So, I'm going to have one of the canon hunts go sideways because of the butterfly effect. Any requests for which hunt it is?

It isn't until Sam is listening in to the angels one morning while Dean's driving them towards what is probably another pagan god eating people (and, seriously, what is it with pagan gods and eating people?) that he remembers that kid, Jesse something, who was frighteningly powerful and didn't even know it.

The Cambion should be found, one of the angels intones and Sam sits up straight in his seat, startling Dean. We must discover a way to control his potential.

"Sammy?" Dean asks, but Sam shushes him, listening intently as orders are given in Heaven.

"He doesn't have his powers yet," Sam mutters. "Fuck, he's wide open."

"Sam?" Dean says.

Jesse was frighteningly powerful, in a way totally unlike anything else Sam had ever met because it was all unconscious. He didn't know it was there. "What town was that?" Sam mutters. "Fuck, I can't remember." He turns to look at Dean, who is about ready to pull the car onto the shoulder. "Dean, we gotta go somewhere immediately."

"Okay," Dean agrees, glancing in the rearview before hitting the brakes, shifting back into park, and turning the ignition off.

Sam focuses on Jesse, on his blind faith in Dean, on his shock at transforming Castiel into a toy and then they're there, in front of that house, which looms exactly as forebodingly as it did last time. He reaches, spreading his senses throughout the town and there's one bright spot. Sam has no idea how to shield a stranger the way he has himself and Dean but he figures it can't be much different and he has to do it right now.

When he finally blinks back into awareness, Dean is patiently waiting in the driver's seat. "So, where are we and why, Sammy?"

"There's a kid we gotta help," he says. "He's, like, the Anti-Christ or something?"

"Okay, why not," Dean says. "Well, it's the middle of the day so he's probably at school. Who's after him?" He turns the ignition and Sam can see the grin that always brightens his face at the engine roaring.

Sam scoffs. "Everyone."

.

Because Dean is Dean, they get the same motel room they did the first time. Dean drops his bag onto the bed closest to the door then settles beside it, crosses his arms, and stares up at Sam.

"Okay, so, there's this kid named Jesse," Sam starts. He has to backtrack a couple of times and also goes off on a tangent once, but when he's done, there's that same protectiveness in Dean's gaze.

"We gotta help him," Dean says. "What can we do?"

.

They toss ideas back and forth until late afternoon but nothing seems like it might work. Until Jesse's powers wake up, he won't be able to hide, and when Sam leaves town, the shield will fall unless Sam constantly focuses on maintaining it, which he won't—because having his attention divided like that would weaken him (Dean's reason) and because it might affect the shield on Dean (Sam's reason).

But Jesse is entirely too dangerous to just leave out in the open, and it isn't like they can kidnap him and stash him somewhere warded all to hell.

"What about the trickster?" Dean finally says. "He's secretly an angel, right? But a little less of a dick than the rest?"

"Oh, he was entirely a dick," Sam scoffs, "but he did pull through in the end." He slumps back onto his bed and stares at the ceiling, working through multiple ways that summoning Gabriel could end badly. "Okay," he finally says, pushing himself back up.

There's really no point in talking to Jesse before he actually has powers, because there's way to prove any explanation they have. But offering him up to Gabriel? Bringing himself and Dean to Gabriel's attention?

"Okay," he says again. "Let's get dinner and then find a good spot for a summoning."

.

Because he doesn't want to piss Gabriel off from the beginning, he doesn't lay a trap of holy oil. They're in an unused warehouse on the edge of town that Sam has warded against everything, leaving just one hole for something to eel through. If Gabriel answers the summons, Sam's going to seal it up tight.

Gabriel will be able to punch his way out but nothing will be able to get in or hear what's said, which is all that matters.

He starts with shouting, "Hey, tricksters out there—could the one from the mystery spot pop in, please?" He intentionally does not look back when Dean snorts. "I know you can hear me!" Sam continues. "You killed my brother over 100 times, but I'll forget that if you come talk with me!" He won't forget it, actually. But he also probably won't go after Gabriel for it, not since Gabriel tried to fight Lucifer.

Behind him, he can feel how Dean tenses. Sam'd been a wreck when they left that Wednesday. It's years ago for him, but months for Dean. He wasn't ever pissed at Gabriel for all the Tuesdays he died; he was pissed because Gabriel did it to Sam. Because it hurt Sam. (Sam never told him the lengths he went to, hunting the trickster. Even if it was all an elaborate game like the TV shows, it felt real. He never even hinted to Dean about what he became. And if Ruby hadn't been there after Lilith—)

"Loki!" he tries next. "I have an idea for what could be your greatest trick!" He pauses, waits. When there's no response, he shouts again, "Loki! If you don't get here soon, I might have to start praying to some of your brothers, and I might even use the name your father gave you." If there's a bit of menace in his tone, well. Gabriel had been a bit of a dick.

It's a little itch at the back of his mind, similar to how Michael and Raphael felt when they brushed against him, and then Gabriel is there, glowering at him, all of his wings spread in what's meant to be a threatening display.

