Realized I messed up the year for April-ish. So just a quick edit! Sorry!


.

March 27, 2009, Random Place, Random State, United States

Night

Gabriel

Blah, blah, blah, demons, blah, blah, must protect [insert random seal here], blah, blah, blah. It'd been the same over and over again for the last few months now.

Demons doing what they do; threatening a seal here, some chaos and bloodshed there.

Then Gabriel goes in for the win! You're welcome!

Yay, Heaven! Go team!

Please note the extreme sarcasm in that last sentence that Gabriel couldn't possibly express properly in written form.

He was all too aware of what was happening. No matter how many seals he helped save, Heaven was still dropping the ball. It wasn't because a lot of angel garrisons wanted the Apocalypse—the dodos he was with sure didn't—but it was those few, those small few that were in on the whole con with his older brothers and their subsequent ass kissers.

Gabriel was certain that that Douche-aria brown noser was undeniably one of them. That little power-hungry ladder climber! He twitched his shoulders at the spell one of those assholes had placed over 'Loki' almost a month ago.

The random angel he didn't get a chance to identify had sprung it on him the moment he arrived at an endangered seal and had to hold back a damn golem being controlled by a rabbi gone rogue.

Apparently, his pestering over being given leave to go see his child was annoying and had made the higher ups think he wasn't focused enough on the task at hand.

Saving seals.

But, unlike the assholes' subordinate angels, Gabriel had a 100% success rate so far concerning those seals.

Thank you, very much!

They had fired some spell at him while he was distracted keeping the golem restrained and dodging the rogue rabbi's own spells.

Gabriel hadn't thought the spell would really do anything to him. His archangel-ness would just shed it off, but it didn't latch on to the part of him that was the Archangel Gabriel. It latched onto the part of him that was masquerading as the pagan Trickster god 'Loki'. Attaching itself to the Trickster pagan magic he imbibed when he took over the role from the real Loki.

Over the millennia both powers that should've repelled each other had blended somewhat. Probably what helped him to stay hidden for so long, but the Trickster-ness wasn't just a mask anymore.

To be fair, however, he had always enjoyed a good trick/prank.

The spell addled his mind a bit. Gabriel could always feel the worry, but he couldn't always remember what it tried to keep him from remembering or what he knew he should be worrying about. Oh, he'd remember after another seal was saved, but it had kept his worries to a minimum.

But it also impeded his ability to hear his daughter's prayers.

Like her desperate prayer apologizing for her stubbornness and for something else that the spell had been able to garble. The prayer didn't have the power behind it to fully come through, but something inside him told him it was urgent. The spell forcefully quelled some of his worry telling him he didn't know what was going on. That it was probably nothing.

It did something similar again when he got another prayer from Maya a couple hours later, and when he heard her begging for him a week or so ago. She sounded so…sad and heartbroken. On the verge of sounding beaten.

What should've sky-rocketed his worry through the roof was instead tempered by that damn spell. It convinced him that at least she was still alive. That she wasn't dying somewhere. That his rightly founded worry was unnecessary.

It was an insidious spell.

He'd then spent his free time—what little there was—trying to figure out what spell they had hit him with. Gabriel knew he could've used his archangel grace to break free, but this spell was locked onto 'Loki' and wasn't something even the real Loki could just shrug off easily.

To use his grace would send up some pretty big flags of the red variety with dazzling and eye-catching fireworks behind them.

Not currently thinking of the spell, he rolled his eyes as with a flick of a wrist the demons' ritual for whatever current seal they were protecting was sent careening into the ether. Never to be seen again. Oh, the demons were pissed, not that Gabriel cared in the least.

A demon came charging at him and almost caught him off guard, not that they could've hurt him, but still.

There was as a nagging sense that kept pinging against his brain. There was something he wasn't remembering. Something important that was keeping his body battle ready and spring loaded. Gabriel felt his shoulder blades and neck twitch at the phantom itch that prickled across his skin.

Gabriel's head shook as a ringing suddenly tore its way through a fog he hadn't 'known'i.e. remembered at the moment—was there. He felt it when the spell shattered, and he was mentally hit broadside by a powerful prayer from his daughter.

It reminded him of the time he had heard her scream of anguish and horrific burning pain, but this was directed straight at him instead of the entirety of the Heavenly Host.

It turned his blood to ice.

'Dad, I'm so sorry. I love you…I love you…Please don't blame the guys or Bobby…I…I love you…'

Gabriel's eyes widened at the-the—the resignation that could only come when you knew you were close to death. Not just death but a painful death, he could feel the phantom burning pain echoing in his grace and vessel.

Then the briefest picture of a town and a rundown house forced its way into his head.

He knew where his baby was.

His dying baby.

Right, Gabriel was out!

The leader of the garrison of angels he was saddled with had just finished killing the last demon.

"Right. Good! Yay team!" Gabriel mock cheered, stress and barely restrained rage edged at the corners of his voice. "Listen, I've got a family emergency to take care of, so I'm leaving. Right, now."

Gabriel was about to take wing when the leader snarled out an Enochian spell. The angel's grace glided over him and grounded him in invisible chains.

The look of an enraged archangel overtook Gabriel's face as he glowered with a burning rage, he hadn't felt in…well, probably ever. Oh, he's fallen prey to his divine rage before, part of the whole archangel/Heaven's-most-terrifying-weapon thing, but this was a whole other level to that.

It was a volatile mix of archangel and parental rage at this shit stain for thinking he had the authority, the audacity to keep him from going to his daughter's aid.

"You're not going anywhere, filthy pagan scum!" the angel snarled, exerting pressure over Gabriel with their grace as they stalked closer.

Under less extenuating circumstances, Gabriel might've come up with a clever Trickster way of getting out from under this nimrod's control without drawing suspicion to himself.

But his child sounded like she was about to meet Death—or at the very least one of his reapers. Logic flew out the window as the very fiber of his being screamed out in a rage filled panic.

With the slightest twitch of his grace he broke the unseen chains the angel had tried to entrap him with to keep him from leaving. A look of surprise overtook the other lesser angels' faces.

The leader quickly got his bearings first and lunged at him with his angel blade drawn and seamlessly sliding into Gabriel's chest without much resistance.

Gabriel looked at the blade sticking out of his chest from the hilt with a dangerously calm and bored face, before raising his head to stare into the idiot's quickly widening eyes. Gabriel raised an incredulous eyebrow as the leader angel tried to quickly back up.

The other angels in the garrison murmured uncertainly around them, their own eyes wide.

The blade should've killed the pagan Trickster false god, but it didn't. They watched as the Trickster grabbed their leader's wrist holding the angel blade and rip it out of his hands in a swift yank before plunging it into its owner's own chest. The angel's eyes lit up as their grace flared in its radiantly dying supernova. The body fell and wings burned into the ground, signaling their leader's demise.

