Oneiroi [epilogue]

[mclachland]

prologue | one | two | three | four | five | six | seven | eight | epilogue


There is a tree on a sun-soaked hill, an elm with resigned branches that births globules of light and thought, heavy fruit sprouting wings. They tear from the boughs and fly away, leaving the sad elm, never to return and never missed. More blossom in their place almost immediately.

He studies it -- this well-oiled machine -- and is so engrossed in the process that he does not hear the heavy footsteps in the grass behind him.

"It was the first of my dreams," Dean says, coming to stand beside Cas. He shoves his hands into his pockets and looks up at the tree with a critical eye -- usually reserved for the Impala or a piece of pie. Except this is not Dean. "I wanted an extension of me, a piece to do my work should I find myself far away. A part of me, a dream that dreams."

"It is magnificent," Cas admits, watching the process with awe. The fruit, the creatures he has come to know and fear and understand, pull away and drift into the sky. The oneiroi will find the minds of the inhabitants of some world out there, whether it is Earth or a place that does not know of angels and humans and a failed deity's kingdom. He tracks them until they leave his sight.

Dean rocks on his heels and then gazes out into the fields, sunlight reflected back in his eyes, his skin, and Cas is not sure how he could have ever thought this poorly-made copy was Dean Winchester. "It will not be long. A blip. A blink. A breath, and then you will finally be here, my Castiel, dreaming of me."

At the bottom of the hill, the tall grasses rustle and part, and Cas cannot contain the smile that blossoms across his face.

"Cas!"

He shakes his head, still smiling. "You're mistaken. It's true that someday I will be here. I will dream for you, perhaps even with you, but… I will never dream of you."

His words are final, and he leaves Morpheus on the hill to wait for the end of this blip, blink, breath.

Running down the gilded slope to join Dean, Cas holds him careful and close, swallowing his laughter and pulling him back into the grass, into gold, until they disappear.


“As I lay me down to sleep, this I pray:
that you will hold me dear.
Though I'm far away I whisper your name into the sky,
and I will wake up happy.”

End.


Notes:

So, I guess when I said that "Named" was my first and last Big Bang story, I lied. "Oneiroi" was a long time in coming, actually, having first been an original screenplay about a girl who goes into Demos Oneiroi to rescue the kid she's in love with. In 2009, I was gearing up to seriously give thought to shopping it around when I heard that Christopher Nolan was making a movie about dreams. I ended up shelving it, because who would ever contend with Christ Nolan (even if our plots were completely and utterly different)? I ended up using it for my DCBB mostly because I had only a month to write it and I could come up with nothing else.

Writing from Castiel's POV was the hardest thing about it and I probably (re: definitely) will never do that again.

I'm glad I wrote it, but I'm fucking stoked it's over. On to new things!


Thanks:

I would be completely in the wrong if I didn't thank the people who yelled/cajoled/threatened/bribed/sat up until the wee hours of the morning with/loved me throughout June and July.

First and foremost, thanks to my betas peroxidepest17 and nanoochka for pretty much carrying me through the writing process. I'm sure they were ready to murder me in cold blood if I were to say "OH GOD I CAN'T DO THIS" one more time, and no jury would convict them. Between the late night chats, treating them like my own personal sounding board, and bothering them around 2am and pleading for reassurance, I honestly couldn't have done it without them. Thank you so very much. I owe you girls everything -- and by everything, I mean most if not all of my viable, transplantable organs. I love you both.

Thanks to miki_moo, my fabulous artist, for her wonderful work! She is one of the sweetest, most enthusiastic people I've ever had the privilege of working with. She did a great job -- EVERYONE GO CHECK OUT HER ART!

Thanks to timetravel, staraflur, nightanddaze, alexwhitman25, and everyone else who cheerleaded/kicked my ass.

And, of course, as always: thanks to tigbit for being there. <3

Comments

[lymricks.livejournal.com]

There are so many good things to say about this and I'm not even sure where to start. I can't lie, I've been looking forward to your big bang since I read Named admittedly, well behind your actual posting date and curious.

There's always some interest in seeing an author write well and then wondering if the next thing will be just as well or eh or totally the same thing in a not good way. This was perfect. Originally, what drew me to Named was your summary. It was perfect. It told me nothing about the story (well, not REALLY) but made me want to read it. This summary was the exact same thing. You should give a class on summaries.

Anyway, before this gets too weird and creepy, I just want to say that your prose and voice are both amazing. The original and interesting plot aside, the way you write your characters is actually amazing. Even through Castiel's POV, you manage to give Sam, Dean, Gabriel, Isis, and even Morpheus completely unique voices. You give readers this amazing ability to hear them as if we were RIGHT THERE and listening. It's great. Your descriptions are poetic without being long and confusing, and you balance the line between prose and plot very well.

And your plot was great. That's such a bummer about Inception, because the whole time I was reading this I was thinking "I'd see that movie." It converted well into SPN though, and the way you handled Castiel's belief in his father and the discovery of Morpheus was beautiful.

My favorite part, my absolute favorite part, is the way you handle Castiel's in-between phase as human and angel. I loved that his grace was literally ripped from him and that he struggled to adjust. The best part of the whole thing was during his Re-education, when you really beautifully combined his experience as an angel in heaven with his new human senses, how he knew there wasn't that physicality to heaven, but he saw it anyway and it made sense.

Anyway, this is getting long and creepy. In short, you are a wonderful writer and this was a beautiful story.

[mclachlan.livejournal.com]

HOLY YOUR COMMENT IS HUGE, BATMAN.

The first thing I would like to address is the one line summary. Honestly? I can't write summaries for shit. At all. The working summary for this story was "CAS AND SAM'S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE IN DREAMLAND AND IT'S RIDIC AND I HOPE YOU ENJOY THE VELOCIRAPTORS, YOU FUCKERS." Seriously. That was the summary I started with. I looked at all the big bang summaries in the artist claims, plus all the spn_j2_bigbang summaries from each year, hoping to get a clue, but I am just incapable of writing a concise synopsis. One liners like this summary and the one for "Named" just seem... easier. I try not to give anything away, but just enough that interests might be piqued. Mostly I just try to avoid writing an actual summary like a normal person. XD

ANYWAY. Your comment wasn't creepy at all. It was fantastic! It really warms me when a reader can pick out the things they liked and why; it tells me I'm doing something half-right. My writing tends to be very cinematic, so I tried to tone it down a little. Looks like I failed, but I'm not too choked up about it. Whatever works, right?

Thank you so much for reading and for your wonderful comment! <3333