"How was the world created?"
Gabriel looks up from where he's laid out on the bed, head in Sam's lap and a book held open and propped on his chest. "Which world, kiddo?" he asks curiously, one eyebrow raised.
That hadn't occurred to Sam. "Our one, I guess, if it makes a difference," he says with a shrug, running an absent hand through Gabriel's hair.
"Which universe?" asks Gabriel, and this time he's grinning, eyes teasing as Sam huffs in exasperation.
"Stop being ridiculous."
"I'm not!" Gabriel's voice is full of innocent protestation, and Sam's not buying any of it. "Lots of universes out there, kiddo, and you've wandered around on this world in more than a few of them.
Sam sighs, thinks for a moment, and rephrases his question so it can't possibly be misinterpreted (and even then he's sure Gabriel will find a way). "How was the world that we're currently on, right now, created?"
Gabriel taps a thoughtful finger against his lips for a moment, book discarded and forgotten down by his hip. He opens his mouth, and then his face twists in a frown and he closes it again – which is something Sam's never seen before, Gabriel thinking before speaking.
"Lost for words?" he teases with a grin. "That's a first for you."
Gabriel scowls, and then opens his mouth, and a lightbulb shatters. Sam claps his hands over his ears with a yell as the sound of Gabriel's true voice ascends above human hearing. His eardrums throb in time to his heart, and the window pane cracks down the middle. Just as he opens his mouth to yell at Gabriel to stop, the archangel finishes with, "Basically, it wasawesome."
"What the hell," snaps Sam – which, considering he was the one that asked the question, is a little unfair. He scrubs the blood from under his ears with his sleeve, and glowers at Gabriel until the archangel's look of amusement softens.
"Best way I can explain it, kiddo," he says, patting Sam's knee with a wry smile and picking up his book again. He smoothes the pages where they were creased by contact with the bed, closing it with a snap and resting it flat on his stomach, stroking the cover. "You lot just don't have the words for it." He paused, tilting his head back thoughtfully. "Give it a few more thousand years, though, considering how fast you lot move, and you might have.
For a long moment, Sam's silent, processing this. Then he asks, "So the Bible's wrong, then?"
"The Bible?!" A surprised laugh punches its way out of Gabriel's chest, and his eyes dance as he raises an upside-down eyebrow at Sam. "You guys're still taking that literally? Seriously, the number of scribing errors in that thing, even when it was brand new…" Gabriel shakes his head as best he can with it still in Sam's lap.
Sam bristles a little at the archangel's amusement, feeling offended on behalf of all humanity. "Well, no, most people think the Big Bang-"
Gabriel doesn't laugh this time, but it's a near thing. "Ah, physics," he says, tone light and full of mirth. "You guys are so cute – you're still all about quantum theory and force-carriers and Einstein, right?" He grins, patting Sam's knew. "It's adorable. Wait until you lot get to permeable sonospheric graviton theory and wormhole-photon equilibrium resolutions, then we'll start talking."
"You use your archangel powers to go to the future and learn physics?" is the only thing Sam takes from that – although he recognises some of the words, he doesn't really know what Gabriel's talking about. He's a lawyer by training, not a physicist.
Gabriel looks offended by the mere implication that he might do something serious. "No, I use my archangel powers for hot, hot sex, making delicious food, and saving your oversized ass from all the things that want a bite of a Sammywich," he huffs, dragging his thumbnail down the underside of Sam's foot in revenge.
Sam yelps, does a full-body twitch, and the next few minutes are spent with him trying to shove Gabriel off his lap to no avail – Gabriel can, and does, turn on his 'made of stone' angel mode sometimes, which makes him damn near impossible to move.
Eventually, Sam gives up, and simply leans over Gabriel to rest his elbow on the join between his shoulder and collar bone. "So, if you're not taking future-physics classes in your spare time, where do you learn it?" he prompts, genuinely curious as he slowly piles the pressure onto the elbow on Gabriel's shoulder.
"There's a guy I go drinking with," says Gabriel, and Sam doesn't know why he even bothers being surprised any more. "Some 51st century idiot. Got a fiend he drags along sometimes – you'd like him, kiddo, same bad dress sense and face-eating hair – who is the whiniest drunk I have ever met. But yeah, get him tipsy and he'll start complaining about human physics to anyone who'll listen."
"Human physics?" asks Sam, frowning.
"Human physics," confirms Gabriel with a nod. "Plenty of things your physics don't apply to, me included." At Sam's raised eyebrow, he adds, "I'm a wavelength of celestial intent, kiddo, that can move faster than the speed of light, and I'm-" He breaks off with a growl, and then continues, "The archangel that is going to smite you if you don't stop that right now." He turns to glare at the elbow dug into his shoulder, eyes sliding up the long path to Sam's face and scowling at the hunter.
Sam shrugs. "No can do, kiddo," he says, in a mockery of Gabriel's voice as he grins down at the archangel.
The grin's wiped off his face a moment later when he feels teeth digging into his arm through the padding of his shirt. "Jesus, Gabe!" he yelps, finally shoving the archangel's head off his crossed legs. The bite wasn't that hard – hasn't left marks, when he rolls up his sleeve to check – but it was unexpected, and the raw surprise of teeth against his flesh has sent his heart racing with fight instinct.
"Using my Dad's name in bed?" manages Gabriel between chuckles, from where Sam's pushes sent his torso draped over the edge of the bed, head resting on the floor. "Kinky, Sammy."
"Shut up," says Sam, but his voice is tinged with amusement as the adrenaline calms down.
"No, no, really," says Gabriel, and though his voice is still teasing, there's an odd edge to it that catches on something in Sam's brain. "I like that in a man."
"Not interested in hearing it, Gabe," warns Sam, because learning about an archangel's sex life is so not what he wants to do with his morning. Sighing, he reaches down and pulls Gabriel back onto the bed, missing the flash of disappointment across the archangel's face as he shifts Gabriel back onto the mattress.
"Fine, fine. But you don't know what you're missing, kiddo, seriously," he says, keeping his tone joking as he resettles his head on Sam's crossed legs, picking up his book again. Sam laughs, shakes his head, and goes back to his own book again, and agrees with Gabriel inside the privacy of his own head.
They read in silence for another half-hour, before Castiel and Dean return and drag them out to lunch, and the incident is consigned to memory.