The rest of the angels tried to overcome their shock of this filthy pagan surviving a weapon of Heaven and from watching it be quickly turned on their garrison leader.

But it wasn't quickly enough. Especially when Gabriel turned burning golden eyes on them and let his grace bleed through a tiny bit.

Horror and comprehension crossed their faces. They might not recognize the grace completely, but knew enough that it was the grace of an archangel.

Gabriel didn't like it, but he couldn't have any of them trying to fly back or get in contact with Heaven and relaying abilities, or more precisely the grace he shouldn't be in possession of.

Being 'Loki' and all.

In a manner of minutes…maybe two at most…Gabriel was surrounded by three more dead angels. All with identical holes in their chests.

Gabriel felt the tiniest twinge of guilt, accompanied with long forgotten memories of small little fledglings and their downy wings chasing after him playfully and laughing their little heads off.

But for the sake of his daughter he couldn't spare another minute. Gabriel had already taken too long as it was.

With powerful wings he flew.


.

Salem, Idaho, United States

Gabriel was just flying over the town when he got blind-sided by a pain filled scream that rattled his brain. He forced himself to land before he accidentally crashed into the house Maya was dying in—if that scream was anything to go by.

He could tell that unless there were other angels in the area to hear it, Heaven wouldn't know about it. What should've assuaged some worry just made him worry more because it just showed how weak she was getting.

Gabriel shuddered as he used his grace to dampen the burning sympathetic pain that tried to wrack through his body. He released a slightly shuddering and relieved breath when it stopped as quickly as it started. Definitely not as strong as that last one.

He quickly looked around to gain some bearings of where he was when he spotted black smoke curl and twist unnaturally in the light night breeze overhead.

"Uh-oh," Gabriel said in a breathless whisper at the sight of the demon hoard headed towards his baby.

A flap of a wing and he disappeared from the barely lit street he had landed on.

The black smoke lit up with orange light as demon after demon was smote before finding a body to possess.

But he was just one angel—sure an archangel—but just one who was trying not to drag unwanted attention from his big brothers…well more than he already had anyways. Him killing that garrison could be explained as some kind of fluke, of the Trickster getting the upper hand but not a mass smiting that no single angel could possibly do on their own.

Gabriel soared unseen over the houses and buildings towards an abandoned district filled with boarded up houses. He gritted his teeth when his daughter let out another unconscious and agony filled scream.

He'd arrived before the demons in their human bodies that he'd missed and had to quickly reign in his shock and rising rage.

Gabriel saw his baby and the sight was as heartbreaking as it was infuriating.

She was so thin and-and-and hurt!

And was that a nail through her ankle?!

Gold eyes narrowed as he took in the angel that hovered over his dying daughter, a hand on her chest. He could tell the dark-haired angel was using their grace to inspect her and if he revealed himself, he wasn't sure he'd be fast enough to keep them from smiting her.

Or damaging her further if he just tore the angel and their grace away from her.

An angel doing a deep body or soul probe of a being with their grace was risky enough to begin with. To suddenly remove them and their grace could cause serious damage to that fragile tether that kept the soul tied to a body…even death.

Gabriel still debated on what to do and wondering where the hell Puck was, when something odd and unexpected happened.

The angel had a brief look of awe on their face, then quickly and carefully moved her upper body enough to let her vomit tainted blood, keeping her from choking on it. Gabriel could tell—after he'd took a quick glance around—that that blood was the destroyed vampire blood she must've got into her system.

But then her body started to shut down.

Gabriel made to reveal himself and save her, confident now that he'd be too quick for the angel to defend against, when the other angel did another unforeseen and surprising thing.

They healed her. Well, not completely, but enough so that Maya wasn't on the verge of bleeding out anymore, or anytime soon.

Gabriel was floored. Enough that he hadn't heard the approach of two blonde women and almost startled when they barged into the room. If the situation wasn't what it was, he'd probably smile in silent laughter when the older blonde tried shooting the dark-haired angel.

He tensed when the other angel did…when Castiel did. Finally realizing which of his little Brothers he was looking at. They had both sensed the demons Gabriel had missed approaching. Gabriel knew that Castiel probably hadn't picked up on the number yet.

Gabriel then looked back at Castiel as he quickly pulled Maya's nailed ankle from the floorboards in a quick jerk, eliciting a cry from her and then hand her over to the blonde Hunters. He'd been ready to interfere then, but he saw that motherly protectiveness enter the older blonde woman's eyes.

She'd watch out for his baby.

Gabriel quickly winged it after hearing Castiel would hold the demons off.

Gabriel hovered unseen a bit, watching the women load his baby up and drive off to the nearest town with a hospital. He looked back at the house where the demons had started converging.

Even after his little stress relief on the bodiless bastards earlier there were still a good number of them. Enough to probably leave Castiel in a bad way. Maybe even kill him if there was an old one amongst them.

With a beleaguered sigh Gabriel made quick work of the slower/non-cannon fodder demons that had been bringing up the rear. He left the three low level assholes to make it to the house. If he remembered right, Castiel was always a talented little soldier. Well, unless his curiosity got the best of him, although…he didn't see it when he looked at him now.

Gabriel grimaced when he felt a bigger more powerful demon arrive…in a little female brunette child. He mentally shrugged and silently hoped Castiel made it out of this little pickle.

Gabriel couldn't smite Lilith.

As much as he wanted too, and oh did he want to.

Heaven would be on his ass in a heartbeat if he did.

Gabriel felt a little bad for leaving the little angel there, but he had places to be and secrets to keep.

And possibly a scumbag spell casting angel to uncover and skewer or flambé in Holy oil. He hadn't decided quite yet.

He summoned his inner Tulio and Miguel:

Both? Both is good.


.

March 28, 2009, Rexburg, Idaho, United States

Rexburg Memorial Hospital

Gabriel

Gabriel was currently wondering if he should show himself to Bobby and the badass Mom-and-Daughter Hunting duo. The women he'd let go, maybe send them to Florida for a little vay-cay. Him and Bobby needed to have some words.

The ass knew his baby was in trouble and didn't tell him. The doctor's list of her injuries and possible permanent handicap didn't help any. Not that Gabriel planned for her to stay injured for long if he had anything to say about it.

Well, once he planned out his retribution against Bobby and how to sneakily grab his baby past the young angel now guarding her. They seemed familiar, but Gabriel didn't focus too much on that, he had other priorities at the moment.

The kid was seriously undertrained if they didn't have a vague sense of the Trickster being practically in the same room as them. So, Gabriel doubted it'd take too much planning for that, so he focused on ideas for Bobby.

Gabriel's little planning session of what he was going to do to the Hunter—nothing lethal mind you—ground to a halt when the police officer had started asking questions.

Like if Bobby knew John Winchester was Maya's biological father.

