like a fever that just won't break.

1. On a Steel Horse
Author: glorious_spoon

Genre: gen, post-canon (S9)
Characters: Dean, the Impala
Tags: death (temporary), demon!Dean
Rating: PG
Word Count: ~1600
Summary: It’s already too late by the time I rise up through the layers of twilight to the crossroads that called me. The big car is little more than a twisted heap of scrap metal, the smell of burning antifreeze overpowering the fading scent of lilies on the evening breeze.
Reccer's Notes: This is the perfect ghost story. This is a perfect story. And you have to read this. For more detailed, but slightly spoilery, praise of this fic, here's the comment I wrote in response to it.

2. Fight Club
Author: beesandbrews

Genre: gen, pre-series, character study, hurt/comfort
Characters: Dean, Sam
Tags: bruising/internal damage, injuries (misc.), pain, caretaker!Dean, wound tending
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: ~2800
Summary: The brothers are left to their own devices while John is working a job in a neighboring town. They're short on cash and Sam is a growing boy with a hollow leg. Dean remembers what's that's like, so when he finds a way to pad his wallet that doesn't involve fifteen minutes in a back alley with a stranger, he goes for it.
Reccer's Notes: There's this hard-hitting, glorious, masculine sensation to this. The piece (and its subject) are wild, but practiced, and mediated by a certain sort of care that I find very distinctive of the piece, relative to others with a similar subject matter, and to Dean as a character. This is one of those fics that takes a mere 3k and nails something vital yet underexplored about Dean--past and present--and doesn't flinch.

3. Kin & Keeper
Author: steeplechasers

Genre: slash, memory play; romance; hurt/comfort; canon AU (post-s5—Sam is not raised from Hell)
Characters: Dean, Lisa, Ben, Castiel, Sam
Pairings: Sam/Dean; Dean/Lisa
Tags: grief, alcoholism, depression, post-traumatic stress, hallucinations, abandonment issues, dissociation, whatever the opposite of repressed memories is
Rating: R
Word Count: ~107k
Warnings: discussion of canon character death; child abuse and neglect; sexual content
Summary: On May 5th, 1983, an infant boy is carried for the first time through the doorway of a house in Lawrence, Kansas.

This is Dean’s first memory of his brother. There are others. They are vivid, angry, and relentless—and now, six months after Sam’s leap into Hell, they are coming to him with alarming frequency. He’s trying his best to live the easy apple-pie life he swore himself to, but the more he remembers, the harder it gets to ignore Sam’s shadow filling up the corners of Lisa Braeden’s house. What’s worse, he has no idea what the onslaught of these memories portend—or in what ways they will change him.

Reccer's Notes: This is the first fic I've read that was over 60k or so--I tend not to read fic I can't finish in a single sitting--but if you're like me, and hesitant about the long stuff, you should read this one anyway. It's brilliantly moody and atmospheric, but never in ways that detach the reader from the characters and situations at hand. It's a picture of mourning in adulthood as much as it is one of living in childhood, and both present (that is, post-S5) and pre-series storylines wend together toward a climax that's really just masterful. I didn't want it to ever end, and I'd definitely read it again. For more detailed, but slightly spoilery, praise of this fic, here's the comment I wrote in response to it.

Title: Shadowman
Vidder: justmep2
Song: "Shadowman" by K's Choice
Characters: Dean; Sam, Castiel, special guest at the end
Genre: gen
Tags: mark of cain, depression, abandonment issues, identity issues, supernatural powers, blood loss, lacerations, injury (misc.), death, daddy issues, emotional pain, psychological damage
Warnings: Spoilers through 9x23, angsty angst
Description: Dean and his journey in season 9.
"Any time tomorrow a part of me will die / And a new one will be born / Any time tomorrow / I'll get sick of asking why / Sick of all the darkness I have worn"

Reccer's Commentary: I left an effluent comment on the video itself, so I'm just going to copy that here if no one minds. If it's tl;dr basically my commentary is WATCH THIS NOW. Or set aside a time when you have six minutes of uninterrupted time to spare, because this deserves your full, unrushed attention. Or possibly more than six minutes, if you choose to watch it again immediately upon finishing it. Which I may or may not need to do a few more times, er:

This video put my heart in my throat and kept it there the entire six minutes. This is phenomenal.

I particularly liked your pairing of Sam and Castiel walking away from Dean in 9x23 and Dean walking away from them in 9x10--it had really great flow, visually, and the juxtaposition of those two scenes both thematically and emotionally just blew me away. [...]

And wowwwwww that last bit! Your pairing of John's last words and Dean's is a stroke of genius--it never once would have occurred to me to make that connection (or to remember John's words), and my initial reaction to the scene when I first watched 9x23 was basically just like, "lol Dean what part of this past year are you proud of us for, exactly." And I really haven't been sure what to do with the line, because I couldn't find any resonance for it. But here is one interpretation right in this vid! And it's a beautiful one.

I guess in a similar vein I've had trouble for the latter part of S9 maintaining my emotional, immediately personal connection to SPN, instead drifting off in a haze of more cerebral glee and idk almost pornographic meta enjoyment of their pain. Not that there's anything wrong with that, I mean. XD But I prefer to be emotionally devastated and then thrilled by that devastation, rather than skip that first step, you know?

This vid put me right there in that emotional sweet spot. [...]

