Here we go then, for the last time on this journey! Info on more from this universe at the bottom but first of all THANK YOU EVERYONE! I'm so pleased and flattered that this world has generated so much attention but I wouldn't have written half so many of them without you guys pushing me on, big hugs all round!

Skovko, Thanks, my mum is doing really well! Sorry I didn't put Mark in jail for you but glad you liked reading about his death, kinda went all out on gore for this one...for me anyway! As ever my lovely, thank you being there every chapter!

Cherry619, Yeah, the poor boys are always having to run after Dean, but that's what brothers are for right? Thought it was about time that Dean saved himself, apart from the choking! Hope you like this last chapter and thank you so much for your reviews!

Mandy, I hope things with your grandma are okay. I know it's not the same, but I probably know a bit how you're feeling, it's kind of like treading water. But whatever happens it will get better. Thank you for always reviewing and being there. *Hugs*

LHisawesome4ever, Aww, thank you, the blacklash concerning Mark is mentioned here, so you'll have to see what you think and there are more one shot stories coming too (see below) so hopefully you'll be there for those. Thank you for your lovely reviews.

Minnie1015, Yep, I gave you a double whammy last time of Dean being all brave but also needing his boys to take care of him. I'm good to you like that! More coming but first that prison AU you've been dying to read (hope you still are!) Lauren and Dean too!

SkittlezLvr79, Glad to have you on the edge of your seat, because I'm mean like that and I like to make you squirm a little bit! Yep, Mark totally lost it, but did a good job of keeping it hidden...for a while! One last chapter coming up and thank you sooo much for reviewing!

Derick Lindsey, Yep, Dean can handle himself sometimes too! Hope you like this last chapter and you're right, more one shots coming but a brand new AU first, hope you'll check it out. Thank you for having taken the time to reviews, means a lot.

Kirrak, Aww, yay, I'm glad you liked it, I never know whether or not I've hit the right tone for the big finales until I've put them out! And thank you for your well wishes, my mum is doing really well and the doctors are super pleased! Have loved reading your reviews as always!

Cheryl24, Michelle is not in this chapter except as one of the mourners I suppose, I wanted this one to mostly be about the boys (with a bit of Cesaro because why not?!) Glad you have enjoyed it and hope this one finishes it nicely. Thank you so much for your reviews.

Daisysakura, Haha, I think we are officially hurt!Dean loving!boys soulmates! Glad I put you on the edge of your seat, but Roman and Seth will always come through! Thank for your well wishes and your reviews, see you at the next one too I hope?!

Wwe21, Thanks for your review. I'm writing more one shots but following my own ideas because I have sooo many I needed to write, they'll be coming soon though. I needed someone people thought was good but could be bad, Mark fitted perfectly!

For the last time this story then everyone...

The Way Life's Meant To Be

The funeral had been nice in the way they mostly seemed to be and had literally been packed with black colored mourning suits and people who had turned out to pay their last respects to a person they had all held in impossibly lofty esteem. There had been a blizzard raging – it still was frankly – so the outside part of the ceremony had been pretty quick and in the end they had only had to shiver their asses through a speech by the tearful widow and the obligatory one by Vince.

Roman and Seth had tried to talk him out of it, but Dean had been adamant that he wanted to go. Not to pay homage or mourn the guy's loss or anything but to make sure the guy made it into the ground and then possibly to dance on his grave a very little once the genuine mourners were gone.

Because one thing was for sure –

He wouldn't miss Mark Calaway or celebrate his life.

Goodbye and good night.

In the immediate aftermath of the night on the hillside when the veteran had revealed his true nature to the world, Stephanie and Vince had sworn them all to silence and then holed up in her office making some sort of contingency plan.

To say their idea had gone down badly was a weighty understatement,

Seth and Roman had hit the roof,

"You want to hold a fucking ceremony for the asshole?"