Gabriel wouldn't deny that in all his high-powered celestial glory that that bit of information caused his mind to imitate the Windows blue screen of death.

He was only brought back to the present when Bobby exclaimed, very empathetically "Balls!" which also had the double role of perfectly summing up Gabriel's current feelings over that tidbit of information. Gabriel carefully took in the protections around the room the female Hunters had set up and figured it'd be enough—along with baby angel—to let him go do a little investigating.

He went to the morgue—masquerading as a coroner as one does—and looked up the bodies involved in the multiple homicide from Salem. Gabriel found some vampire bodies and some dead demon meatsuits.

And John motherfucking Winchester.

He…was supposed to be dead…well, dead-er.

Gabriel examined the dead man's features closely, a spark of recognition lighting up.

Gabriel wanted to either smack himself in the forehead for how stupid he was or curse his Father and his damnable sense of humor, because, of course! Out of all the Hunters he occasionally slept with, the one time he was a woman and made vulnerable to pregnancy by his Father it'd be with John freaking Winchester of all men! And it would be this man that would end up getting him pregnant with a Nephilim!

Somewhere, a Chuck winced but kept typing up the little side accompanying novel to his Supernatural series. Well, this version of it anyways.

Gabriel was about to fly back and hogtie the other much, much, much younger angel before absconding with his daughter when a familiar and oh so annoying presence made itself known behind him.

"Well, you've really stepped in it now, haven't you?" sneered the whiney voice of the asshole that roped him into his little stint as Heaven's whipping boy.

Gabriel turned an unimpressed face towards the Great Balding Angel that was Douche-ariah.

"My daughter was dying," Gabriel sniffed unapologetically with a glare at the snooty angel that was grinning that too toothy grin again. It was a grin that Gabriel likened to Zachariah thinking he had all the cards and he only had the one…and it was a crappy card at that too.

Or, Zachariah had that final UNO card that could change any colour and make the other player pick-up four…and then he just said UNO.

"You just couldn't control your impulses enough so you had to go and destroy an entire angel garrison!" Zachariah shouted at the end with an incredulous look, that was still far too gleeful for Gabriel's liking.

"Hey! They were lucky to last this long with the leash and collar you've got wrapped around my neck," Gabriel snorted with a sneer. This was one angel he wouldn't feel guilty about shredding. Not one bit. "Pretty sure the euphemism is, 'Shark at the end of a leash'," Gabriel bared his teeth a little at the end, still glaring heatedly at the angelic asshole.

"Ah, ah, ah!" Zachariah tutted pompously. "That would be a noose. And it would really be around your little spawn's neck."

Gabriel let his face go blank as his archangel fury began to build and his grace churned like a slowly encroaching and foreboding storm.

Zachariah mistook his expression and his fake calm as being cowed by the lesser angel and decided to taunt Gabriel.

Little did Douche-ariah know, that he was in fact poking an already agitated and quickly waking mama/papa bear that was getting ready to go postal all over his ass.

"Lucky for you we still see some use for you, but we think some punishment is in order," Zachariah grinned in power-drunk gleefulness. He wanted to see the despondent helplessness on the Trickster's face. "I think some horrible pain might be in order for your damnable half-breed. Perhaps an infection in its ankle from the old nail John Winchester had used? Probably will need to amputate it. Could definitely get one of ours in to mess with the anesthesia so it's awake enough to feel every cut and scrap of saw on bone—"

"You honestly think I'd let any of your asshats—" Gabriel snorted, interrupting the bureaucratic angelic pencil pusher and barely tried to keep his anger at bay. He was still pissed from the garrison trying to keep him from his daughter and from Bobby not informing him of Maya's situation to put it mildly. But Zachariah couldn't handle being interrupted by the indecent pagan false god, so he in turn cut Gabriel off.

"It's funny," the ass chuckled smugly. "You didn't show this much concern for your spawn during these last few weeks…" Zachariah trailed off with a shark like knowing grin.

The spell. The one that eased his worry and made him forget his daughter during the saving of a seal.

Gabriel could barely restrain his righteous fury as his golden eyes blazed hatefully at Zachariah.

Zachariah lost his grin and had a more nervous and calculating look that he tried to hide behind an anxious chuckle. It was only for a moment, but he could've sworn…he could've sworn he saw a flare of grace in the Trickster's pupils.

It was then accompanied by a power that suffused the air around them. It radiated from the pagan filth and pushed threateningly against his own grace inside his vessel.

Ready to lash out like a pissed off viper.

Zachariah was about to snidely ask what the Trickster thought he was doing to further hide his growing unease but was instead cut off by the deadly and furious Gabriel grabbing him by the neck. Zachariah soon found himself slammed on the empty examination table beside them.

Gabriel didn't yell. His fury was beyond that now when it concerned this little pissant. Grace mixed with some Trickster magic slashed at the pinned angel's grace, eliciting a pained but oh so satisfying yelp.

"You," Gabriel's normally jovial and joking voice dripped with deadly intent. Every bit one of Heaven's deadliest weapons. He felt Zachariah's grace try to force back his own, in a futile attempt. It unintentionally quivered in dread instead. "You're the one that put that spell on me. You tried to make me forget my own daughter!" Gabriel's blank face had long since gone, replaced by the face of a vengeful archangel. Not that this ass could see it.

He still had some self-control over his power, using it to add potency to his Trickster magic while still hiding behind it as well. At least Maya wasn't at risk of dying at the moment, like when he went vengeful archangel on that last group of angels. Gabriel had slipped up a little bit there.

Not that there were any witnesses left to rat on him.

"AH! It was only to quell your worry to keep you from running off!" Zachariah bit out as the secretly grace fueled pagan Trickster magic raked across his own grace with unseen claws. "Can you really blame us for not finding a way to keep you from running off to your spawn the minute you realize it was in dang—ACK!" Zachariah's grating voice was cut off by a strong hand squeezing the angel's vessel's throat.

It was obvious on Zachariah's face that he was scared. Gabriel was showing a bit too much power for a mere Trickster. Gabriel wouldn't admit it, but he felt some slight satisfaction from the pained squeal he elicited from the dick when he sent his out his power and slowly dug into Zachariah's grace.

But then Gabriel frowned as he thought of something. Why cast that spell on him then? Why do it around the time he suspected they resurrected John Winchester?

The Trickster magic stretched as it tried to keep the archangel grace from showing, but the rising, rumbling fury Gabriel felt in his chest burned with a protective intensity he hadn't ever felt until he became a father.

His face scrunched up in a terrifying snarl at the lesser angel, baring his teeth and pressing down on Zachariah's grace. Ready to throw back the Trickster veil and unleash his righteous archangel fury and smite this asshole.

It'd raise a whole lot of questions in Heaven since it took a lot more to smite an angel than it did a demon.

