A/N So, a couple of months ago, I did a post-Sacrifice outsider!POV collab project with The Resurrectionist, who happens to be one of the most amazing people to collab with. Anyway, in one of the chapters, I introduced these characters who turned out to be ridiculously fun to write, and I've been slowly working out a story for them. I'm trying to keep this as much within canon as possible. Just, y'know, with my own characters. For anyone who's already read the collab story, this first chapter's just a re-upload of what I posted there, but I suggest you read it again anyway. It has been MAJORLY edited, and is a very long WIP.

This is dedicated to Vendelareader for inspiring me to actually continue this. Enjoy! :) ~Sammy

Nothing, save the ash on your mantle

Chapter One

I shifted on the barstool, trying to get more comfortable, because I was pretty sure that with the way things were going, I was going to have to keep my ass parked there for a couple of hours. Jackie was tipping back shots every three seconds, and she was already halfway down the lane to totally wasted. As her bridesmaid, it was my responsibility to make sure she didn't get alcohol poisoning, but I let her drink herself to oblivion anyway. Being left standing at the alter by an asshole who ran off with some wannabe-actress tended to leave people feeling like shit, so I supposed that drowning oneself in alcohol was an acceptable coping mechanism.

I picked at the bowl of pretzels in front of me, and pulled a drag from the newest sweating bottle of beer in front of me. After about seven minutes of tracing out patterns in the wood-grain of the bar-table, I glanced up at the muted television. A stuck-up looking news-anchor seemed to be talking about something in a tone that could not have been anything but two shades more than disinterested, considering the way she was perched way too stiffly on her chair. The headlines flashing across the screen were the same they had been all week. All anybody had been talking about for the past five days was the crazy star show that had lit up the skies, as stars apparently crashed into the earth.

Yeah, right.

I scoffed at the news report, and the blonde bartender looked over at me, still wiping down the rough tabletop. He glanced up at the television, then back at my disbelieving expression, and he reached up and switched the channel to some basketball game, earning quite a few whoops of approval from the drunk group of men standing over at one of the pool tables. The bartender took away my empty bottles and put a new one in front of me, the top popping off with a hiss. He grinned at me. "On the house."

I raised the bottle at him in a salute before taking a sip. "Thanks."

His smile turned knowing. "You looked like you needed it."

I nodded, and he leaned forward, propping himself up with one arm, the other still clutching a dishrag. "So, I'm going to assume that you don't really put much faith in the whole 'the sky is falling' thing?"

I shook my head and chuckled, albeit coming off rather tipsy. I really couldn't hold my alcohol. "Naw, I think it's just complete bull. I mean, seriously, who'd believe that the stars are actually crashing into the ground? It's ridiculous."

The bartender raised an eyebrow at me. "So, what, you think that there's a reasonable explanation for it?"

I was pretty sure that my expression was conveying my thoughts of 'duh' in so many ways that my eyebrows were curling into weird hairy squiggly lines of exasperation. "Look here... uh..."

"Jason. The name's Jason."

"Well then, Jason, listen up. Everything's got a reasonable explanation. This whole star-falling crap isn't any different. It's probably just some freak meteor shower or something, nothing more."

Jason looked thoughtful for a few moments before shrugging. "I guess that that makes sense. You're probably the first logical drunk person I've gotten here, y'know, who hasn't been yammering on about angels falling from the skies."

I scoffed. "Angels? Really? That's what everybody thinks they are? Damn, and I thought that I had issues."

Jason laughed then, I thought it sounded a bit off, but I'd learned long ago to give up on my alcohol soaked brain's insane attempt at intuition, because it was literally the most embarrassing ever, actually,how many times I'd been wrong about someone while wasted. I looked around for one quick moment to see Jackie pressed up against some random dude, who was, by the way, seriously hot, her tongue rammed down his throat. And, okay, maybe my judgment wasn't at its best, what with the alcohol muddling my brain, and the attractive bartender Jason in front of me, but I just let her make out with Hot Dude, because honestly, she needed some cheering up. Anyway, it wasn't like I was gonna let her go home with him. I may have been drunk, but I wasn't an idiot.

Jason rapped his knuckles on the wood of the bar, and when I turned back to him, his expression was serious again. In my drunken haze, it would've been funny, what with the little crease in between his eyebrows, and his gray eyes all business-like, but somehow I managed to keep myself from giggling like an idiot. His lips were moving, and I struggled to keep up with what he was saying. "So, you really aren't even going to consider the possibility that the angel-theory is right?"

