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“The way they looked at each other, they just seemed happy, y’know?” Relieved, too, Dean thinks.To have your partner back from the dead? Talk about a weight lifted from the heart, broken pieces glued back together with a fool’s hope. Dean’d call that a win―if he didn’t know from experience there had to be one helluva downside (which, apparently, hadn’t been enough to stop him from using the pearl to try and oust Michael; but, bigger fish).Still. He hadn’t seen his mom light up like that, since.. well, since his childhood memories of her have since proven to be not-quite-right, he may need to defer to time-travel memories. Happy, was her with pre-hunter John.So. It’s been a while.“It doesn’t feel fair, to get all this and have to throw it away―and I know we have to, but it just feels like, y’know.. once we send dad back, it’s like none of this ever happened―he just goes back, t-to.. to being dead.”Dean’s not gonna argue about the lack of fairness―doesn’t need to. Sammy wants to crap on Fate, he’s not gonna stop him.But Dean doesn’t agree.“You sayin’ you wish things’d be different?”“Wh―don’t you?”..No.He really doesn’t.Okay, yeah. Dean had foolishly, selfishly wished for a long damn time to hear John say certain things he never thought he’d hear―that he wanted a better life for Dean; that he wanted Dean to be happy; that he wanted Dean to have a family of his own―but he gave up the dream of hearing those words a long time ago (let ‘em die bloody on the job). And, said or unsaid, they can’t change the past.And, yeah. It sucks for mom to get her second chance with John only to have him snatched away, like she had been from him―but considering how her being here is just as much a madcap-miracle as John coming back from the dead, even though it hurts (hurts some more than others), sending him back is a no-brainer.Because Dean loves his parents―despite everything―he does, but he wouldn’t trade their lives, their entire reality just so they could get a happily ever after.Because that’s not how it works.Hunters don’t get happy endings.Ever.“Can you imagine, dad―in the past―knowing then what he knows now ? I-.. think it would be nice.” Nice.Except you can’t step on a butterfly without changing the course of history, Kutcher. Lucifer, the Angels, all the craptastic evil plans him and Sammy’ve had to thwart over the years―what would happen to the world if they took a knee?“I used to think that too. But, uh.. I mean, look. We’ve been through some tough times. There’s no denyin’ that. And for the longest time I blamed dad. I mean, hell―I blamed mom too, y’know? I was angry.” He had every damn right to be. “But say we could send dad back knowing everything. Why stop there? Why not send him even further back, and let some other poor sonsofbitches save the world?”It’s not a new thought. And Dean comes back round to the same, why do we gotta be everyone’s hero? vein of thinking.Their lives ain’t ‘fair’.But what if the catch in changing things ‘for the better’ really is not worth it? They’ve both seen what-if version of similar changes to history; maybe there is no one else on the bench to take their place.Could they really doom the world in return for the possibility of a few short years of so-called happiness?It sounds all too familiar. Sounds like another deal with another devil, made in desperation and glad to take the short end of the stick because it’s that or nothin’.They’d moved on from that, Dean thought.But forget the world, for a minute. Time to get selfish, time to think on the smaller scale of things.“It is a problem. Because, who does that make us? Would we be better off, y’know? Maybe.. But, I gotta be honest―I don’t know who that Dean Winchester is. And I am good, with who I am.”For better or worse. Because being good with who he is was a long-fought, hard-won battle. To wish all the bad stuff away, to wish all those years undone on the blind hope that things could be better, that he might be better―it’s not worth the risk. He’s come too far, learned and grown too damn much to just wish it all away on a magical ‘maybe’―they both have.“I’m good with who you are.” And Sammy actually looks surprised at that. “‘Cos our lives? They’re ours.” Another battle waged against them; another battle won (more or less). “And maybe I’m just too damn old to wanna change that.” Old, in every damn sense of the word: body, mind, spirit―changing things now would be to tack on a few more decades to his existence (whether he remembers most of ‘em or not), and he’ll be well into triple digits before he’s barely edging forty.Even if things turned out the better-kind-of-different (from younger-Dean’s point of view, anyway), odds are that wouldn’t last. Because, 1, he’s a Winchester, and ‘smooth-sailing’ hasn’t matched up to anything in his life―ever―even before his days as a hunter. And B, all those phantom years would be weighing on his soul like some forgotten curse―forgotten, but still there, still knowing, still lived and pained and scarred and tired and so damn heavy from fighting the war that has been their lives.He could be twenty-two again, none-the-wiser (but soul-weary).He could be sixteen again, blissfully unaware (his burdened soul would know) of all the nightmareish things he had lived through (and doled out to others).He could be