Author's note: Thanks so much to Larkafree, Maknatuna, Maddy Love Castiel, RachelPhobia, Treeni, FireChildSlytherin5, Kirabaros, PercyJfan1802, kb18142, Improbabile, random yet loveable, eiahlaie, Sophia Griffin, Chichi-10018, baileylovesyou0400, Fallen's child, Riceball-1989 and XxZessxX for last chapter's reviews!
Special thanks to Treeni for beta-reading!
2
"Dean! What's going on here?" Sam exclaimed as soon as he found his older brother huddled up against the wall of the day room. The younger Winchester didn't think that he had seen his brother this openly and obviously scared since their run in with yellow fever, a fact that spoke for itself. Something was definitely fishy.
"I'm going crazy, Sammy," Dean replied, looking at his younger brother for a moment before he quickly looked away again, as if he had seen something unpleasant, "I was having therapy sessions with… nobody. She was only in my head! And now I'm seeing wraiths everywhere!"
Sam frowned deeply. That Dean was having hallucinations explained how it was possible he had mistaken Dr. Fuller for a wraith. There was no explanation for why the older Winchester was seeing things that weren't there in the first place, though. Alright, there was a very obvious explanation, but they had already jumped to conclusions once before. Sam wasn't too eager to repeat the mistake they had made, especially not with the psychiatrist's words were ringing in his ears.
"What the hell is happening?" the younger Winchester asked, turning to Gabriel. The archangel was standing next to Sam casually, looking around the room and unwrapping a piece of candy. Sam couldn't be sure, but he assumed that Gabriel was assessing the situation and looking for their wraith under the façade of mild curiosity he had put up.
"Hell's got nothing to do with it," Gabriel explained, popping the lemon drop into his mouth before he extended his hand toward the older Winchester, "Your wraith must have gotten his fingers on Dean-o."
Dean looked like he was ready to bolt, staring at the archangel's hand as it came ever closer to his head, as if it was a deadly weapon. Sam couldn't help thinking that, in theory, Gabriel's hands actually were deadly weapons. Not that the archangel would have to touch them to kill them or that he'd want to kill them in the first place.
The younger Winchester put a steadying hand on his brother's shoulder, effectively keeping Dean from running away with the gesture, too. As much as the overly cocky and confident attitude his brother often displayed annoyed Sam, he clearly preferred it over the 'deer caught in the headlights, ready to bolt' version of Dean he had in front of him.
"Maybe it got you, too. I didn't pay that much attention to what drugs exactly, I removed from your system," Gabriel told Sam, while he pressed two fingers against Dean's forehead to rid him of the wraith's influence. A part of the archangel had hoped that the younger Winchester would take this new – and this far best – excuse for any kind of violent behavior he might have displayed earlier and run with it, but one look at the taller man's face revealed that he wasn't dreaming of it.
"So you're saying that the wraith got in contact with both of us?" Sam asked with a frown. That new piece of information didn't make it much easier to figure out who the wraith was. There were a few people they both had been in contact with since they had gotten themselves committed.
"Bingo," Gabriel replied, shaking his head slightly when he saw the thoughtful look on Sam's face. Like the Winchesters would really have trouble finding the wraith now that the archangel was with them! Gabriel just had to get one look at the thing to know exactly what it was, no matter how good its human disguise might be. Perks of being an archangel.
"Sam, what's he doing here?" Dean groaned, blinking a few times. The older Winchester felt like he had just woken up from a very realistic nightmare, but Gabriel's presence made him wonder if he really had woken up yet.
"Don't ask me, I don't know," Sam shrugged, throwing a side glance toward the archangel. The younger Winchester realized that he should have asked why the smaller man had shown up in the middle of a hunt, but he had been a little preoccupied.
"I'm helping you muttonheads, that's what I'm doing," Gabriel stated, throwing his hands in the air showily. It was just typical Dean behavior to immediately be suspicious. The older Winchester could use a few lessons in trusting the people who had helped him previously, but the archangel had other priorities than coming up with some pocket universe that could teach Dean exactly that.
"We were doing fine without you," Dean huffed, crossing his arms in front of his chest. Alright, things hadn't looked that great for them for a minute there, but they would have solved their problems and the case soon enough. There was absolutely no need for the archangel to be there!
"Yeah, I could see that," Gabriel commented with a slight smirk. However, this wasn't the time or the place to have a pissing contest with Dean, so the archangel decided to get them back to the other topic at hand. There would be a time to discuss everything else once they were done with this case. "Let's just get rid of that pesky wraith and get back to your home base. There's so much we need to discuss."
Sam looked surprised at that announcement, but not in a bad way. The younger Winchester had sounded so hopeful when he had asked, if the archangel was going to be around for a longer period of time, while Sam was still under the influence of the drugs. The drugs were gone, but the human obviously still liked the thought of having Gabriel with them.
"If you think that we'll…" Dean began to protest. The older Winchester didn't even get to finish his statement about how delusional Gabriel had to be if he thought that they were going to work with him, though.
"You have an Apocalypse at your hands, I have a way to stop it. You sure you don't want to talk to me?" Gabriel asked in a serious tone. The stunned silence that announcement got from both brothers was enough of an answer. "Thought so."
Sam didn't want to get his hopes up, but there was a part of him that simply trusted that Gabriel was going to make things right for them. Dean, of course, looked more suspicious than anything else. The older Winchester didn't believe that things that were too good to be true could be anything other than lies.