I shrugged, and straightened up. (When did I start sagging over the table?) "I don't really even believe in angels. I used to, when I was a kid. I'd pray every night y'know. I prayed for all those people who had less than me, who were worse off. I prayed for all the people who needed saving. I never prayed for myself. Didn't think I needed to. And then, the one time I asked for something, nothing happened. I just prayed that my mom make it out of the hospital okay, that was it, but..."

I trailed off, and Jason somewhat awkwardly patted my shoulder, even as I brushed away the few tears that had collected in my eyes after slipping past my too-drunk-to-care emotional barriers. I sighed. "Anyway, I stopped praying after that. I didn't believe anymore. So, no, I don't think that it was angels. But if it was angels that were falling, then I'm glad. They deserve it, don't they?"

Jason was silent for a few moments, staring at the bottle cap he was twirling around in his fingers. I thought, for a minute, that he was mumbling something, but I dismissed it as an alcohol induced hallucination, because the very next second he looked up and disarmed me with a smile, and damn, were those dimples?

I smiled back, because, hey, I was kinda drunk, the guy was cute, and who cared if he didn't answer my question? It was a rhetorical one anyway. Or, well, I thought it was. I took another sip from my fourth (fifth?) bottle of beer, and frowned when it turned out to be empty. Jason pulled out another bottle, but I waved it away, shaking my head. "No, I think I should stop now. I won't be any help to Jackie if we're both completely wasted."

"Jackie that girl with Klein's tongue in her mouth?"

I nodded and rolled my eyes as best as I could without succumbing to nausea. Jason chuckled when Jackie looked away from Hot Dude Klein for a second to send me a cheery wave and blow a kiss in my general direction. I waved back at her, and started picking at the pretzels again. Jason shot me one last smile, before drifting away to serve some new customers that had walked in. I watched as he poured out drinks and chatted easily with everybody. An unfaltering grin was spread across his face, except for the few times he'd glance back up at he television, as if to reassure himself that it was still flickering with testosterone-packed images of the basketball game. In those moments, there was a flash of wistfulness, and something that looked awfully like sadness.

Fifteen minutes into my impromptu game of Stare-At-The-Cute-Bartender, Jason walked through some door behind the bar, probably headed to a back room or something, and another bartender came up to replace him. I supposed that she was pretty, with her brown curls and her blue eyes. Her name-tag read as 'Amy', and she seemed good enough, but I sighed at the loss of my cute bartender friend.

I went back to tracing the swirls in the wood-grain, not even looking up when somebody collapsed into the stool next to mine. Amy bounced over and said, in a voice that was way too chipper to be natural, "Hey there, I'm Amy. What can I get ya?"

There was a heavy pause, and then the deep voice that answered her was laced with uncertainty. "I'm not entirely sure what I am supposed to order. I have never been to an establishment like this before."

I looked up to see Amy standing there, her hands on her hips, a furrow between her brows. She looked appalled. "You mean to say that you've never been to a bar before?"

"I've never had the need to."

I turned, as surreptitiously as my drunkenness allowed, which meant I held all the grace of a blind octopus who'd been drugged to high heaven, to look at the guy sitting at my side. He was all dressed up in a suit, but he looked like he'd been dragged through a meat grinder a few hundred times. Not to say that he wasn't attractive, because honestly, I'd kiss that face, it was just that he looked like he'd taken on a semi truck and lost a couple dozen times over. His gray tie was askew and the matching blazer was rumpled, his dress shirt was wrinkled, his light brown hair all over the place, his green eyes red-rimmed and haunted. He looked exhausted, and even as he slouched in his seat, he somehow managed to look stiff and awkward.

He looked like a kicked puppy, and I saw the exact moment where Amy finally took it in, and her shocked demeanor changed to that of a woman cooing over a baby. "Oh, sweetie. What's your name hon?"

Another long silence, and when the man did answer, he sounded close to tears. I just barely managed to keep myself from hugging him. But that would be weird, and I was totally not one of those drunks. "I am Elidiah."

Weird name or not, Amy looked like she was three seconds short of squealing over how adorable he was, so I decided to save the poor guy from her. I cleared my throat. "Amy, how about you stop staring, and get the man a glass of whiskey. He looks like shit."