But this pissant had tried to orchestrate his daughter's death. He deserved to know exactly who it was he pissed off before dying. He raked another invisible claw against Zachariah's grace beneath the unharmed and only slightly rumpled vessel. The vessel being the only thing keeping the angel's grace from bleeding out.

First, though, Gabriel wanted to know why.

"You," Gabriel growled animalistically through clenched teeth, gold eyes almost glowing with a golden back light. "You tried to have my child killed. Why?"

Zachariah for the first time in millennia was scared, and only prayed that his frantic call for help to one of the commanders was heard…and heeded. He was under no illusion that if Michael or Raphael didn't find him worth the effort, neither would lift a finger to stop the false god from killing him.

He also knew that if they did come it wouldn't be to save him. It would be to put Loki in his place for the insult of one of his kind for killing angels.

In Zachariah's head he heard the bored affirmative and slightly insulted hum of one of the commanders in response to his plea. It didn't mean that they would arrive in time though. Readily available vessels were hard to come by for regular angels. It was even more true for archangels. Even temporary ones.

Gabriel silently cursed when he sensed one of his big brothers coming on the winds of a fast approaching thunderstorm. He forced down his fury with a restraint he hadn't used for thousands of years.

Last thing he needed was—

An achingly familiar voice rumbled into existence beside them.

Zachariah's face was downright joyful, while Gabriel's face drained of colour at the appearance of the new guest star of this episode.

The familiar voice was as old as creation and was powerful and fierce. Something surged in the air, leaving ozone in its wake along with contempt and malice. The deep voice that sounded out beside them echoed with a voice Gabriel once knew that a millennium ago that, although deep, was once filled with comfort and compassion.

This voice was cold and unyielding. It both was and wasn't the voice of his older brother.

Raphael.

"Loki," the deep voice sneered with a rumble like barely contained thunder. "Release, Zachariah," Gabriel heeded the order but glared at Zachariah to let him know that this was far from over.

Gabriel turned his full attention to Raphael. Raphael didn't offer the same curtesy and glared down at Zachariah as he struggled to his feet, wincing as he stretched his wings and disappeared.

Only then did Raphael turn languid eyes onto Gabriel.

Gabriel squashed his fear and tightened his grace close to his chest, letting his Trickster-ness shine through more predominately to hide behind. He hoped Raphael would look down on 'Loki' and not decide to probe further with his own grace. Raphael always had been the more…scientific of the lot of them and enjoyed experimenting.

Gabriel didn't feel like being on the receiving end of Raphael's curiosity, especially with how cold…how detached his brother seemed to be now. So, he plastered on his best unconcerned façade, a confident smirk, and greeted one of his big brothers for the first time since he'd fled Heaven.

Raphael looked to be wearing an old Navajo man with white hair and if he hadn't been possessing him, he would've had a very kind looking wrinkled old face. The deep smile wrinkles remained but the hard and unyielding grey eyes with a deep-set frown ruined the laugh lines at the corner of the vessel's eyes and mouth.

"Well, you're not my 11:15 prostate exam," Gabriel chirped with an overconfident smirk, the Trickster mask firmly in place. "So, who the hell are you? Definitely up there on the power scale compared to Douche-ariah."

Raphael glowered at him, the pressure he exuded from his grace rumbled in scarcely withheld archangel fury.

"I am The Archangel, Raphael. And you will be silent!" Raphael demanded, dark piercing eyes staring holes into Gabriel. The demand wasn't loud, but it held power. "You're nothing but a pathetic pile of pagan refuse!"

The power of one of Heaven's most terrifying weapons.

And yet…still falling for his tricks. A relief, in this case.

Leave it to his old bros to be so holier-than-thou that they didn't even bother to wonder why a pagan god was able to seriously hurt one of their underlings.

Or kill a group of them.

Didn't stop Gabriel's teeth from clicking as he quickly clenched his jaw and eyed his brother warily. Raphael had always been no nonsense, Michael too. It usually made them the target of many of his tricks when he used to be The Messenger.

Their reactions had been priceless then.

Gabriel didn't want to see their reactions now if they ever found out he was still alive and hanging out around pagans…or that he had a half-human child.

This expression Raphael wore now was already bad enough.

It looked like a mix between fury, disgust, and, oh! Was that a smug glint in his brother's eye?

Well, shit. Raphael did so enjoy being smug.

"So, you dare to sully our blades with your pagan filth to slay my Brothers?" Raphael asked with a slow composed drawl and barely restrained rage and repugnance. Not that Raphael felt any real brotherly feelings for the lesser angels below him.

Gabriel rolled his eyes, not letting his worry and fear to be seen by Raphael. Nor his grace. No, even a whiff of the stuff and Raphael would be all over him.

He skillfully played his part, "Well, the whole blackmail scenario kind of goes out the window if the blackmail you've got on me kind of dies on you."

Raphael just scoffed, the colour of his vessel's skin beginning to distort, "Please, you Tricksters can always make more spawn to replace the ones you've lost. But you had no right to slay almost an entire garrison of Heaven's soldiers."

Gabriel didn't need to pretend to be the completely offended parent for this next bit, but it did take every ounce of self-control—and then some—to keep his grace from blowing his cover to try and beat the crap out of his older brother.

Gabriel briefly wondered if this parental fear and fury to this obvious threat to his child would help gain the upper hand over his older brother, because, uh, how dare he!?

"My child was dying! I had every right to off those angelic assholes for trying to keep me from her!" Gabriel snarled angrily, clenching his closed fists. His right hand just itched to call his archangel blade to his hand. He was barely able to keep his grace from surging forth. The thought of what Raphael would do if he knew it was him…and discovered the truth about Maya.

Gabriel couldn't let that happen.

Oh, he loved his brothers—even this dick—but they weren't his entire world. Sure, Gabriel would mourn their deaths and eventually move on. But Maya's death?

Forget the predestined Michael vs Lucifer Showdown everyone's been angling for.

Gabriel would flambé this world himself in his grief and righteous fury.

Raphael shook his head—a blister or two showing up on his face—slowly with a malicious smile and a deep rumbling chuckle, "That's where you're wrong, Trickster. You have no rights in the eyes of Heaven. Your pathetic spawn? Even less so. It's nothing but a perversion of my Father's…greatest creations." He made no overturns to hide his derision of humanity and how little he obviously thought of them.

Raphael stalked a little closer to Gabriel, "I should send out some of our warriors…" He scoffed with an unsettling smile on crackling lips, "Or perhaps just the…one to deal with that little abomination of yours. We know where it is. It wouldn't be difficult."

Gabriel's eyes narrowed. It was hard to hold back his archangel rage—or was it his parental rage? At this point it was the same difference. Forget whatever old brotherly feelings he used to have for Raphael, at this point he was ready to unsheathe his archangel blade and shove it right. Up. His. Ass.

If only it wouldn't tip off Michael.