four years old again, dreaming of pie and warm hugs and riding in the Impala (some things never change).He could be any age in another life as another Dean, free from the clutches of evil and the life of a hunter. But you wish away an entire life, it hits the reset button on all the good as well as the bad.And despite all former arguments to the contrary, he’s got a helluva lot of good to lose, and he doesn’t wanna know what life might be like without it.John calls mom his girl, says he misses her―present tense―so damn much. They’re both tearing up, saying Goodbye after a Hello they never shoulda gotten in the first place. And Dean’s mind, where does it go..?Not to the hole about to be left in their lives by a loved one being ripped away (again), no. Dean’s had his fill of loss, and then some.His mind goes to what will be gained in the trade-off of realities. Because John may be standing right there, but he’s still just a ghost. And there’s someone out there―someone still very much alive―who needs to be brought back home, someone who belongs here.Someone Dean misses very much―present tense―is about to return. And as unfair as this all may seem to Sam, as much as it hurts, this is the way it has to be. This is the right thing to do. Because the cost of bringing some ghosts back is too damn high.It was good to see John, despite everything. But now it’s time for him to go, and beneath the pain of this farewell, Dean can’t find it in himself to wholeheartedly regret that.They had this much time together, this miracle-reunion in the eye of the storm, and that’s more than any of them coulda hoped for.John’s parting words are for them to take care of each other, and that sentiment settles deep and familiar, because they always do. And John is proud of them, and.. and, Dean doesn’t know what to say to that―what to even think.And then there’s more: their dad loves them.And that’s.. that’s all Dean ever really wanted from John, all he ever wanted to hear and know that he meant it (and he does).Those words, they’re the real wish come true. A gift, but one that will stay with Dean, long after John’s ghost fades away.In fact, they’re enough to spur his own voice into action, speak the same right back―and ain’t that just one more goddamn miracle? Making the most of the eye of the storm. Dean loves, and is loved. As last words go, they ain’t half bad. Better than most, actually. It’s not everyday you know you’re gonna see someone you care about for the last time.His cheeks are flush with cooling tears. His eyes sting and vision blurs. Everything inside his chest feels too tight, too heavy.But the pit in his stomach―a space not left by the departing of his father, but by the absence of his friend―tangled up in all the pain and, yeah, relief, he recognises dread and concern and what if they’ve already stepped on the butterfly―The entrance to the bunker creaks open and closes, swift and solid.Dean can’t get a line of sight fast enough, because.. what-if? Because sometimes the lore is wrong or incomplete. Because―more often than not―screwing with magic leaves the user used and missing something they were too reckless to realise they’d gambled with in the first place.But.. there’s Cas.Squinty-eyed and head-tilted and echoing Dean’s fastly-fading concern.A single look, and Dean knows.That’s their Cas. Sam looks to him, “Well, there’s a story,” and claps him on the shoulder. They share a knowing look, one that says, this story needs booze.It’s probably a story best told sober, but having just lived through it, sobriety can wait a spell.And, really, tragedies aren’t meant to be held too soon in sober hearts.Sam gets that. He’s escorting mom back to the kitchen before Cas has even left the stairs. “Gonna need a drink first, Cas,” Sam says, backstepping his way from the war room, shoulders slumped, face a mess.He pulls mom into his side and she buries a tear-ruined face in his flannel as they round the corridor, out of sight.Turning back Dean’s met by Cas’ worried blue gaze, but what Dean really needs is that aborted hand to lay comfortable and grounding on his shoulder.He knows he probably looks as much of a mess as Sam and mom did. He feels like a mess, so that’s expected.Thing is, Cas is back―and Cas is Cas―and the hole in the pit of his stomach is no more; all filled up with his best friend’s presence. But the presence of his father is lingering, heart-aching. Ghosts have a way of getting under your skin.What Dean needs is something real, something that’s not gonna fade away, something that won’t disappear as the eye of the storm shrinks and shifts and whips up the dark clouds closing in on them (again).Is it too much to hope for a little comfort? A little reassurance? A little company?No, ‘course not. Because some hopes aren’t a gamble. Some are rooted in faith from experience―rooted in trust, in friendship.Cas’ hand does find his shoulder, but it’s just a pit-stop on the way towards pulling Dean into the hug he so sorely needs (one he recently feared he might never feel again).He’s a mess of tears and snot and battle-wounds―but Cas doesn’t seem to mind, just holds him as fresh tears track into the fabric of his trenchcoat. And if Cas doesn’t mind, then Dean can’t find it in himself to care.He lets the tears run themselves out. Some present things aren’t worth the risk of a better yesterday.