Amy flounced away, and when I looked back at him, Elidiah's eyes had widened a bit, and I smiled apologetically. "Sorry. You do look like crap, and I don't really have a brain to mouth filter when I'm drunk. Jackie's always going on and on and on about how much I ramble when I have too much to drink, but she's usually drinking more than I am, so what does she know, right? Oh, and my name's Valerie, in case you were wondering. You probably weren't, though. Gosh, Jacks is right. I do ramble, don't I? God, I need to learn how to shut up, and here I am, still talking I don't even-"

Elidiah cut me off mid-drunk-freakout by ever so carefully putting a hand on my wrist and giving me a tentative smile. He looked much nicer when he smiled. "Valerie. She was an angel. In charge of keeping records, I think. I did not know much about her."

I shrugged, not nearly drunk enough to get into specifics about the origins of my name, but I went with it anyway. Heck, I was just happy I hadn't scared the man off with my random-ass meltdown. "Yeah, I guess I do have an angel name. Yours is more angelic-y than mine, though."

(Was 'angelic-y' even a word? Whatever. Drunk people got free passes, even the ones that were supposed to be top-of-the-whole-freaking-class language majors.)

He sorta smiled at me, still looking very unsure, and that was followed by a few very awkward moments of complete silence, Elidiah still watching me intently. Amy popped up again, a tall glass of whiskey in her hands, and she placed it in front of him before bouncing away again. Elidiah looked bewildered for a few seconds, and I sighed. I nudged him with my elbow. "Drink it. You'll feel better."

Eli (when did I start calling the dude Eli?) stared at me with those damn green eyes for a few more seconds before picking up the glass and downing the whole thing in one quick gulp. He flinched, probably from the burn of the alcohol, and when he turned back to me, he was swaying a bit. "That is… very potent. It wasn't quite so strong the last time…"

He trailed off, and even as I watched, tears formed in his eyes. I put a hand on his shoulder in what, I hope, came off as supportive. "Hey, hey, what's wrong?"

He just shook his head, looking absolutely devastated, and that look made his inner kicked- puppy just hog the damn spotlight. "I'm not sure. I'm just so weak now. I used to be so strong, almost invincible. I was a leader, one of the highest command, and now? Now I'm just sitting in some strange bar, and I can't even consume a single glass of alcohol without breaking. I'm not strong anymore. I'm nothing."

Okay, obviously, drunk-me was not the best communicator because all I could come up with to answer that was a slow blink and a very confused, "What?"

"Have you ever fought a battle, Valerie? It isn't a pleasant experience."

I stared at him for a few moments, his words making absolutely no sense to me. Suddenly, something clicked within my booze-addled mind, and I could finally understand what he was saying. "Wait, you were a soldier? I- I didn't know."

He shook his head a bit, his lips twisting into a smile that look strangely stiff even as it was caustic, as if he was unfamiliar with bitterness. "I suppose it would be unreasonable to hope for you to know. It's probably better that way, anyway. Creatures like you shouldn't know about some things. We wouldn't want you to break, would we?"

Something about what he said sounded strange, but I was too far gone in a beer-induced haze to bother thinking about it too much. I touched the soft fingers he still had wrapped wound my wrist with my free hand, and he looked up from the dregs of the whiskey he had been staring at. I smiled. "You okay?"

He nodded, and somehow, even as he managed to look even more miserable, I couldn't bring myself to call him out on his lie. Amy slammed another drink down in front of him, and I watched as it too, suffered the same fate as the first one. All swallowed in one long desperate sip. Then another drink, and another, and maybe a few shots of something strong and then a beer or two, and he was still somehow conscious. Drunk as hell, but conscious. Softly crying, but conscious. Stumbling and lost, but conscious.

"You know," he said, and I listened, because I was still buzzed, Jackie somehow got bundled off into a cab and went home at some point, and he was interesting. "I used to be respected. Used to be powerful. Used to follow orders and lead well, and I fought so much, I killed so many of my brothers. Killed them. Why'd I kill them? Why? I could have disobeyed. I could have said no. It wasn't impossible. It had been done before. He did it. He disobeyed our superiors. Said that he'd do it his own way. Of course, everybody wanted him dead then, and he messed things up even more, but he did it."

He waved his arm in a wide sweeping motion, spilling some of the beer from his bottle, but he didn't seem to notice.