"You," Gabriel hisses.

The final ward snaps into place, and Gabriel glances up at the ceiling and then around the warehouse. "You shouldn't know—" He cuts himself off as his gaze returns to Sam, wings flaring even more. "You're not the little kiddo who spent hundreds of Tuesdays in tears."

Sam tilts his head up, rolls his shoulders. It's difficult to use physical size to intimidate an archangel and he knows he could never manage it, not without tapping into more of Lucifer than he ever plans to. But Gabriel recognizes the motion, and he knows what Sam Winchester had been bred for.

"You're supposed to be in the Cage," Gabriel mutters, getting ready to flee.

"He is," Dean says, stepping up beside Sam. "If you mean your asshole older brother."

Gabriel's eyes go to Dean. "The last two times we met," he says, "you were both wide open, broadcasting all your thoughts like a radio. Now?" He flicks his hands. "Radio silence." He looks back at Sam, anger and fear and a painful amount of hope saturating the very air around him. "Who are you?" he asks. "What do you want?"

.

They don't tell him everything; Dean wouldn't let Sam, not that he's sure Sam would've. But Dean looks at Gabriel the Trickster and he doesn't see one of the most powerful angels in existence. He just sees a trickster god, the same one that's screwed with them twice now, but who's confused and maybe frightened, looking at Sam like… Dean doesn't even know. Like Sam is terrifying and amazing at the same time. (Which, yeah, Dean gets that.)

They tell him about cambion. Hypothetically, Sam asks how Gabriel feels about cambion, and Gabriel shrugs.

"So, if there was this kid," Dean says, slowly circling Gabriel. "He doesn't know, and he doesn't even have his superpowers yet. But the angels want him, and the demons, too." He looks over Gabriel's head at Sam, who's giving him that befuddled puppy look that always takes years off his age. Dean smiles at him and focuses back on Gabriel, whose shoulders are tense. "See," Dean continues, "until his superpowers wake up, they can find him. Then they'll use him up, and he's just a kid. He'll be scared out of his mind and he'll be in so much pain—" Gabriel's shoulders hunch.

Good. That's a relief.

"You're the most powerful thing we've ever met," Dean says, in front of Gabriel again. He waits until Gabriel tilts his head back to meet Dean's gaze. "Please, help us protect this kid before Heaven or Hell tear him apart."

"Just tell me one thing," Gabriel says after a few moments of silence, of gazing at Dean so fiercely Dean wouldn't be surprised if Gabriel had been reading his mind or his soul. (Dean is really pretty sure he can't, actually, because even though he can't feel it, he knows Sammy has him locked down.) Gabriel turns that piercing gaze on Sam as Dean steps backward to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with his little brother. "You know I'm an angel. This boy is cambion. Why trust me with him?"

Dean thinks about the story Sam told him, about Gabriel saving them from a hotel full of pagan gods, about Gabriel taking a stand against Lucifer and dying for it, about Gabriel giving them the plan that save the world but damned Sammy at the same time.

"Because he hasn't done anything wrong," Sam says, voice dropping into the quiet like it's gospel from on high. "Because he's half-human and he's got the right to choose his own destiny."

Gabriel swallows so heavily Dean can practically hear it. Then he says, "Not much could'a killed Lilith."

There's a smile in Sam's voice when he replies, "No. Not much could."

Gabriel nods slowly. "Well. I've been lookin' for somethin' to do, anyway."

.

They watch from the road as Gabriel magics up a moving van and a set of parents, as he slips into the guise of a little girl who can't be more than nine, as Jesse's parents stop by their neighbor's house to chat before going to work.

They watch as Gabriel, her tiny body wearing a Wonder Woman shirt and tiny jeans, waves in their direction. She's got curly red hair. She adorable, which is just odd since she's actually one of the most powerful beings in existence.

"I think we're good here," Sam says.

Jesse, with his booksack on his back and a lunchbox in hand, walks over to Gabriel's new house and they watch as Gabriel's 'mom' answers the door. As Gabriel's 'mom' shepherds both Gabriel and Jesse to the end of the street, where there's a bus in the distance.

"How much you think he figured out?" Dean asks, shifting Baby into drive.

Sam sighs. "Enough."

"Yeah, that's what I think, too," Dean says. He doesn't look back even though Sam twists in his seat to watch until they're too far away to even see the bus. "Push comes to shove, Sammy," Dean says when Sam twists back around to slump in his seat, "he'll do the right thing. That's what you told me. He'll pick the world over the dickbag plan."

Sam sighs again. "I know. I, I'm pretty sure he will, but there's so much crap that hasn't happened here. What if I've changed too much for it to all work out?"

Dean glances over at him. "I think you give yourself a little too much credit," he straight-up lies. "And even if you've butterfly effected the world, we'll figure it out, same as we always do."

Huffing a tiny little laugh, Sam asks, "Promise?"

"Yeah, Sammy," Dean says. "Promise."