But Ackles can one-up that feeling with a dream he had. “I can see it right now,” Ackles says. “It’s just one scene. Think: Middle America, Big Sky country. It’s just wheat fields as far as the eye can see, and there’s an intersection, a crossroads, oddly enough. I drive up in the Impala, and I park in the middle of the intersection. There’s nobody for miles. I get out of the car and I look in the distance — and it’s like Lawrence of Arabia when Omar Sharif was running up with the camel — I just see this thing coming in the distance, and it gets closer and closer and closer and closer. It’s a guy on a motorbike. And we never really see his face. He’s got a helmet on. But he walks up and I give him a nod, and I take a walk around the Impala very slowly and I walk back over to him and I hand the keys to him. And he takes off his helmet — we don’t see who it is — he hands the helmet to me and hands me the keys to the bike. From his back, he gets in the car and I watch the Impala drive off. And then I turn and I look at the bike that’s got one seat. And I put the helmet on, start the bike, [give] one last look to the Impala, it’s now gone, and I take off. Because I don’t need the extra seat anymore. And I even have the soundtrack in my head. There were no words spoken. I had this swelling score. It was like some Robert Zemeckis film.”
Collins, hearing the story for the first time, chimes in: “I can see the emotion in your face talking about it. It’s amazing to think that you’ve lived with these characters for so long that the idea of one of them dying actually even makes you, as Jensen, want to tear up.”
It’s a mutual feeling among all three stars, who pause before Padalecki sums it up: “I feel like I know Jensen, I know Dean, I know Misha, I know Cas, I know myself, I know Sam, and [when the show ends], it’s going to feel like losing a friend. When it’s all said and done, it’s going to be tough. I’m going to lose several friends.”
Supernatural returns Thursday, Oct. 12 at 8 p.m. ET on The CW.