Raphael grinned cruelly, assuming Gabriel's silence and the obviously barely contained restraint was a sign of his submission. It was so easy to force anything with a sense of parental instincts to bend to one's will.

"You're nothing but a pathetic pagan false-god brought to life by the collected misplaced belief of thousands of these filthy mud-monkeys," Raphael drawled unkind and belittling. "You're worse than these pathetic humans that pollute this world my Father painstakingly created. Your half-bred offspring even less so. At least my Father planned and had taken part in Humanity's creation…unlike that bastardized offshoot that is your filthy abomination of a spawn."

"Is there a point that you're going to make, or…?" Gabriel asked flippantly with a vague gesture around the room, his eyes never stopping their intense glare at Raphael.

Raphael glowered at Gabriel's interruption of his belittlement. He was aware his current vessel was quickly deteriorating, not being of a particular Vessel bloodline for him. He would have to wrap up this little meeting before his grace spilled over. No point to start leveling towns and cities quite yet.

"The point is that you are nothing. And it is only by Heaven's grace and your usefulness that we haven't done away with you yet," Raphael growled lowly, blisters turning into craters against pallor skin. No longer the aged tan of the vessel's life outdoors or his Native heritage. "You were to spare angel lives that could've been lost before the coming conflict. Your usefulness is to keep that number low. But then you went killed off one of our garrisons!"

Gabriel crossed his arms, face unrepentant. He had a dying daughter to get to. Sue him.

"You will obey our orders until we no longer have any use for you," Raphael ground out, offended at Gabriel's rebellious air about him. That upstart false god! "And we don't kill off that half-breed abomination of yours."

Gabriel grimaced and scoffed, "Ah, so pretty much the same deal then? I'm your whipping boy and you save a few of your little wind-up tin soldiers for the big finish in exchange for the continued existence of my little girl?"

"At least even a pathetic pagan like you recognizes the inevitable," Raphael observed, a dangerous and curious glint in his eyes that worried Gabriel.

Gabriel felt dread and…disappointment in his chest. He'd figured that that's what his big brothers were up to, but still. A part of him wished to know why, but the bigger part? Wanted to hide under a rock somewhere with his baby till the whole mess blew over.

"Yeah, yeah. Fate. Destiny. All that jazz," Gabriel snorted, only to have Raphael move quicker than his temporary and greatly deteriorating vessel suggested. Raphael pinned Gabriel to the body lockers behind him. An archangel blade pressed threateningly against Gabriel's sternum.

Fear gripped Gabriel at the threat pressed sharply against him. The tip of the blade just broke the skin, it drew a twitch of pain from the pinned archangel and a rivulet of blood. His grace curled nervously inside his chest, hiding further behind the Trickster magic he possessed.

The once dark eyes were now slowly becoming cloudy as the vessel's skin started peeling repulsively, making Gabriel grimace in disgust. Both for the sight and for what his brother was doing to the poor elderly man that was foolish enough to agree to this.

"Despite what you might delude yourself into thinking, Trickster," Raphael spat, some bloody spit spraying onto Gabriel's face making him flinch in disgust. "You cannot win against us. Cannot outmaneuver us. Definitely not for the price I know your kind will never be willing to pay," blood stained teeth grinned as the vessel lost all sight.

Raphael stepped back out of Gabriel's space with a slightly condescending grin, "But since it is just in your nature to be protective over your spawn, I suppose I can grant you some kindness."

Gabriel straightened his jacket, wiping the bloody spittle from his face and eyed his brother carefully. He highly doubted Raphael did anything for the sake of being kind anymore.

"On a day of my choosing I'll let you see your offspring," Raphael held up one quickly blackening finger as his grace further burned through his temporary vessel—quite literally. "One day. But—" there it was, "—make any attempt to flee with your half-breed spawn and the area it currently resides in will be levelled. Some of my angels were quite put out they couldn't do a repeat performance of Sodom and Gomorrah in that hovel called Gloversville."

Gabriel narrowed his eyes at his brother. Not that Raphael could properly see it from the now sightless vessel…but he didn't need human sight to see. As much as he was happy that he'd get to see his daughter again after…oh Father, 5 months! It'd been so long since he'd last seen his little girl. His grace twisted behind his Trickster façade in anguish at the thought, but he made sure to keep his face a mask of resigned anger and suspicion.

"I doubt your nature would allow you to put so many undeserving innocents at risk," blood and blackened teeth fell past raw grinning lips. "That's where you Tricksters get your strength from, isn't it? The humans' collective belief and ideals of justice. Wouldn't do for the paragon of all Tricksters to go against it, hm?" Raphael mocked one final time.

Gabriel didn't shield his eyes when his brother left the old man in an ordinarily blinding light for anyone who didn't have a little angel in them. The old man's body collapsed to the ground, barely breathing and in obvious agony.

He bent down and gently touched the man's shoulder, seeing what Raphael's little ride did to him. Not that the gruesome scene before him didn't give Gabriel a pretty good idea on that front. But he also wanted to see what made the old man say yes.

Joseph Riversong.

Joseph had led a hard life. A country robbed from his people and injustices at every turn, like the Canadian government sweeping up his children during the 60's Scoop. Under the guise of Child Welfare Services that went to reserves and took children from parents…basically because they lived on reserves in poverty that their people had been forced on. The assumption that they were living in unsafe living conditions, even if most of the time that was never true and never properly investigated. It was an attempt of cultural genocide that succeeded for the most part.

He never saw his children again.

But he still believed in God—or what he assumed was in fact a different name for the Great Spirit.

That was how Raphael got him.

Said he was a messenger of God, the Great Spirit, and needed his help and in return would reunite him with his lost children.

What was a devout man who ached nothing more than to reunite with his children to do?

The spiritual tether that tied Joseph to the mortal plane broke as he painfully exhaled a final time.

Gabriel watched distantly as a reaper collected the untethered soul and escorted it to be weighed and judged. He had no doubt where Joseph was headed.

At least he'd see his children again…in his happiest memories.

Gabriel wished his troubles could be over as quickly, but no such luck.

At the very least he hoped Zachariah got the chewing out of an immortal lifetime over being bested by a pagan god.


.

Heaven's Healing Wing

Zachariah glared at every angel that looked his way curiously while one of Heaven's Healers worked on his damaged grace. The wounds were deep and excessive, but they did not reek of the Sulfur most of the powerful demons tended to leave behind.

The angel that was—unfortunately—working on him was able to stop the bleeding of their superior's grace but would also cast furtive glances at Zachariah. Normally, he was quite vocal when it came time to heal his wounds. Often loudly complaining about his opponent if it was another angel or gloat if they were an enemy of Heaven. Well, a very dead enemy at least.

The quiet glaring was new and disconcerting, but they were only a Healer and not meant to think too far on such matters.