"You really have a way for us to… stop all this?" Sam asked quietly, his eyes searching Gabriel's for any trace of deception. The younger Winchester wanted to believe that the archangel was telling the truth, he wanted Gabriel to have the solution for their problem and he wanted them all to work on it together, because that was their best shot at stopping the Apocalypse. At the same time Sam couldn't help thinking that the last time they had had a plan, Ellen and Jo had died for it and it had all been for nothing.
"I'm on your side, Sambo," Gabriel replied just as quietly, touching the human's arm reassuringly. That however, ended abruptly when Dean decided to obnoxiously clear his throat. The archangel knew that he'd have to prove himself to a lot of people, before they would consider him as just another member of the team, but it looked like it wouldn't be that hard to get back into Sam's good graces, at least.
In the end, the hunt for the wraith was over as quickly as it had begun. The nurse had walked around the corner, Gabriel had caught one look at her and had snapped his fingers to make her go up in flames. Of course, Dean had complained that it had been their hunt and that they were perfectly capable of finishing their own hunts, but even the older Winchester had to admit that only a very small pile of ash being left instead of a whole body, made it much easier to escape without raising all the alarms.
Once they were standing next to the Impala, it became clear that none of them knew where they were going from there. Gabriel had already told the two Winchesters that he wanted to talk to them, but what he was planning wasn't a conversation they could have in passing, standing in a parking lot.
"You want to talk? Fine," Dean decided after a few moments of heavy silence, "We'll be at Bobby's in about ten hours."
Listening to what the archangel had to say was a good idea, even the older Winchester had to admit that. Even though he didn't trust that Gabriel had the solution he had said he had, Dean still acknowledged that they had to give it a chance. It wasn't like they already had a plan to even work with, so anything might turn out to be better than nothing.
"What? I don't get to ride with you?" Gabriel asked in a teasing tone, nodding toward the Impala. Honestly, the archangel had only brought up the possibility of driving to Sioux Falls with the Winchesters, because he knew that it would annoy Dean. The older Winchester was too easy to tease at times.
"You're not getting into my baby again," Dean replied, stony faced. They weren't going to spend hours with the trickster in the backseat, absolutely not! It was bad enough that they'd have to spend time with the little bastard when they arrived at Bobby's!
"You were saying?" the archangel's smug voice came from the backseat of the Impala, just a second after Dean had made his opinion on him being in the car clear. It was admittedly, only about proving to the bullheaded Winchester that there was nothing he could do to keep Gabriel from doing whatever the hell he wanted.
"Dean, can't we just…?" Sam suggested diplomatically, rubbing his forehead. The younger Winchester just wanted to get away from this place and talk about the plans Gabriel had been speaking about. He didn't want to watch his brother and the archangel having a pissing contest, especially since it was quite likely that Gabriel would zap himself out of the car after ten minutes the latest. Apparently, Dean was counting on the archangel's boredom, too. He had different ideas about how it was most likely going to play out, though.
"No! I'm not spending ten hours on the road with him!" Dean interrupted his younger brother in a defiant tone, "I don't want him to get bored and litter my baby with his candy wrappers, I don't want him to prank drivers that pass us by and I don't want him in my car!"
The older Winchester could already see them driving into trees or getting off the road, because of some stupid thing the trickster had done. Dean also didn't fancy the thought of being hunted down by a biker gang, because of Gabriel throwing candy at them! Besides, the older Winchester wanted to speak to his brother just between the two of them before they talked about any plans the archangel might have.
"If you put it like that, Dean-o," Gabriel stated, once more standing outside of the Impala, "Ten hours is awfully long. I'll meet you there then."
The archangel was gone within the blink of an eyes, but Sam couldn't help feeling a little paranoid. The younger Winchester didn't mention the fact that Gabriel might have made himself invisible instead of disappearing to his brother, though. There was no need to bring Dean's mood down further.
"Ten hours, Dean?" Sam said after they had gotten into the car. It didn't really matter, if Gabriel heard about that little detail. For all the younger Winchester knew, the archangel knew everything about how long driving certain distances took, anyway. "The way you drive, we'll be there in eight."
"So? Maybe I just want a little more time without that dick with wings," Dean retorted, pulling out of the parking lot. It was worrying that Sam apparently didn't see things the way his older brother did. The older Winchester feared that they would have to have a probably, unpleasant conversation about Gabriel's involvement in their lives soon.
"Do you think he's really going to help us?" Sam asked a few minutes later. The younger Winchester wasn't sure if Gabriel had been in the car with them at the start of their journey, but he was confident that the archangel wouldn't hang around for more than three Metallica songs. Gabriel seemed to be a ball of energy usually. It was doubful that the archangel could sit still for longer than that.
"Who knows?" Dean answered, shrugging. The older Winchester threw a side glance toward his brother and couldn't say he liked what he saw from his brother. Dean sighed heavily before saying, "Sammy, I know… I know you liked him when we were both younger, but he's still the fucking Trickster."
The older Winchester had the sinking feeling that this wouldn't be the last time he'd have to say something on the topic. Sam might be acting reasonably this far, but it would have to been seen how long that was going to last when they spent more time around Gabriel. Dean hadn't forgotten how much his brother had latched on to the archangel during the time they had spent with the man as kids.
"I know, Dean," Sam replied, not quite meeting his brother's eyes. The archangel's second identity as the trickster was something the younger Winchester doubted he would ever forget. Sam wished he could forget it and just focus on the things Gabriel had done for them – especially, for him. Apparently, that was exactly what Dean was afraid of. Of course, the younger Winchester could see where his brother was coming from after the entire disaster with Ruby.
"Just don't get your hopes up," the older Winchester stated. He didn't give his younger brother the chance to reply before he reached for the radio to turn the volume up. They had a couple more hours before they had to deal with the trickster again and Dean fully intended to enjoy them.
