Michael is still unable to believe it, doesn´t dare believe it, no matter how close he holds his little brother, no matter how long he watches the regular rising and falling of Gabriel´s chest.

He is safe, the oldest archangel tells himself over and over again. He is safe and in my arms, I can stop worrying now. He is safe, he is safe, he is safe and I´ll never let him get hurt again.

But there is also that other voice, the cruel one that sometimes sounds like Lucifer, but this time just sounds like himself, the one telling him, that this is too easy. You just found him there free, sitting on the beach? Miracles like that never happen and certainly not to you.

The voice goes on relentlessly, effortlessly ripping apart his paper-thin confidence and hope, reminding him of how he opened the garden again, when he thought Gabriel dead and saw his brothers there, laughing and playing, whole and happy. He knew it wasn´t real back then, but it still felt like it would be the easiest thing in the world to reach out and touch them.

What if the only thing that has changed since then is, that he lost his ability to tell hallucinations and reality apart? What if all of this is just him creating his own reality, because he can´t live in a world where his brother sobbed and screamed for him, but Michael failed him and Gabriel was left to die alone in some stinky alleyway?

And suddenly Michael is sure that Gabriel is dead and lost to him forever and he just went mad, lying alone in the garden, dreaming about the past till the dreams took him over.

And really, how could it be more than a dream, the silly, little dream of someone whose heart, whose entire essence, was finally broken beyond repair? The notion of Raphael standing up to him and saving him is ridiculous, impossible even, but one corner of his heart always yearned for it to happen, the one who wanted Raphael to talk back during the stupid power play, not to get an excuse to push him down further, but as proof that his brother was still in there somewhere; that he hadn´t killed them all.

Then talking to Death, an absolutely insane thing to do, something Michael would think about, but wouldn´t have dared in reality, with the risk of accidentally releasing the horseman and screwing up everything, would he? And of course Death conveniently told him Gabriel was alive, even though the horseman had no reason not to leave him in his grief.

And then surfacing, just to get the message that it was possible to find Gabriel and get to him, to find him beaten up but not lethally wounded, while his captors conveniently killed each other off? Tearful reunion and his brother calming down in his arms, pressing himself close to Michael, just as he did when something upset him as a fledgling?

No way this is reality and Michael has no idea how he ever thought it could be. He can almost feel the grass tickling his back now, the grass in the garden where he is really lying, hallucinating so he doesn´t have to face the fact that he killed all his little brothers, throwing Lucifer into the pit, twisting Raphael beyond recognition, letting little Gabriel get tortured to death.

Those little fledglings playing tag in the grass are all dead and gone because of him.

He carefully strokes Gabriel´s hair, listens to his brother´s heartbeat, checks over the freshly healed wounds again, but somehow no matter how solid Gabriel feels beneath his fingers, he still can´t believe it.

It´s way more easy to believe he has finally fallen that far, that hallucinations and self delusion can be that powerful, than to trust they actually have a shot at something like a happy ending.

Gabriel stirs slightly and Michael holds his breath, the urge to shake his brother awake getting overwhelming. But surely it´s easier to hallucinate his brother unconscious than awake and if his brother is really dead, then he wants to avoid anything that could disturb the illusion.

Give me this at last, if you will give me nothing else he prays. Just a little longer, let me live in a world where I´ve still got a chance.

He smiles down at the memory of his brother, tears forming in the corners of his eyes.

Just a little longer, please Father, he looks so peaceful.

And then Gabriel scares the crap out of him, by choosing exactly that moment to crack his eyes open and mutter: "Oh shit, what did I smoke and why did no one stop me?"

For one moment Michael is too overwhelmed to hear his brother talk, to react in any way, but when Gabriel tries to push himself away from him, he instinctively fastens his grip, pulling his brother back against his chest.

"Hey, that´s rude. Listen, I have no idea what I did last night and I´m pretty sure I don´t want to know, since it feels like it involved getting run over by a truck, but I would still very much appreciate if you would just let me…" Gabriel´s voice trails off, the moment he has managed to turn himself around in Michael´s grip and get a look on who is holding him.

"Okay...", he continues, after a moment in which the two brothers just stare at each other, now sounding considerable less confident and more squeaky. "Awkward. Uhm… so it was all real?"