The Healer pulled back with a frown, uncertain of what to try next. Castiel's wounds from earlier were much easier to heal completely and those had been doled out by Lilith herself. Whatever Zachariah had encountered…if it had pressed any further then Zachariah would be no more. It buffeted against the Healer's belief that nothing short of an angel blade or an archangel's grace set on 'smite' could kill another angel.

Zachariah sneered at the Healer when they had asked what had caused such damage to his grace. He wasn't about to admit that this was the work of the Trickster false-god, Loki.

Then the Healer commented on what they had been thinking as they healed him. That the damage was like an angel blade had sliced into him or damage done by only a miniscule amount out of the sheer might of an archangel's grace.

That had shut Zachariah up momentarily before sniping at the Healer that if there was nothing more that could be done, he had better places to be.

Zachariah felt his aching wings shift behind him at his uncertainty as he left the Healing Wing. He quickly concealed them from casual view. He walked stiffly down sterile white walls of Heaven, his face set into a fearsome glower that kept the lesser angels distant.

He refused to let the lesser angels see the worry and trepidation that swirled uneasily beneath the façade.

What the Trickster had demonstrated…the power it wielded. It shouldn't have been that powerful. Then there was that brief momentary glimmer of something in the Trickster's pupil. At the time he'd sworn it was the briefest glimmer of grace, but perhaps it was a trick of the fluorescent light in the morgue? Then there was what the Healer mentioned about the nature of his wounds…

But it was ridiculous—laughable, even!

Because what self-respecting angel—or archangel (slightly manic mental chuckle)—would possess a Trickster of all beings? Or continue to demean themselves posing as one?

And yet…Zachariah found no real amusement from such a notion. He just knew he wasn't mistaken. He knew he saw something…divine in that filthy pagan's eyes. Something powerful

"I thought Castiel wasn't supposed to interfere with that Trickster abomination?" Zachariah overheard one of the angels that had gone to aid Castiel the previous night when he found himself alone against Lilith. "It was dying, he should've just let it die. Demons wouldn't have gotten it either way."

"What was that?" Zachariah barked at the soldiers, making them stiffen.

"There was a lot of the half-breed's blood. Enough to have died from blood loss but it still lives," the angel said stiffly. "We assumed the only way for it to have survived was if Castiel intervened enough to keep it alive till it received human medical treatment."

Zachariah looked between the two at attention soldiers, quietly enjoying the slight nervousness the one was radiating at being put on the spot by a superior.

Made Zachariah feel all warm inside.

"Good to know," Zachariah hummed with a nod at the two, dismissing them with a hand and made his way back towards his office.

Perhaps, Castiel might've discovered something from healing that disgusting half-breed of Loki's to help him figure out what was going on with the infuriating pagan false god. Or at least point him in the right direction.

There was something not right with Loki, and he'd bet there was something off about that spawn as well.

Until he could figure out what…he needed to tread carefully…and covertly.

Perhaps, it was time set aside some time to finally to dig more into the Enochian symbols Castiel had first discovered under that blasted half-breed's skin?

Behind the closed door of Zachariah's office, he allowed himself a shiver of rare fear as he remembered the pain of invisible and powerful claws digging into his grace sharpened by a terrifying rage. The only comfort he gleamed from what happened was the fact he survived the encounter and that their commander Raphael was dealing with the Trickster's current insubordination.

He had no doubt that the archangel would bring the snarling Trickster god—or whatever it was—to a heel. It still had those pesky parental instincts that most creatures on that mudball of a planet had.

Zachariah pulled out a copy of the sigils Castiel had seen under the abomination's skin. He'd had the angel write them down so he could peruse them at his leisure later if he had found a lull in duties. It seemed Zachariah had put them off long enough if the Trickster had gotten the jump on him. The sigils might hold something in them to discover the true nature of the Trickster.

They weren't supposed to be this powerful…or inflict wounds that only a being of Heaven should be capable of. Or a highly powerful demon like one of Lucifer's Princes.

A terrifying what-if question whispered in Zachariah's ears that set his vessel's heart racing in both pure terror at the absolute gall of an errant thought, but also in pure ambition if it was true.

And despite his increasing disgust the more he entertained the thought…Zachariah knew it all centered around the 'Trickster's' little half-bred spawn.


.

April-ish, 2009, Sioux Falls, South Dakota, United States

Couples week later…

Gabriel

His ass of big brother had finally given him leave to visit Maya, his little girl, after almost half a year apart. Gabriel felt a nervousness in his chest as he approached the paint faded house and walked up the creaking wooden front porch.

He wasn't sure what to expect.

Gabriel remembered when she had first tried to call on him in her time of need and he hadn't shown. He'd unintentionally sown doubt in her mind when it came to him.

Taking a calming breath—not that it worked much to calm his nervous heartbeat—Gabriel pressed the doorbell. He frowned when no sound came out and rolled his eyes before opening the screen door and heavily knocking on the heavy wooden door.

The familiar gruff visage of Bobby—aka Hunter—Singer answered the door, swinging it open with a surprised look. The surprise was short lived and was quickly replaced by a grumpy scowl.

"'Bout time ya showed yer face around here," Bobby grumped, his voice low. "Where the hell have ya been?" he demanded as he boldly grabbed Gabriel's green bomber jacket and dragged him into the house. "Surprised ya didn't just pop yerself in like last time."

Gabriel rolled his eyes and briefly entertained the flash of amusement he'd felt at the Hunter's bold action towards a being—as far as he knew—that outclassed him 1000:1 on the power spectrum.

I mean, what Hunter would just grab a pagan Trickster god—let alone one that they knew was probably not a Trickster but as powerful or more so—and manhandle them around without worrying about finding themselves dead in a microsecond?

"Thought you didn't like it when I did that? Just no satisfying you, huh?" he quipped with a small smug smile. "And it's not like I had much of a choice, Hunter," Gabriel snorted, answering the man's question before he shrugged his arm out of Bobby's grasp once he was finished being dragged into the cramped kitchen. "As well you know," he said pointedly.

Bobby rubbed a hand through his thin hair under his trucker's cap. He then dragged a hand down his face with a tired sigh, "Yeah, I know. Just…just been hard fer her lately."

Gabriel released a long worry filled sigh. "I saw, and…I…I heard the prayer she sent out. A dying prayer. Hit me broadside like a speeding semi. I turned the table on my angelic babysitters when we finished up a seal…" Gabriel finished with a grim but satisfied smile.

"The hell did ya do, Loki?" Bobby asked in trepidation, watching as Gabriel did the face Maya usually did when she didn't want to say what she obviously knew. Wide eyes, tight lips, with a slight I'm-in-trouble air about it.