Vince had spread his hands,

"You have to understand – ,"

Roman had cut him off in tones of pure fury and delivered the words beneath a hugely tightly drawn brow, that had left the onlookers by no means doubtful of his opinions on the matter,

"He tried to kill Dean, he did kill his brother and eleven women – ,"

Stephanie had interrupted him shortly,

"We know."

"You sure 'bout that?"

In the end the tensions in the room had reached a fever pitch, until Dean himself had suddenly sat up, shifting the ice pack held in tight around his neckline and the trauma of his ordeal making everyone shut up. Perhaps nearly having been garrotted by a murderer offered certain perks?

He had waved an airy hand,

"I get it."

Seth had blinked,

"Then you wanna explain it? Because me and the big guy aren't getting this shit at all."

Except for the fact that on some level they all did, because no matter what had happened in the hours up on the hill, the fact remained that Mark Calaway was still a legend and a name on the street that everyone knew. Suplex City had always had a problem with ridding itself of the reputation for violent crime and it was people like 'Taker' who had helped to hold the worst back in the years before their own secret taskforce had been birthed. People respected the name and the news reports that – much like Seth – they had read and kept tabs on. Mark Calaway was not just a policeman's policeman, he was practically the figurehead of the whole damn force. No way could they have admitted that he was the murderer who had held them in such terror twenty five years before.

No way.

Faith in the police would have been totally ruined and so in the end they'd had no fucking choice but to celebrate his life and accept the tears and sympathies and the lies that had been babbled by the eulogists –

Including Vince.

Dean had sucked it up then watched the coffin getting buried, before turning with his two brothers and heading off for a drink.

Cesaro was almost beside himself with anguish,

"It's on the house boys, we've all had a hard day."

He offered out the sentence along with a bottle the second the three of them trooped in through the doors, the wind that chased in after them rattling the paintings and blowing soft white snowflakes in around the room.

Seth nodded vaguely,

"Thanks man."

They hit their table and then set about shrugging out of their suit jackets and ties, until they each of them felt a little more normal and a little less like a gang of pretentious stuffed shirts. The bottle that Cesaro had given them was brandy and while it was none of their usual choice, the dark liquid was smooth and beautifully warming and chased off the worst of the bitterness from their hearts.

Well, maybe not quite.

"To the Southside Strangler," Dean held up his tumbler so that it glinted in the light, "Both of 'em."

Roman sighed,

"Least they can't hurt anybody else now."

Seth shook his head,

"God damn it, this isn't right. I mean planting the blame on Glenn for the murders while making out like his brother was the best thing about the force?"

He tailed off rapidly and then sucked another gulp down to mask whatever curse he had been about to spit out and instead internalizing it in a series of expressions that let his brothers know that he was yelling it in his head.

Dean poured him some more,

"So you think maybe they should 'a told his kids about what happened, or how 'bout the poor little cryin' blonde wife back there? You think they deserve to know their old man was a killer who shot their long lost half-uncle to death an' liked to wind rope round other peoples' necks an' strangle 'em for kicks?"

"No."

Dean shrugged back,

"Then there's your answer, 'sides, people believin' in the us is a good thing, might make our lives easier."

"We nearly damn well lost you Dean."

Seth blurted the words out while slamming down his tumbler in a way that made the liquid slop over the sides and was delivered with a sudden and pulsating burst of anger which was directed at the man being patted down beneath the earth and for who in a bar a few blocks over, the great and good of the city were sharing canapes for and swapping anecdotes and having kind thoughts about.

Dean reached over and flicked his ear,

"Ow, what was that for?"

"To remind you m' still here, n' m' not goin' anywhere."

Roman snorted,

"Not too late to change your mind."

In response to the teasing, their younger man rubbed his ear lobe and then glowered across heatedly at his two grinning friends, who seemed to be taking the whole funeral hoopla far better than he was and for reasons he couldn't guess.

He grumbled back testily,

"What the hell is wrong with you two?"

Dean shrugged,

"I dunno, guess m' just happy to be alive."