"You tell me", Michael whispers shaky, but pretty sure that if this was his hallucination, Gabriel´s first words after waking up would have been quite different. "You tell me, because I really don´t think I should be trusted on that matter"

"You are asking the guy, who can forget how to dissolve his own time loops, if he gets too caught up in music", Gabriel sighs in response. "But I guess the whole story has enough shitty parts to be real, so let´s just go with it, alright?"

"Yes", Michael hurries to agree. There are still chances of course that this is an hallucination, but if you never get out of it, doesn´t that mean it´s your new reality? Isn´t that the principle on which the heavens work? "Yes of course, this is real, this is all real"

"Glad to have that one solved", Gabriel continues, again trying to get out off his older brothers grip. "But one thing I said before is still standing and that is, you can let me go now... Wait, did you watch me all the time, while I was unconscious? Anyone ever told you that stuff like that is creepy?"

He continuous to prattle on about everything and nothing, leaving Michael slightly stunned and not entirely sure how he feels about this new Gabriel. Somehow he expected his little brother to wake up as the vulnerable fledgling from the night before, but together with his health, Gabriel also seems to have restored some of his walls again. He isn´t exactly snarky and provoking, as he made a point of being, when Michael found him with Kali and later when they talked in the warehouse, but he is definitely trying to talk away his nervousness and is intent not to show any more weaknesses than he already has.

"Seriously Michael, I´m fine, just stop it! I wasn´t drinking after all and you are a pillar I´m chained to or something, are you? I admit that whole idea sounds like the prove I was drinking and I would really like to know what can still knock me out like that, but you know I´ve seen some crazy stuff, the best of it created by myself, not that I want to boast or anything, Kali will never stop laughing if I´m telling this to a pillar… wait, what was my train of thought again?"

"Uhm, not sure there was one", Michael manages, while trying to work out that wreck of a sentence, which hasn´t been made more understandable by the fact, that Gabriel was spitting the words out faster and faster, as if they were burning his tongue.

Gabriel was hyper and hard to follow as a fledgling sometimes, but that was a happy kind of hyper, this is desperate hyper and while Michael didn´t even know that existed a few minutes ago, he already knows he doesn´t like it. It´s like his brother is trying to escape, but can´t flee physically, so he doesn´t know what to do with his adrenalin and just spits out everything he is thinking in real time.

Oh, right, escaping.

"Wait, there actually was one, you wanted me to let you go, I´m just not sure, that´s a good idea in your state."

Gabriel throws a skeptical look at Michael´s arms, wrapped around his torso like screw clamps. "Well, I´m not sure if you breaking my ribs is a good idea either, just saying"

Michael lets go so quickly, that Gabriel looses his balance and can catch himself just in time, to prevent crashing face first into the sand.

It takes five minutes, a flash flood of hasty apologies from Michael, about a hundred assurances from Gabriel that he is fine and has had much worse, really, and finally an intervention from Raphael, who has seen that Gabriel has woken up by now and wants to do another check up on his brother, to get things down to a tolerable level of drama.

"Are you sure he shouldn´t lie down again?", Michael asks nervously, still way more shocked by the little incident than he should be, while Raphael checks over Gabriel.

"Michael" Raphael sounds like he won´t be able to hide his annoyance much longer, which some part of Michael can understand, since he has to admit, he asked that question four times in a row. Still, all the rest of him is absolutely shaken, because he hurt Gabriel again, even if he didn´t really break his ribs, and then let him fall. What kind of brother has so little control of his actions, when he should just fully concentrate on taking care of his wounded little brother?

"It´s his grace I am worried about, if I´m worried about anything. His vessel is completely healed and I dare say he can sit and stand without using his grace"

"Also, you are behaving like you dropped me from a cliff", Gabriel chips in. "I just made a stupid reply and startled you and there is no way I could have hurt myself in that little slip. If you are beating yourself up about this, what will happen if I get seriously hurt again? Will you just die on spot out of self reproach?"

Michael swallows, forcing himself to calm down. Objectively, yes, he is behaving foolish and totally blowing this out of proportion. He is the leader of heaven, damn it, and Gabriel is right, if he gets paralyzed by something so little, there is no way he´ll be able to properly fulfill his job. He is acting ridiculous and that should stop right now.

Still, the pure panic streaming through him, when he lost his grip on Gabriel for just a second, is way to present and burning to hot to dismiss. The panic that returns at the mere thought, that something bad, no matter how little, could happen to Gabriel. It could happen any moment! He could fall. His grace could be fatally damaged after all. The Norse could come back. The Hindu could seek revenge for Kali. Raphael could…

"Michael, look at me!"

