and help us. We can still change it. We've done it before."
Please.
no subject
It was supposed to be some kind of... reward, or some kind of... something to make up for the crappy years before it, it was supposed to be good and different from what they went through at home.
Let the dam fill and burst and let him beat the shit out of Dean, and Dean would be all the happier for it.
Deep in him, Dean's own aggression starts to rise, battles through the apathy for the first time in days thanks to Sam's goading. His head rises and turns again, jaw clenching. It fades as a younger man fills Sam's shoes, and his head ducks again, muscle still thumping uncomfortably. His tongue works against his teeth behind his lips.
With slow, thoughtful movements, he shoves himself off of the bar stool. Stands up right, shoulders back, and stares Sam straight in the face. "I know. I know you're scared, I know you're frustrated, Sam, because we've had this conversation. We've had it about a thousand goddamn times through years you don't remember because you haven't had them yet. I've got you back where I'm from, where shit is hopeless. A you that knows what's going on, because we fought it. Together. We've been through hell and high water, and we've hit this thing at every god damn angle we know how, so excuse me if I think it's a little stupid that you- a you that doesn't know anything- is gonna stand there and preach at me about hope and fighting. Five years from now, you're just as screwed and hopeless as the rest of us, so spare me the speeches."
He bites it out hard, a vicious satisfaction in his gut that he hates himself for. Because Sam's scared, and it's supposed to be his job to douse that fear. It's supposed to be his job to make his brother feel safe, to make him safe, to make him feel strong, but Christ, he's tried. He's tried so damn hard over the last few years to do that, he just...
He's tired.
He passes a hand over his mouth and looks down, away, just for a second. Then back again. "I've been trying to help you. I've done everything I can possibly friggin' do to help you. Now, it's up to you to figure it out. You've got a god damn roadmap of what not to do, Sam, I just don't know what else to tell you."