If there was only one reason why Sam and Dean loved Gabriel and Castiel…
It certainly wouldn't be their cooking.
"Cas!" Dean had shouted when he came back to the bunker to find the kitchen in utter shambles.
"Yes, Dean?" the hunter flinched when his angel appeared behind him.
"What have we told you two about cooking when we aren't home? What have we told you two about even being in the kitchen when we aren't home?"
"Apologies…" Castiel said simply. "Gabriel is, as you know, difficult to keep track of."
Dean sighed and rolled his eyes, though Castiel could sense a bit of pride coming from him. It was probably coming from the thought that Cas himself hadn't caused the mess this time, and Sam was the one who couldn't control his angel.
"Where is he? This is the third time this week!"
"I believe he is with Sam at the mall. He mentioned the arcade."
"Good God…" Dean mumbled. Since the arcade in the mall was open 24 hours, the Winchesters had often had to deal with Gabriel going on gaming marathons that lasted entire nights—impressing geeky kids and employees alike—only to come back pretending to be tired so he could drag Sam into hour-long cuddle sessions on the couch. Dean pulled out his cell phone to call Sam, and Castiel went about calmly mopping up some spilled flour.
"Dammit, Sammy, turn your phone on." Dean huffed. He turned to Castiel and gave a soft sigh at the sight of him pushing a sponge mop around a mess he didn't make. He stepped over, placing a quick peck on his temple. "I'm gonna go find them. You just…Y'know what, just stay out of the kitchen, alright?"
The angel set the mop aside with only a polite nod as he watched Dean leave to go find Sam, who, incidentally, was looking for Dean at the museum across town. He pulled Sam's cell phone, which he had sneakily taken and turned off while the younger Winchester was there earlier, from the pocket of his trench coat and set it on the coffee table before standing about in the kitchen doorway.
"Thanks for covering for me, Cassie." Castiel turned to see Gabriel standing in the kitchen, his arms decorated with grocery bags.
"I am starting to question the safety of this plan." The blue-eyed angel worried. "Perhaps we should quit while we are ahead."
Gabriel laughed. "Nonsense! We just have to be quick about this. Here—" He handed Castiel a plastic container of berries. "You get started on that. Now, where did I put that recipe?"
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Two very grumpy Winchesters returned a little over half an hour later, the older of the two looking particularly upset.
"I'm telling you, Dean, I know I put my phone in my pocket when I left."
"Then where is it now, smart guy?"
"I…" Sam sighed. "I don't know, alright? Anyway, why weren't you at the museum?"
"Why the hell would I have been there?!"
"How should I know?! Cas told me you were there doing research."
"He told me that you—" he turned and glared around the room. "Cas!"
"You don't have to shout." Both humans jumped almost a foot in the air, and the angel that had just appeared beside them chuckled softly.
Dean huffed, looking at him accusingly. "Cas, why the hell did you send Sam and me on wild goose chases?"
Taking note of the baffled look in the angel's eyes that practically said 'I don't recall sending you to hunt wild Canadian birds', Sam said: "Why did you tell me he was at the museum? And then tell him I was at the arcade when you knew I was looking for him?"
"I apologize. Gabriel insisted you were there." Castiel was a bit amused at how often he could use his brother as an excuse to deter the Winchesters' rage.
Sam groaned and stalked off, leaving the older hunter and the angel alone. "Where is he?"
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"Gabriel!" Sam called as he walked through the inner halls of the bunker.
"What's up, Sammich?" he heard as he passed his bedroom. He stepped back to see the archangel in question leaning in the doorway and licking red syrup off of his fingers.
"What have you been up to all day?" the younger Winchester asked, hands on his hips as he loomed over Gabriel like a parent.
"Whatever do you mean, Sammy?" Gabriel smirked, reaching out to tap Sam's nose and leave a drop of syrup there.
"Don't get cute with me. Cas says you've been making trouble again."
"Ugh...Why do you two always agree with him? I'm just as much an angel as he is."
"Maybe because you're always screwing with us?"
Gabriel smirked provocatively. "Oh, honey, you know I only screw with you."