"I, uh, maaaaaaay have…killed the angel garrison that I was being forced to assist with stopping the breaking of some seals with their own angel blades?" Gabriel said in a rush, finishing with a shrug as he wondered where his baby was. "To be fair!" he said quickly when Bobby looked ready to yell at him for no doubt being an 'idjit'. "I was a bit mental at the time because I thought my baby girl was dying! Parental rage and fear, man. It's no joke."

Bobby released a long angry sigh through his nostrils as he glared at the slightly sheepish Trickster. He shook his head, "Fine. What happens now?"

"Now?" Gabriel scoffed at the memory of his own brother now threatening not only his child but every innocent bystander in Sioux Falls. "I'm still stuck playing their game. Only this time I am allowed a visit with my daughter for the next 24hrs."

Bobby's eyebrow rose, "Really? And they think ya won't run off somewhere with her?"

Gabriel's silence was telling.

Bobby narrowed his eyes shrewdly, "What?"

"If I tried…Heaven would…blow up the whole town," Gabriel muttered the last bit with a resigned sigh.

There was a tense silence as Bobby obviously contemplated his life choices that had led him to this moment. Where he wasn't shooting the bloody Trickster and all but legally adopted said Trickster's daughter. And yet, he couldn't find himself wanting to change too much if it meant he had Maya and the boys in his life. No matter how estranged two of the 'Idjit Trio' had become.

But he could do without the Apocalypse and smite happy angels who he was sure were more like their demon counter parts. The only difference Bobby could see was that they don't own up to being assholes and need permission to take over a human body.

"So," Gabriel said a bit awkwardly, shifting on his feet a little nervously. "Where is pecan butter tart anyway?"

Bobby scratched the back of his neck, "Restin' upstairs. She's been doin' that a lot for the last couple weeks. Been tryin' to get her up and movin' to help with her physiotherapy, but…"

Gabriel looked at Bobby with sorrowful eyes. Golden eyes that conveyed no lies of how awful he felt for his child.

Bobby released another sigh through his nose, "How much do ya know what's happened to her?"

Gabriel tilted his head a little at him before looking through the archway into the study/library, he wanted, no, needed to go wrap his daughter up in his arms. Reassure her the best he could.

And himself in the process.

"That when I wasn't being careful, I ended up knocked up by John Winchester of all people," Gabriel huffed as he pushed against the counter he hadn't realized he'd been leaning on and ventured further into the old musty house. "And my little girl had to shoot the bastard when he tried to kill her."

Bobby's face took on a worried look as he quickly walked in front of Gabriel to halt him in his tracks, "So, ya don't know what happened here then?"

Gabriel started and turned intense gold eyes on Bobby that clearly said, 'What else had happened?!'

Then his eyes narrowed at Bobby, "What happened? Did she get more injuries?"

Bobby hesitated. He knew if he told Loki what happened between Maya and Dean…well, the boys might have an unexpected visit from one angry Papa Trickster.

"Let's just say her and Dean had a bit of a fallin' out concernin' what happened with the boys' father," Bobby said slowly and as vague as he could. "It wasn't good, and she's still pretty upset over it."

Gabriel's eyes narrowed even further. He had a remarkably good idea what Bobby was probably alluding to and he could probe the aging man's mind, but he didn't think he really wanted to know. He knew enough.

The eldest Winchester had hurt his baby.

Gabriel itched to send Dean through the gamut of a-thousand-deaths again but let him remember them all this time.

"Don't do anythin' to the stupid idjit," Bobby asked, but not begged. "He got a bit overemotional—"

"Bobby," Gabriel cut him off sharply as he held back his rising anger. He had a good grasp on the oldest Winchester's personality and could guess he doubtfully wasn't thinking as clearly as he could've been. Still no excuse though. "I get it. I do. But that doesn't mean he's not on my shit list."

Bobby nodded reluctantly with a shrug, "Fair enough." It was the best he could hope for given the circumstances.

Their heads swivel upwards at the sounds of staggered footsteps from the second floor.

Gabriel hesitated. "How bad do you think…?"

"One way to find out," Bobby shrugged unhelpfully and forcefully shoved Gabriel's shoulder to get him moving towards the stairs. He watched Gabriel give him a warning look before moving further into his house, but he wasn't concerned. Might have to check his rot gut before the next time he thinks he needs to take a swig from his flask.


.

Maya

After finishing up in the bathroom, Maya made the hard trek down the hallway back to the bedroom she used every time she came to Bobby's. It was unofficially her bedroom, that also doubled as Bobby's spare book room. For the first time in a long time the room was no longer filled with inordinate amount of stacked old tomes. Now, only a few were carefully lined up against the walls…and only covered just over half the small student desk under the dirty clouded window.

Maya was never there enough to add too many personal touches that suggested that it was someone's room and not just a spare guest/book storage room. It, however, did have a little memento from her childhood that she'd left there when she'd first came to Bobby's all those years ago.

She leaned against her crutch while she turned the nob and pushed open the bedroom door—she didn't remember closing it but didn't think too much on it—and then froze.

That said memento was in the hands of an awfully familiar person who sat on the edge of her bed.

"I always wondered where this little guy disappeared to," Gabriel said, looking down at the faded and well-loved blue elephant with red polka-dots. "All you said was that you stashed him somewhere safe," Gabriel then released a huff and a small smile.

Maya didn't know how to feel about seeing her Dad sitting there on her bed after so long, after everything she'd been through. All she knew was that her face wasn't smiling, and it was getting harder to breath.

"I remember once when you were four you misplaced him," he smiled with a reminiscent look in his gold eyes, hands turning over the beloved stuffed elephant. "You cried and cried and threw such a tantrum. I'd make a show of looking around before snapping up a new one," Gabriel chuckled with a far-off reminiscent look.

"I thought, I had made the perfect replica, even had the grape juice stain on the one foot when you both had a tea party mishap. I gave it to you, and you know what you did?" he looked up at Maya smiling. "You held it in your little hands looked at it for a good 10 seconds. Your face got redder and redder before you screamed at me that it wasn't 'Phan'! Then you threw it—with surprising accuracy—right at my face!" he chuckled with a small smile, his gold eyes lighting up briefly at the fond memory.

"You made me turn the apartment we were in over until I found him wedged up on top of the kitchen cupboards of all places," Gabriel placed the stuffed elephant beside him on the bed. He looked back at the face his daughter was giving him, just as uncertain of how she was feeling as Maya herself was. The only difference was how relieved Gabriel was, seeing the bruising gone and her features a little more filled out than the last time he saw them when she was in the hospital. "Nanaimo?"

Maya seemed to finally settle on an emotion as her frowning bottom lip quivered and reflective gold eyes began to water slightly, "Why now?" Her voice was quiet like a whisper, but with the way Gabriel flinched and looked away you would think she had screamed it at him.

