A/N: I was supposed to be finishing the next instalments for other two fics that I have on the go. So I wrote this instead. Sorry, I will drag my focus back at some point. On a positive note, I passed my exams! Unfortunately term just started again and I have literally no time.

A/N2: This is sort of the beginning to a new series that is floating around my head where Alec is travelling with the Winchesters. Basically this is a backstory one-shot.

Then

Alec believed that the guy was completely insane right up until he blinked and found himself somewhere else. Some when else. Then he believed that the guy was a vicious Machiavellian bastard. That part was true.

Alec had enough experience with being tortured and manipulated to know when he was being tortured and manipulated. Of course, Manticore had never called it torture. They'd dressed it up as reindoctrination and training, and murdered anyone who said differently.

Well, Alec had had more than enough of that for one lifetime. So, if what this Zachariah guy wanted was a short and simple 'Yes', what he was getting was a short and simple, "No way in Hell!" Zach could rant and rave about archangels and Lucifer and Armageddon all he wanted. Leopards don't change their spots, and this leopard was one stubborn, unyielding son of a test-tube. Actually he was more a jaguar than a leopard but he doubted if that particular proverb had been written with Manticore in mind. So he said no, and no, and no again. He was right in the middle of saying no when another guy showed up, stabbed old Zach through the chest and blinked Alec somewhere completely different.

It took a couple of human Hunters to make the Archangel Gabriel decide that he'd been sitting on the side lines long enough. He'd removed himself from the field several millenia ago, giving the Morning Star and God's Right Hand space to duke it out as only brothers can.

But enough was enough. Earth was Gabriel's playground and playing his raison d'etre. So when the Winchesters had finally convinced him it was time to pick a side, well, he had. Besides, Zach was being a douche, and if there was one thing Gabriel in all his incarnations (be it Archangel, Loki, or Trickster) couldn't abide, it was self important, blow hard douches. Which Zachariah should have remembered before stealing a clone of Dean Winchester from an alternate timeline and torturing him into saying yes to Michael.

Now

Of course, now that Gabriel had possession of said clone he wasn't entirely sure what to do with him. So he'd just sort of, kept him. Which was the sort of thing that tended to happen when Winchesters were involved. So here he was, the great Archangel Gabriel, in the Elysian Fields Hotel, gearing up for a confrontation with his second most irritating brother whilst babysitting a genetically spliced and diced Winchester. He looked at the young man consideringly, "I know you're awake." Green eyes flicked open. "Look, just, stay out of the way okay. Oh, and try not to get killed."

The guy that had rescued Alec from Zachariah was facing off with yet another guy who had just throw Alec against the wall with a wave of his hand. Maybe he was part of the Breeding Cult, some of them had telekinesis, didn't they? Although, maybe Alec had hit his head because another guy, who looked exactly like the guy that had rescued him from Zach. Jeez, Alec really needed to learn some names. Okay, shorty clone was sneaking up on Meany while Meany was distracted by the first Shorty. Meanwhile, Meany was...

Oh crap! That wasn't going to end well. Alright Alec, time to prove your X-5 chops. Alec blurred. He pushed off his right foot, leaping into the air and using his left against a table top to pivot in mid air. He grabbed Shorty Number One's blade on the way and driving it through Meany's sternum. The blond was halfway through his own rapid spin and their combined momentum sent them careening to the ground. There was a brilliant flash of light. So incandescent that Alec barely registered the shadow of great wings that shuddered and flared. The blade that had been milliseconds away from Shorty Clone's heart went skittering across the floor.

Alec blinked away the shadowy motes that were dancing across his vision and looked up. The Shorties were staring at him, mouths agape. "You know, of all the ways I thought that was going to play out. That was not it. Congratulations Kitten, you just axed The Devil."