Sam rolled his eyes. "Funny." He said, completely deadpan.
"Aw, c'mon, don't be that way." The archangel wrapped his arms loosely around the Winchester's neck, leaning up on his toes to kiss his chin.
The hunter chuckled softly, wrapping his longer arms around Gabriel's waist. "Not this time."
He stepped forward, forcing the archangel to take awkward steps back until he fell onto the human's bed. "I've let you get away with too much this week."
Gabriel grinned saucily again. "Oh, so you intend to punish me then?" he taunted.
Sam smirked and took the archangel's wrists, removing them from around his neck as he leaned back to straddle the smaller man's waist. "Yes, actually."
The hunter lunged, tightening his hold on the archangel's wrists and pinning them above his head. Before he had a chance to struggle, Sam raked the fingers of one hand from his ribcage all the way down to his hip.
"H-Hey!" Gabriel cried out, a giggle in his voice. The human grinned, scribbling his blunt nails into the flesh of his side.
"Hey yourself." The Winchester chuckled, quickly darting his fingers up into the archangel's underarms. Under normal circumstances, he knew he would have been thrown off or otherwise attacked by Gabriel's grace, but let's just say—hypothetically, mind you—that one of the couple's less "tame" escapades involved Sam painting an angel trap on one of his comforters in a permanent ink and enjoying the liberation of being stronger than an angel of the Lord. And let's also say—also hypothetically—that Sam had put that comforter on his bed after laundry day instead of his normal one.
Now, hypothetically, Gabriel would be kind of screwed.
"S-Sammy!" he cried out through peals of laughter, feeling his angelic strength draining away. "Damn you; this isn't fair!"
"Who said anything about fair? You know what's really not fair?" Sam's hands crept under the archangel's shirt, kneading his belly like dough. "How about when you promised to spend last Tuesday night with me?"
"I said I was sorry! I had to settle a bet!"
"And the incident with the pancakes the other day?" the human started a cruel, repetitious pinching on his hips and up his sides.
"I deleted the picture!" Gabriel squealed. "Come on; let me go!"
"And the honey in my shampoo?" Sam turned and wrapped his arm tightly around the archangel's ankles.
"You know that was Dean's idea!"
"Nope, he made it pretty clear that it was all you."
"For the love of—Ugh…" Gabriel groaned, panting. "You are so gullible, Winchester."
Sam glared at him, starting to pull off the angel's socks. "Oh, you are in for it now…"
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Castiel chuckled softly as he and Dean heard Gabriel's helpless cackling from the living room. "They seem busy." He grinned.
Dean nodded, only half listening as he held Castiel in his lap and nuzzled the crook of his neck. The angel giggled and cringed, leaning away as the hunter pressed soft kisses along his neck and collarbones.
"Hm…" he murmured into Castiel's skin. "You smell like raspberries." He sat up to give the angel a questioning look, and said angel blushed.
"You think so?" he asked, trying to sound nonchalant.
Dean nodded again, and Castiel grew slightly nervous at the smirk that was forming on the hunter's face.
"Speaking of raspberries, angel…" he said slyly, tugging Cas a bit closer.
"Dean, no!" the angel said quickly, already giggling as the hunter wrestled him down onto the couch and straddled his hips. Before he could attempt to teleport away, Dean wiggled his fingers into his ribcage. Castiel gave an audible squeak, his giggles growing louder as Dean's fingertips applied the perfect amount of pressure to the vessel's bones. He arched his back with a helpless squeal, unsure if he was trying to move into or away from Dean's hands. It didn't matter much; the hunter leaned closer, wrapping his arms around the slightly smaller man and scribbling his blunt nails along Castiel's shoulder blades. The angel's laughter spiked in volume as he writhed in Dean's hold.
"D-Dean, wait!" he cried out, a bit of clarity breaking through his mirth to remind him of an urgent matter.
"Not a chance, Cas." Dean took back one hand, pushing up the angel's shirt. Funny enough, he didn't seem to take note of the fact that he was now wearing a white t-shirt instead of the dress shirt he had been wearing when Dean left earlier.