He had clearly intended the sentence as a loose one but the weight of it caught and then dragged the mood right down and stifled the formerly easy chatter over the table in a way that made him clear his throat and then roll his blue eyes. Beneath the part-shaved stubble and above the unbuttoned collar there was a band of red marks that was still trying to heal and which reminded his teammates each time they caught a sight of it, that he had very nearly been strangled to death.

Seth looked up at him,

"Do those things hurt still?"

"Not too much, unless I turn over an' lie on 'em in bed."

Roman snorted back,

"Well that's what you get uce, for trying to catch two killers by yourself."

He was grinning and the sight of the brightly lit up features and the sounds of the deep chuckle brought the mood swiftly back and within less than a second they were all three of them smiling because when they were together and happy and generally healthy, the bad times never seemed to last for too long. Dean took another sip of his brandy and then turned thoughtful,

"I didn't see my girl that time."

"What time?" Seth frowned,

"When I was bein' – y' know – strangled, I didn't see her smilin' at me the way I do when – ,"

Dean chose not to finish the sentence, but instead waved his hands around in the air as if the word he wanted was floating right in front of him and he was trying to bat it down or make it pop up. Luckily however, he didn't need to say it because the two men in front of him were his very best friends and so they knew in an instant how to unravel the sentence and precisely what it meant.

When I'm staring down death.

Roman cleared his throat a little and then tried to look casual as he poured more booze out, but then blew his cool façade by filling his tumbler to close to the brim line and spilling it over the top of the glass.

"Why do you think that was?"

Dean shrugged,

"I dunno uce, figure it wasn't my time then, y' know? Plus I knew you two assholes were comin', so I think that means my girl is kinda keen for me to stick around, probably knows I need to keep tabs on my two brothers."

Roman smiled back at him,

"Maybe babe, maybe."

From behind them Cesaro came in over the parquet and then dragged a noisy chair across the empty lunchtime bar before shaking his head and blowing a breath out with a look of totally genuine remorse.

"He was an incredible man."

He was talking about Mark again but was met by a muted and unconvinced sounding pause, which thankfully he was far too cut up to really notice and which was then finally filled in by a very sarcastic Seth.

"Yeah, he was something."

That was the part that really hurt, the fact that they would forever have to bump into people who wanted to espouse how amazing they thought Mark was, but who would never have to look at the path of sheer carnage he had carved through his victim's lives or else on his target's throats and who would also never have to see their friend or their brother, half-conscious on the floor having fought for his damn life.

Dean had passed out on the floor of the half-built bedroom as the cavalry had shown up, sirens blaring in dark and led by Steph of all fucking people, who had taken charge and purposefully kept the responding officers well back and instead insisted on them getting Mark taken out of there instead of having attention drawn to her battered taskforce.

A terrible accident.

That was how she had described it, by which she had possibly meant bringing Mark back into the fold but which seemed to satisfy the shell-shocked looking beat cops who had soberly removed the body of the policing icon.

Stephanie had crept up towards them on the first-floor once everyone else was busy,

"Is he okay?"

She had been asking about the limp looking copper blonde man, whom Seth had been cradling to his chest like a newborn and even rocking backwards and forwards as his eyes had blazed up at her,

"What does it look like to you?"

Roman had thankfully been a little more even,

"Mark tried to strangle him, Dean knocked him over the edge."

Stephanie had surprised them then by dropping down next to them in a squat of almost motherly looking concern, which had then been enforced as she had laid her palm across her officer right at the point above his steadily beating heart, as if she had needed to convince herself he was with them and which hadn't been a huge surprised based on how terrible he had looked.

She had sucked in a breath,

"I can't believe this happened, I mean Mark was – Mark was – ,"

Seth had grunted back,

"Yeah, I know."

Because at one point or another the recently deceased veteran had clearly been a huge inspiration to them both and so the horrific revelation of his true deadly nature was a huge breach of trust in which the both of them could share.

Back in the present, Cesaro held up the bottle and waved it around at the glum looking group, topping up his own drained crystalware first off before grinning,

"Who wants another?"