It takes him a few seconds to determine what is real and when he finally manages, the haze of panic immediately returns again, because Raphael is kneeling in front of him, which means he isn´t with Gabriel, which means…

"Michael! Michael look at me, oh damn it, Gabriel come here, he won´t calm down without you. Michael, just breathe, Gabriel is here, everything is alright, he won´t get hurt, I promise, we are safe..." "Uhm, yeah, exactly what he says. This really isn´t worth you getting so worked up over it Michael, not at all. If this is my fault for faking my death I´m sorry, but I´m alive, believe me. I´m here and alive, just open your eyes and look at me. I´m here, right here"

Open your eyes? When did he close them? The voices of his brothers wash over his, but don´t seem to touch him, a steady roar in the background, he can only catch clear fragments of now and then, while his heart is jack-hammering in his chest and his vessel is surely dying of suffocation, because he is just unable to get in some air. A hand is pushing into his and Michael grips it as tight as he can, like a drowning man grips a life line and slowly, excruciatingly slowly, he is able to calm down.

When he finally manages to get his eyes open again, Gabriel is kneeling in front of him, holding his hand and Michael immediately feels guilty again, because it´s obvious he gave his little brother quite a scare. "Damn it Michael", Gabriel is saying very softly. "Did you just get a full blown panic attack because of me?"

Michael blinks away tears, he hasn´t been aware of crying. "Can we just go home?", he croaks out. "Please?"

Gabriel says "Sure" almost immediately, but Michael doesn´t miss the flash of fear his brother is quickly trying to hide away. He thinks of how he grabbed for Gabriel´s arm in the warehouse, trying to force his little brother back to heaven and how exactly that action sent Gabriel running, leading to all this mess in the process.

"If you don´t want to, that´s alright too", he blurts out. "I know I messed up heaven and everything, so if you don´t want to go…"

"Of course I want to, don´t be stupid", Gabriel replies a bit too fast to really mean it.

"No, you don´t" Michael is sure of it now. "You are just saying that, because you are afraid I´ll get another fit. Stop it, I´m not so fragile you have to lie to me!"

Gabriel responds with a deep sigh, sitting back heavily on the sand and pressing his palm against his forehead. "If we are doing absolute honesty again… I have no idea, if I want to. It´s… I have wanted to return for so long, believe me, there were nights in Asgard, when I just wanted to screw it all and blunder right in, no matter the consequences. There were nights, I thought if I wouldn´t let my shields down right now, if I couldn´t hear your voice in the next thirty seconds, I would either die of loneliness, or go maniac. Some part of me always wanted to go home and here we are… and it´s just been so long"

He raises his head to look at Michael, eyes brimming with uncertainty. "I want to go home, I really do. And at the same time I´m so scared I won´t fit in anymore, that I would rather be alone for the rest of eternity, give it a try"

And doesn´t Michael just know exactly how that feels? How it hurts, when something you´ve always secretly wished for happens to you, but you just can´t embrace it like normal people do, so you keep trying to search for faults, because there is no way this is reality, there is no way you deserve this, after all that you´ve done, after all the times you have twisted yourself, till you couldn´t stand to look at what you have become anymore. Not daring to hope, because the more you hope, the deeper you can fall.

He wonders if Gabriel also suspects, he is going to wake up any moment. Wonders where Gabriel secretly suspects he really is, what drugs he thinks he is on. Wonders what drugs Gabriel tried during his time as Loki.

Gabriel get up so suddenly, he himself looks surprised, like his body just decided to declare independence, turning his face away from Michael and looking really to bolt, to flee, to run forever.

"I´m sorry", he mumbles, not looking Michael in the eyes. "I just… Can I go talk to Balthazar for a moment? Just to tell him I´m alright. We won´t run away, I promise, just..."

It´s just too much right now.

"Of course", Michael answers, even though all his instincts are screaming not to let his brother go. Gabriel throws him a quick look and then Michael remains helplessly frozen to the ground, watching his brother run away again, feeling Gabriel´s helpless restlessness cursing through his veins, the restlessness of someone, who never allowed himself to stay and now every time he opens up just a bit, can´t help but feel like this is the moment to cut all bonds and run, before the other gets too much power over him.