Castiel fell back into giggles as Dean peppered kisses all over his bare stomach. "N-No, Dean, really, I—!" The angel let out a shriek as the hunter blew a raspberry into his taut skin, arching his back again and only exposing himself for several more cruel raspberries. "G-Gabriel!"
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At the sound of Castiel's laughter-infused call, a realization struck Gabriel instantly. He had been recovering from Sam scratching between his toes, and the hunter was kneeling over him, gloating.
"Had enough yet, Trickster?" he chuckled as Gabriel moved to sit up.
The archangel wore a crooked grin. "Darling, you know I can go for hours." He teased. "But something's come up." He tried to push the taller Winchester off of him, mentally cursing him for putting the runes on the blankets.
"Where do you think you're going?" Sam smiled, trying to pin him back down.
"It's a surprise; and unless you let me up, you won't get it!"
"How do I know you're not just trying to weasel out of this?"
Gabriel rolled his eyes, mustering the strength to shove Sam's weight off of him before hopping off of the bed. "You're dense as rock, Winchester!" he taunted just before zapping out of the room.
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Dean looked up curiously as he heard footsteps in the kitchen and the sound of the oven being opened.
"Sam, if these things are burned, I'm turning you into a hamster!"
"Gabriel, what are you—?"
"Just a minute, pudding. Cassie, get in here already!"
Dean looked down again, only to see that Castiel had teleported away.
The angel had appeared beside his brother in the kitchen, his cheeks still burned red from being tickled silly; and Gabriel wasted no time teasing him for it. Dean stood up and walked into the kitchen just as Sam came running down the hall, and both found the archangel holding a tray of freshly baked—only slightly browner than necessary—shortcake cups and Cas pulling a Tupperware bowl of pink ice cream out of the freezer.
"I don't think it's too frozen…" Castiel murmured as he handed it off to Gabriel.
"Ooh~ Not bad, Cas." The Trickster grinned. "You mixed the berries in pretty evenly; a lot better than I expected."
Cas rolled his eyes this time, but chuckled goodheartedly as Gabriel placed scoops into each cup. "I still believe using the raspberry sauce as it was would have been a better idea." He said calmly as he pulled the carton of remaining raspberries and the whipped cream from the fridge.
"But…then it would run with the chocolate…" the archangel pouted, a bottle of Hershey's chocolate syrup appearing in his hand. "and that would ruin the presentation."
Cas chuckled and sprayed whipped cream over each scoop of ice cream, Gabriel following with drizzles of chocolate over the whipped cream.
The Winchesters stood in the doorway watching them, a bit too curious to be mad at either of them.
"Is this what you were trying to hide earlier?" Dean asked with a chuckle as Castiel carefully placed a raspberry on top of each shortcake.
Gabriel laughed lightly, flicking his wrist to replace the baking tray with small individual bowls under each cake. "Maybe." He taunted. "And we wouldn't have had to hide it so much if you two trusted us more."
"It's not that we 'don't trust you'!" Sam argued as Cas handed him one of the bowls.
"Yeah, the last time we let you guys cook, Cas almost burned the place down; and I know you started that fire on purpose when it was your turn, Gabe."
"It was a bad joke!" Gabriel whined. "I said I was sorry like 15 times!"
Sam grinned softly and moved to squeeze the archangel close to him as he pouted. "You see, Cassie?" he huffed. "We go to all this trouble, and they bring up our little mistakes like we're on trial or something."
Castiel smiled softly, eating a spoonful of the raspberry ice cream.
Dean did so as well, his eyes immediately lighting up. "Wow…You two did pretty well."
Gabriel brightened up immediately. "Oh, don't be silly, Deanie; just because Cas can't work a stove doesn't mean I'm completely incompetent." He pretended not to notice the daggers Castiel was glaring at him and lightly tickled Sam's chin. "Remind me to make something else for you sometime." He practically purred. "I bet I could find out your favorite kind of cake for you birthday."
The slightly shorter angel leaned over to Dean, catching him before he got too lost in the cake. "Dean, do you think you have any raspberries left over?"
Dean snorted, casting a smirk toward Gabriel and Sam as Castiel smiled brightly.