Title: Psychological Diagnostic Battery of Dean Winchester
Author: pirrofarfalla@Tumblr
Genre: meta; fic, of sorts
Character: Dean
Rating: SFW
Warnings: discussion concerning mental illness, specifically depression, alcohol use, and suicidal ideation
Summary: I wrote this essay for a Master’s level Diagnosis and Assessment class. It is an objective, complete psychological diagnostic battery that would be completed for any client seeking professional mental health aid.

Reccer's Comments: An interesting read for many hoodietimers, I'm sure. :) The part I was most interested in was the excision of any overt mentions of the supernatural in the exam, or as the author puts it, "I think the striking reality of Dean’s situation with the focus solely being on him and not the intervention of Heaven and Hell is enough to provide a broader understanding of who Dean Winchester is as a human, rather than [solely] as the Righteous Man." The battery goes from pre-series midway or so through S2. God, imagine what it would say now.

HEY GUYS. GUESS WHAT TONIGHT IS. A WEEK FROM LAST TUESDAY BUT WAY, WAY COOLER.

I've recommended a couple Dean H/C and Dean-centric gif/graphic Tumblrs here before, but there's been some truly fascinating, thoughtful Dean S9 discussion going on on Tumblr of late, too. If you're interested in joining in (or lurking!), here are a couple Tumblrs you might be interested in!

• amonitrate
  
• misterdeanvimes
  
• veneredirimmel
  
• and our very own minorkeepsakes, who mods the HT Tumblr. :D
  

amonitrate has an epic Dean meta being posted daily right now, too, which I'm sure to bring up in another rec post soon.

If you find these kinds of Tumblr recs helpful, let me know and I'll be sure to keep a more concerted lookout for cool stuff!

Title: The Weight
Artist: hexacosm@Tumblr
Characters: Dean, Castiel
Genre/pairing: gen, hurt/comfort, drama
Type/medium: digital painting
Rating: SFW, some violence/damage
Spoilers: none
Warnings: other hurt character (Castiel)
Description: An encounter between Dean and Castiel in S9 that, with the Mark of Cain and First Blade in play, reverses an encounter from S8.

Reccer's Comments: I've been jonesing for all the Mark of Cain/S9 stuff I can get my hands on, and this artwork definitely fits the bill! I've previously recced one of the artist's other Mark of Cain portraits, and also commented on her clothing details and rich color palettes then, but I feel compelled to reiterate these things once more! THE SEAMS ON DEAN'S JACKET, the light glancing off his and Castiel's hair, the murky light of the background juxtaposed against the deep shadows of the foreground... Beautiful work that brings to light an interesting concept.

I also want to note that I found this piece via crack_impala's Friday Rec Roundup, where you can get the DL on tons more excellent fanworks daily. :)

While we're at it... XD

Title: Mark of Cain
Artist: sharkifer@Tumblr
Character: Dean
Rating: SFW
Medium: Digital
Description: Cain said to the Lord, "My punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, thou hast driven me this day away from the ground; and from thy face I shall be hidden; and I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will slay me."
Reccer's Comments: This is a little stylized sketch of the Mark of Cain in close-up. Simple, but ominous and moody. Incidentally, the artist has also done a lovely-tragic sketch/animation for Dean's S9 birthday, that's wonderful, as well. <3

Title: Mark of Cain
Artist: gammyun@DeviantArt
Character: Dean
Rating: SFW
Medium: Digital
Description: Wanted to do something with the mark of cain, so this happened. Digital painting in PS.
Reccer's Comments: Forewarning, there is a phenomenal snake in this painting. The details of this (snakeskin! angel feathers! Dean's flannel shirt! The zipped edge/snaps of his jacket! Freckles!), and its rich, metallic colors are a pleasure.

This might seem slightly off topic at first, because technically it's an article written by a woman who's a medical actor (has a script, pretends symptoms, grades med students on the quality of their care), and in her actual life is dealing with the interpersonal/emotional complications of abortion, but the big ideas driving it resonate with me so much as far as hurt/comfort as a genre goes, and erp, Sam and Dean. (I know I Winchester-goggled it...)

The Empathy Exams, by Leslie Jamison, is about empathy, and the role of empathy when it comes to illness, injury, and trauma--as well as the consequences of one's failure to empathize, or even to empathize inadequately. It's also about rotten spaces you fall into as someone who's hurting, where your frustrations and empathies fail, and how that impacts those around you (like, for instance when you're in pain, "the kind of pain that comes without a perpetrator," and you cast your loved ones as either villains or saviors, even if they can't possibly be either).

It's a really nuanced, complicated articulation of what empathy means and how it does and does not look--powerful read, and definitely something you'd be interested in as someone who's involved in H/C as a genre, whatever your role. OR INVOLVED IN SPN IN GENERAL, LOL, BECAUSE SHOW PLAYS HARDBALL. XD

In this sense, empathy isn’t measured just by checklist item 31—“Voiced empathy for my situation/problem”—but by every item that gauges how thoroughly my experience has been imagined. Empathy isn’t just remembering to say That must really be hard, it’s figuring out how to bring difficulty into the light so it can be seen at all. Empathy isn’t just listening, it’s asking the questions whose answers need to be listened to. Empathy requires inquiry as much as imagination. Empathy requires knowing you know nothing. Empathy means acknowledging a horizon of context that extends perpetually beyond what you can see […]

Empathy means realizing no trauma has discrete edges. Trauma bleeds. Out of wounds and across boundaries. Sadness becomes a seizure.