I´ll fix everything.

Just another impossible promise Michael gave his little brother. How can he fix Gabriel´s fear that binding himself to something will only end in getting hurt again, especially if he himself is haunted by the same fear? The more you hope, the deeper you can fall, indeed.

"At least he has Balthazar", Raphael remarks behind him and Michael feels restless fury waking in him, as he watches Gabriel and Balthazar together, the younger angel again somehow managing to find just the right words to make Gabriel visibly relax, not afraid to pull him into a hug, being there for Michael´s little brother in a way, Michael is sure now he can never manage again. He wonders what the two of them are talking about, what Gabriel really thinks about all this mess.

"But I don´t want him to have Balthazar!", he snaps at Raphael, knowing that he is sounding selfish and whiny, but also aware that he already flushed all his authority down the toilet anyway. "I want him to have me!"

Raphael sighs, sounding just as unhappy as Michael feels. "He just needs time, Michael. You can´t expect everything to just click into place again, after all those years"

"Well, it apparently did with Balthazar", Michael mutters, but his fury has disappeared as fast as it came, leaving only frustration. By some miracle he has gotten Gabriel back, whole and alive, he has been granted exactly what he wished for, but somehow he is still standing in front of ruins and broken glass and if anything, everything is feeling even more messed up and complicated. This is mess that can´t be solved with lists and routines, a deep and unpredictable mess and it is scaring Michael beyond belief.

Where does he even begin to fix his relationship with Gabriel, make Gabriel trust him again? Should Gabriel even trust him, objectively speaking?

And suddenly he remembers a place that almost felt like heaven, but is still earthly enough not to freak Gabriel out. A place that soothed Michael and calmed him down, granting him a few hours of peace when he needed it, a place that even captured him enough, that he wanted to return and making it Gabriel´s eternal resting place, even after the horrifying experience he himself made there, feeling Gabriel getting stabbed over the bond.

Sure, that place has ghosts, but it´s not like heaven hasn´t.

So Michael doesn´t allow himself to overthink this too much, because overthinking in most cases leads to everything getting worse and when Gabriel finally seems like he is as relaxed as currently possible, he steps up to him and Balthazar, saying: "Gabriel, if that´s alright, I´ve got a place I want to show you, before we talk about heaven again. Balthazar, I already let Raphael call all the others, would you please go too?"

Balthazar is starring at him, like he just grew a second head and Michael wants to snap at the younger angel, to tell him what exactly was so strange about what he said, till he realizes he just said "please", when the younger angels are used to nothing but orders from him.

"Okay..." Gabriel is getting up, throwing Balthazar a slightly nervous look and smiling in a way that reminds Michael painfully of his fake grins at the warehouse. "Guess I´ll see you one way or another, Balth. Hold on and don´t annoy Raphael too much, do you hear me?"

"Yeah", Balthazar answers absently, apparently still trying to fit the new behaviors of the archangels in his worldview and falling miserably, but the look he throws Michael is pretty hard to misunderstand, even though he is trying not to make it look too impertinent.

You better take care of him.

On another day Michael might have sent Balthazar to reeducation, for trying to give orders to a superior, but today letting him get away with it, seems like the least crazy thing that has happened in the last hours.

I will.

It´s a joy to finally, finally leave the beach, where Michael feels like he has spent half his existence. Its a whole other kind of joy to find the meadow again, the one in Switzerland, that still feels like the garden, even now when he has felt the original only recently.

And finally feeling the archangel bond again, really feeling that unique connection that Michael is sure can not be faked, is the biggest joy of it all.

He is frozen for a moment, breathing in the air, letting that feeling of peace that seems to pour out of this place fill him and most importantly of all, feeling Gabriel, his wonder as he takes in his surroundings, his insecurity at being alone with Michael, his fear, his hope and all those emotions that can be felt telepathically, but never given justice by any description.

And Michael can finally admit to himself, how afraid he was that he would never feel that bond again, how even during their flight to the meadow he was afraid that Kali´s block would fall, but the bond just wouldn´t reappear and be lost forever.

You know, I could have flown that way on my own, Gabriel is telling him over the bond, but it doesn´t feel like a reproach at all, he is just testing their connection and when Michael answers Better safe than sorry he can feel his brother´s relief washing over him.