"I hated all the wars. Hated how I had to keep killing. Just because it had been ordered. Just because they wanted it. There're so many lives that ended because of me. So many fallen brothers. So much fighting. And the most brilliant part is, I didn't realize how bad it was until I was forced out of it. I didn't realize how much I wished I could stop, until I was thrown out. And now I'm weak, I'm lost, and getting drunk is still an effort."

I was totally smashed, and my empathy levels weren't at their finest, but damn if I didn't want to shed a few tears of my own at the man's words. "I'm sorry. I can't pretend like I can understand what that was like, but I'm sorry you had to go through that."

Eli's lips twitched into something that could maybe pass off as a smile, and he sounded much less dunk than he did five seconds before. "Thank you. I- I needed the company."

I frowned at his words. Didn't he have anyone? "Don't you have any family? Friends?"

He shook his head. "No. Well, I do have family, but I can't reach them anymore, I don't even know where they are. As for friends, I was under the impression that you were my friend. Or was I mistaken?"

I almost choked on my beer (and okay I wasn't supposed to drink anymore, but who really gives a shit?), and I spluttered incoherently for a few seconds before finally composing myself. "I don't- I mean, I… huh. I suppose we are friends."

Five minutes later (or maybe it was a half hour later), I may have possibly downed another bottle of beer, and maybe I was a little too drunk to even keep myself upright, but it was okay, because Elidiah was holding me up with his shoulder, and I was blabbering on about something. It wasn't really all that important or anything, but Eli was listening with rapt attention, like I was revealing the secrets of the universe to him. I was in the process of explaining how anybody who hated Harry Potter was an idiot, when a hand landed on my shoulder. I turned to see a creepy-as-hell grin aimed at me, accompanied by bloodshot brown eyes that were seriously unfocused. The man was swaying, and his breath stank of a dozen different kinds of alcohol. "Hey there, hotness. How about you let me buy you a drink?"

I jerked back, missing the way Eli had stiffened, and shook my head. "Thanks, but I think I'm good."

"C'mon doll, don't play hard to get. Just one drink."

Eli fixed the guy with one of his intense stares. "Sir, I believe that she already said that she isn't interested. Leave her alone."

The man chuckled and his grip on my shoulder tightened. "I wasn't talking to you, dumbass. So how about you take your gay shit and say it to someone who gives a damn. Me, I'm gonna have a drink with gorgeous here."

I scowled at him. "I told you already, I don't want one. Go hit on someone else, jerkwad."

The man looked more than a little bit pissed at that. "So, what? You just gonna sit here with this faggot wannabe soldier? Yeah, I heard what the pussy was whining about. I betchya that the bitch didn't even have the balls to raise a gun."

The hand was suddenly off my shoulder, and the asshole it belonged to was all the way on the other side of the room, sitting amongst the broken wood and glass of one of the tables. The man looked dazed, but furious, and when he wobbled to his feet, Elidiah literally growled, and stepped ahead of me. My mind finally caught up, and I realized that it was Elidiah who had thrown the drunken ass across the room. Huh.

Eli, for his own part, had a fearsome expression on his face, and any doubt I had of him not being a soldier was wiped away. His fingers twitched, almost like they were reaching for something that should have been there, but wasn't. One split second of disappointment flashed in his green eyes, before they hardened again, hatred and anger seeping out from him like heat waves. When he spoke, the words rumbled out amidst snarls. "Don't you ever even suggest that. Do not dare. I've been fighting battles from before the thought of you was even conceived. I have had to murder my brothers, all for ignorant humans like you. So never say that my brothers' sacrifice, that my sacrifice means nothing. Because if it wasn't for me, you would not even exist. So I suggest, that you show me some respect."

The asshole, drunk-to-his-eyeballs as he may have been, sure heard the underlying threat in Eli's words, because his jaw twitched, and something like fear shone through his bravado. He lurched forward, staggering, and the gathered crowd parted in his wake. He spat out his words like they were poison droplets resting on his tongue. "I'm not going to respect some faggot just because he's got a fucking god-complex."

"Do not take the Lord's name in vain."

"Yeah? Well what are you gonna do about it, cunt?"