Roman shook his head,

"Nah, thanks man, but we're on the clock here."

Technically speaking it wasn't a lie, because while they were no longer searching for a murderer, they were already plugging through the next few cases on their desks and mopping up drug dealers, rapists and traffickers in the same uber glamorous way the three of them always did.

Having a drink had just been a pit-stop.

But they had to be getting themselves back to the grind,

"You sure?" Cesaro asked, "Not got time for another?"

Dean threw back his own remaining booze,

"We're good man, 'sides – y' know – can't be wastin' those tax dollars by sittin' round here gettin' hammered on the job, always some slippery little worm needs catchin' somewhere."

Seth too put his glass down,

"Sorry, but they're right man."

Cesaro waved his hands and smiled in response to them, because essentially the big Swiss man was impossible to insult, since he carried about him a lightness of spirit that would have made the biggest asshole in the universe brighten up.

"Sure, sure, next time then?"

Dean made a finger gun,

"You know it dude."

Then together they pulled their heavy winter coats back on and zippered them up until only their noses were showing through since the weather outside was about as bad as they'd ever known and which the forecasters were promising was just the start of a week of snow, but which hopefully would lessen their own workload slightly, since not even brutal criminals liked having cold toes.

Roman slapped Cesaro roundly on the shoulders,

"Take it easy man."

The bar owner cheerfully waved them off and then watched with a grin as they shuffled across the threshold, back out into the howling wind.

Seth hissed,

"Jesus."

But the breath was sucked straight out of him and then hurled it off at a point about a mile down the road, since mother nature seemed to be having a tantrum, complete with probing fingers and frozen icicles in eyes. Roman had parked their surveillance van down the street a way and they skidded towards it in an ungainly three man run, before flinging the doors open and piling inside it.

Dean threw himself on top of Seth,

"Hey, watch it man – ,"

"Then maybe you wanna get in a little faster, I mean not like there's a blizzard out there or anythin'."

Roman snorted as he clambered in behind the steering wheel and then watched his brothers try to find their own space, jostling and pushing one another like children until Dean squeezed through the partition gap and fell down onto the backseat. He stretched his legs out and steepled his fingers on his stomach before blowing out a breath,

"Hey uce, turn the heatin' up."

"Coming your way babe."

He fired the rumbly old van back into life again and then flipped the heaters and twiddled with the dials until a thick wall of air was noisily pumping out at them,

Seth peered through the windscreen,

"Figure this thing will make it home?"

Roman threw back a look of offence at him, as if somehow questioning their little van's abilities was also a type of prowess-based insult on him.

"Sure it will."

"Alright, alright man, I'm just asking."

Roman flipped on the blinker and in response to the motion, Dean blew a sigh out and then hummed a little note, like the movement was amusing and which drew the big brown eyes up towards the rear view mirror.

"Babe, you alright?"

"Just the three of us again," Dean grinned broadly, beneath closed eyes that were savoring the flood of warmth.

Seth snorted,

"Yeah, think we learned our lesson on that one."

The copper blonde head nodded back at them sleepily but also pretty happily,

"I like it like that."

Beside them a car slid past on the asphalt, struggling a little on the new layer of snow and charting the perfect imprint of rubber through the mashed potato looking offering fast painting the streets, turning their grimy and criminal-strewn metropolis into something ethereal and virginal and white. Roman checked his mirrors and then pulled out into the traffic with a last clipped instruction that underlined their three man team and filled them all with a deep sense of normality which made the world seem perfect,

"Uce, put your seatbelt on."

Okay everyone, that's it, we're done! Again, thanks so much for being with me on this journey.

The good news is that while you've been reading this one, I've been working on a whole bunch more oneshots for this AU.

I have a brand new story to come first (in a shiny new AU where Roman and Dean are prison inmates coming next week called 'Hard Time') but then as soon as that is finished or maybe somewhere a little sooner, I will start adding more oneshots to The Shield Unscripted again, so look out for those in the next couple of months!

THANK YOU!