Sometimes it´s easier to talk, when you don´t feel what the other person feels, especially when you aren´t ready to open up yet and every attempt to cover up your feelings could get misinterpreted faster than you can blink. But sometimes it´s also nice to just feel that the other one is there, really there and alive.

"Didn´t know you knew places like that on earth", Gabriel finally says, after minutes of mentally getting used to each other, both brothers trying to hide their shock at how deep the mental changes in the other went and failing miserably and pushes the bond into the back of his mind, where it normally rests, like a background hum. "Before I left, you barely went to earth at all"

Damn it, Michael forgot how hard to it is to lie with the archangel bond active. With Raphael that wasn´t a problem, since he would feel the lies, but never dare call them out. "I still don´t like earth", Michael confesses "and I became even more of a shut in while you were gone. I found this place just a few days ago, after the warehouse and I… I thought you might like it"

Gabriel looks around again, his eyes sweeping down to the valley, with the river running through it, over the opposite mountain chain, covered in forest and topped by snow even now in summer and returning to the almost unreal green grass they are standing on.

"You know", he says, voice suddenly cracking. "I found a few places like that over the time. You see them and you just feel at home, like Father cut out a piece of the garden and worked it into earth. I used to think of them as some sort of save spaces for us and I got obsessed with them for a while when things looked bleak as Loki. I told myself that Father had created them for me and if I found them all, something special would happen. I don´t even know what I thought would happen, but I was like a little boy collecting football stickers and I just couldn´t stop"

"Oh", Michael mouths, not sure if he is disappointed because he thought this place unique, or lucky, because these places obviously did or do mean something to Gabriel. "And did something happen?"

Gabriel shrugs. "I lost patience after I stopped finding new ones. Told myself the whole thing had been stupid from the beginning and started avoiding them. And seriously, why would Father send me elaborate signs I have to piece together, when he could just talk to me at any given moment?" Michael can see that his brother is trying hard to dismiss the whole idea, but when he looks up, there is a strange glimmer of hope in his eyes. "Still, I never found this one"

"So...this is a sign?", Michael asks, not sure how he would even feel about that. He has prayed to his father for so long, begging and pleading for just a word, a wink, a sign, anything to make sure, that Father hasn´t just forgotten him, anything to chase away his deepest fear that Father never wanted them to be his children and always just saw them as tools, but little Michael still clung onto him, because he simply knew no one else in the world and when he started educating the other angels to cling to Father too, it got too much for him and he left annoyed.

Gabriel doesn´t answer for a moment, then he says slowly: "Well, we could see it as a sign and spent years debating what exactly Father wanted to tell us. We could discuss why he is sending us such a complicated sign to get us back together instead of, oh I don´t know, talk to us maybe. Or we could say that there just happen to be some nice places in the world and spare ourselves the drama"

But what if it´s really a sign? some part of Michael is screaming. What if Father cares for us after all and there is a valid explanation why he doesn´t answer our prayers and we just turn away from him? Isn´t that blasphemy? Isn´t that betrayal?

But really, all illusions and shields aside, is there any valid excuse for an omnipotent being to just forget you? Isn´t there a limit how long you can wait for someone to safe you, when you should have seen centuries ago, that you are the one betrayed?

Michael takes a deep breath. "I´m voting for just-a-nice-place"

And when Gabriel says: "Me too", his smile is real and Michael knows that it´s worth loosing your favorite dream of someone distant, to win someone literally standing right in front of you.

It´s still awkward between them after that, but something has shifted, like the are on the same side in at least some respects. They are lying in the grass, next to each other, not touching, but that isn´t that important anymore now that the bond is active again, or so Michael tells himself.

"Michael, what are you looking for?", Gabriel asks, breaking the half-comfortable silence they have settled into after deciding to screw Father unto further notice.

"I´m not looking at anything", Michael replies, yanking his head around and turning it towards the mountain chain, where Gabriel is looking. He can´t very well tell his little brother, he can´t stop looking for the exact spot, where he wanted to put him… no, the illusion… to rest, just to assure himself there is nothing left of that horrible moment he had to put his brother down, having failed him in the most fundamental way of all.

"Michael, you are behaving like a human, who lost his car keys. Also I know something is wrong, so come on. Aren´t we at absolute honesty again?"

"Are we?", Michael asks absently, his eyes flickering again over the meadow, without any conscious decision to do so.

"Miiiiiiiichael!"

"Stop using that tone, you are not a fledgling!"

"Miiiiiiichael!"