The idiot loomed over Eli, and Elidiah looked him straight in the eye, fury rolling off of him. Then, in a flurry of movement that felt like a lifetime but was probably over in half a second, Eli had the guy pinned under him, the asshole's arm twisted to an unnatural and definitely painful angle. I would have cringed in pity, but honestly, the dude deserved it. Freaking asshat. The guy was moaning, almost definitely shedding a few tears, and he kept up a repetitive litany of I'msorry I'msorry I'msorry I'msorry I'msorry.

Eli slowly stood up, releasing his death grip on the man, and I swear that for a moment, a gleam of something pure and righteous shone in his eyes. A gasp from behind me had Elidiah turning to look past me. I turned to see Jason standing there, a box in his hands, shock written clearly across his face. "Elidiah." he said, his face pale in the dim bar lights.

I took a step forward, but something was wrong. The floor felt unsteady beneath my feet, like a ship at sea, and everything faded out to a low garble of sounds. My vision blurred, first just around the edges, but soon darkness enveloped me, and the last thing I could hear was Eli's worried voice. "Jassoniel, help her."

I had always wondered what it felt like, to collapse in the arms of someone you trust.

Static was roaring in my ears, and I floundered in the darkness.

As I clawed my way back to consciousness, I could hear a pair of voices near me, and I concentrated on them, hoping to ground myself.

"I thought you were dead, eons ago."

"I wouldn't make it that easy for Naomi. I ran."

A rustle that sounded like cloth sliding over cloth. "But her soldiers, they're powerful. Even Castiel-"

"Castiel escaped her grasp."

"He- Did you help him?"

A sigh. "No. Castiel's escape was different to mine. He overcame it. I fell."

"You- you fell?"

"I had no other choice. Raphael was acting strange, Michael was Father-knows-where, I had nowhere to hide."

"So you ripped it out? Jassoniel…"

"Tell me, brother, is it not freeing? Is it not beautiful? To be able to feel, to be able to choose? It's beautiful. They're beautiful. This is what humanity is. This is what we were made to protect. And this is what I chose. To live with the humans, to have free will. It's a better fate than what Naomi had in store for me."

"Is it… good? This life?"

"It is, little one. It's a good life."

"Falling hurt. It hurts to have to breathe, to sleep. I'm scared that this life will hurt too."

"I know that you're scared, Elidiah. All our brothers and sisters are. I was too. It's different, strange. But it doesn't hurt. I promise you, it doesn't. Not like the Wars did. This hurt is better, purer."

"Jassoniel?"

"Yes?"

"Is Valerie going to be alright?"

"She'll be fine. Just drank too much and had a bit too much excitement for one evening. She'll wake up soon."

"Will she remember any of this?"

Another sigh, softer this time. "I don't think so. Alcohol tends to make people forget a lot. I wouldn't want her to remember, anyway."

"Why not?"

"She stopped believing in angels, Elidiah."

"Why would she-?"

"We left one too many prayers unanswered."

I retched over the porcelain bowl, and Jackie rubbed my back supportively. I groaned at the smell of puke, and she chuckled. "You're such a lightweight Val. Why'd you have to drink so much last night? You know you have seriously messed up hangovers."

I just threw up a bit more before panting out an answer. "Just because you somehow never get hangovers. S'not fair, you drank so much more than I did last night. Friggin' witchcraft, is what it is."

"Well yeah, kinda got ditched by my fiancé and all. And I do know my limits. You on the other hand… you threw up as soon as you walked into the apartment."

I moaned at the memory. "Oh God, don't remind me."

"What even happened last night?"

"You were there, Jackie."

"Yeah, but I left before you really got wasted. So, spill. What happened?"

I shook my head, only succeeding in aggravating that damn headache. "I don't even know. There was something with that bartender, and then some other guy. Eli… something."

Jackie whistled. "Well now, two guys? Not bad Val, I didn't know you had it in you."

I glared at her. "It wasn't like that."

Jackie just laughed and left some aspirin next to me, laughing louder when I flipped the bird at her.

I threw up some more.

Jackie must have turned the television on, because obnoxiously loud music was blaring from the depths of the apartment.

"I hate you!" I yelled.

"I know!" she tossed back.

Oh God, I needed new friends.

There was that stuck-up news anchor's voice again, still droning on about the 'widespread panic concerning what the government is calling a freak meteor shower'.

And this time, instead of the usual surge of skepticism and rationale, a single word echoed in my aching head.

Angels.

A/N This is weird. I love it anyway. I also love what's coming up next. Let me know what you thought in a review! Thanks for reading! :) ~Sammy