"You wouldn´t like the answer. Not at all"

"Miiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiichael!"

"Alright", Michael blurts out annoyed. "I wanted to put you to rest here, when I thought you were dead and I´m looking for that spot. There, happy now?"

That succeeds in throwing Gabriel off the rails for a moment at least "You took me to my grave to relax? Wow, that´s actually something no one I heard of ever came up with. I´ll tell you when I´ve decided if that´s sweet or the creepiest thing ever"

"Technically it´s not your grave, since..."

"Not sure if I want to know the details"

"YOU faked your death, if I may remember you"

"I told you I´m sorry!"

"You really think that cuts it?" Michael realizes at this point that this escalated within seconds and that they are both screaming and he really feels bad about it, since arguing with Gabriel is the last thing he wants to do, now he´s finally gotten him back, but somehow he can´t stop himself, when emotions from not so long ago, start whirling up again. "I thought you were DEAD, I held your body in my arms, I almost went insane with grief! Who knows, maybe I did! I know you wanted to get away and I understand it, but that was just… how did you even come up with that sick idea?!"

"Funny", Gabriel gives back, without missing a beat. "Exactly what I thought when I found out what you did to Raphael"

The words hit deep, hurting physically and Michael quickly turns away, although he knows Gabriel will still feel the impact he made over the bond. The meadow suddenly doesn´t feel like a special place anymore or like home or like anything at all. Just another place he has come back to again and again no matter his bad experiences, foolishly hoping he wouldn´t get hurt this time around.

He loves his brother, Michael is absolutely sure of it. He will panic if even the slightest harm happens to Gabriel, he is sure of that too. He would give his life for Gabriel without a second thought.

And at the same time his little brother is driving him crazy and he wants to hit him for faking his death and thinking Michael wouldn´t care, or – and he can´t decide if that´s better or worse - knowing it would destroy Michael and doing it anyway.

"But it´s a nice place for a grave, I have to give you that" Gabriel breaks the silence carefully, sounding like he just wants to ignore the issues that just came up and because Michael is a coward, he lets his brother get away with that. "Anything else you wanted to show me here?"

Michael forces himself to turn around. Well, Gabriel is still here, he didn´t run. That´s already something, isn´t it?

"The mountain chain", he answers, like their argument never took place. "What do you think it looks like?"

"Is that a trick question?", Gabriel is sounding wary, even thought he was the one trying to change the topic earlier.

"No, it´s not! Just...remember how you used to see things in the clouds, where I couldn´t see anything? Just humor me"

Gabriel shrugs, then concentrates on the mountain chain, twisting his head slightly and completely sinking into the nonsense task, as he used to do as a fledgling and Michael would have to lie to say, he doesn´t love to watch his brother so completely absorbed in something so abstract.

"Camel", Gabriel announces after only ten seconds of intense staring. "Playing G-rated it´s definitely a camel"

"I´m not seeing anything", Michael confesses, trying hard to ignore Gabriel´s comment about G-rating. "Where is that camel?"

"Seriously?" And now Michael has achieved what he wanted, because his little brother sounds exactly like he did, when they watched clouds in the garden and he got frustrated by his oldest brother´s complete ignorance towards forms and patterns. Michael would never admit it, but there were few things he loved more, than letting Gabriel show him the world in his bright light. "Look, there´s the head. Come on, Michael, see that ring of trees. It´s even got an eye!"

"If that´s the head, it has also got six legs", Michael remarks. "And the eye is too round and not in the right place"

Gabriel sighs in half played despair. "Michael, do you seriously have the imagination of a brick wall, or do you just want to hear me talk?"

"What about both?", Michael suggests and then Gabriel throws a handful of grass at him and then they spent the next few hours watching clouds and arguing over the forms, like they used to do, back in the old days without worries.

And after a time it´s as if Lucifer´s rebellion and everything that followed never happened and it´s really just a regular day of arguing over nonsense, because there is nothing else to worry about. And when Gabriel curls into his big brother, like he always did on those precious days when it was just the two of them and Michael offered him all the love he wanted, Michael finally dares to believe, that despite everything that stands between them, they still have a shot. That he can still bring his brother home.

And even more surprisingly, he realized as the stars come out, he isn´t even in a hurry to do it. In this moment, with Gabriel curled against him, the valley beneath them and no other living being for miles, he feels as safe and at home as he ever did in heaven.