"I…I could finally get a—"

"Bullshit," Maya's face became angry as she glowered down at him, eyes blazing. "It shouldn't have taken you nearly half a year to finally come around. Hell, you should've been able to call me at least when things died down, but you didn't!" she did her best to straighten her posture, so she was leaning less on the crutch. She could feel her legs ache slightly, her ankle more so. That was still stiff and hurt every time she tried to move it, or if it was moved manually by Bobby during physio.

Gabriel opened his mouth, but Maya didn't let him speak.

"And how about when I prayed to you months ago?!" she shouted her teeth clenching and nostrils flaring in her anger, seething. "You always told me that no matter what if I was in trouble—life and death trouble especially—to always pray to you and you'll come! But you didn't!" heartbreaking tears started spilled down her cheeks as her legs started to quake a little with the effort to stay standing unaided. "Even the times when I was being beaten or dying! You still didn't show!"

Gabriel didn't answer her questions, because he knew he couldn't and not because he wouldn't. If she acted any different than she usually did or tried to warn the Winchester Bozos, or—Dad forbid—try to confront an angel about it, like that baby angel that was hanging around nearby…he didn't want to think any further on that possibility.

Oh, how he desperately wanted to grab her—Bobby too he supposed—and hide away somewhere, but Raphael had been right. It was against who he was to endanger a whole town of innocent—well mostly innocent—people. Not to mention how horrified and pissed Maya would be if he did it and let the town's destruction happen, just to save her.

Gabriel knew his daughter and she would shoulder that guilt for the rest of her life—or however long Nephilim lived for. Her fault or not. He felt that Maya had too much compassion, but then again, that was one of the things he loved most about his little girl.

Her heart.

And the smiting of a town because of her disappearance would break it. Well, break it further than Gabriel's silence and inactions had already caused.

Gabriel tried to avoid the accusations hurled at him by his own little girl and zeroed in on the way she started to lean more heavily on the crutch she gripped tightly. He stood from the bed and walked towards her, only to stop when she shuffled back from him her face still full of pain filled rage and fury.

"Let me heal you, Fudge Cake," Gabriel said gently, reaching out a hand and letting it hover. "You don't have to be in pain—"

Maya scoffed at him with a shake of her head and a stubborn glint in her eyes, "No."

Gabriel raised a disbelieving eyebrow, his hand dropping, "So, you want to be in pain? You want to never be able to walk without a limp, or be able to run again?"

"I made it this far without you," her lips were pressed into a thin stubborn line. "Not going to let this little set back—"

"'Little set back' she says," Gabriel scoffed under his breath with a shake of his head. He ran a hand through his hair and propped the other on his hip. "Are you serious? The doctors told Bobby—and I'm assuming you as well—that between your knee and your ankle the odds of you being a hundred percent are zero! Zilch! Nadda!" he pointed out a little angrily. He just wanted to heal his baby. Was that so wrong? "And I'm guessing you want to keep those bite marks as scars then too, hm? Souvenirs?" he sneered a little.

Maya shrugged affirmatively, "Reminders of what I survived…without you. That even bound and powerless I can still fight."

"Well, until you didn't. Right near the end there," Gabriel pointed out, his voice biting and bitter. "That last prayer you sent me was a doozy."

Her face went blank and her jaw clenched, a couple more hurt filled tears escaped, "Why am I not surprised that you heard me…and didn't—"

"I'm stopping you right there, kiddo," Gabriel interrupted her, pointing a finger in her face. "I did come, but that angel pal of the Winchesters already healed you enough to keep you from bleeding out. I focused more on the demon hoard that was closing in and making sure your rescuers had a clear shot of getting you out of there."

Maya's face belied her puzzlement as she tried to think on what her Dad had told her…about the angel. The only one she could think of…was Castiel. He said he was reassigned to watch over her till the guys were finished, to keep her out of Lilith's reach.

That meant he'd seen everything John Winchester had put her through and did nothing.

But…if what her Dad said was true…Castiel also saved her life.

Doesn't help quell the fiery anger in her chest that was just growing and growing.

Gabriel took her moment of confusion and stowed his anger on the back burner and put gentle hands on her shoulders, "I came, Maya." Maya's head jerked a little as she looked into his eyes, that shone with so much love for her. "I came," Gabriel slid his hands around her back to draw her into a hug, seeing the anger but also the desire to let it go too. Well, to let go and relish in the comfort he offered and go from fiery rage down to only aggravated annoyance.

It was another thing he liked about his daughter. Maya never held onto her anger for long. Oh, she could be stubborn and try to hold a grudge but—

Gabriel's eyes widened in shock when Maya's eyes hardened, and her free hand pushed him forcefully away. It sent her off balance and made her stumble against the large stack of books behind her, sending some of the ancient tomes clattering to the floor with loud thuds.

"But what about the next time?!" she yelled angrily. "I've been poisoned by demon blood and by some miracle survived that! I've almost was made into spell ingredients for some immortal bitchy witchy magician! I've lost my best friend!" More angry tears fell from her eyes, mixed with the sadness and grief of Puck's loss.

Gabriel grimaced at that. It would explain where the little dog had disappeared to. It was also concerning that John Winchester had had a way to slay the Heavenly Hound. No doubt that asshole Zachariah's doing.

"And then, I've been beaten and pushed to the limits of what I could handle and then some! I've been bitten by a werewolf, barely survived that! And, most recently almost been a bloody happy meal for some vampires and shot by my biological human Hunter father for not dying quick enough!" Maya's chest heaved in her exhausted effort, sucking breath through flaring nostrils.

The fire in her chest grew a little more and back lit her eyes just a smidge, making them glow brighter ever so slightly. A human wouldn't notice, but Gabriel had and convinced himself otherwise. He'd moved a bit from blocking the light coming in through the window, so it was just a trick of the light. Right?

Gabriel knew that was a lie he was telling himself…at least until he dealt with his daughter's current angst. He didn't want to even think about what that 'trick of the light' in her eyes could possibly mean. Not right now. He had a good guess, but hoped he was wrong.

"I'm your Dad—" Gabriel started in exasperation, feeling some of his own anger springing back up again. Why can't she just accept that he was here now, at least?

Neither of them heard the heavy footsteps clomping up the old stairs hurriedly down the hall.

A voice inside Gabriel told him to curb his rising annoyance before it turned into anger and he said something he'd regret. But the words Maya interrupted him with made him feel like a shard of ice pierced his heart.

"Is that supposed to be reassuring? So was John Winchester but that didn't stop him from manipulating me and using me as bait for hunts or trying to prostitute me to other Hunters for a quick buck," Maya told him hurtfully, angry tears falling from her eyes like a never ending water fall drenching her shirt.

Gabriel was silent as he stared at his daughter while he registered what she had just said to him. He closed his eyes and tensely tilted his head, his face screwing up in barely restrained fury.

If that man wasn't dead already—

"That jackass did what?!" came Bobby's gruff voice growled from the doorway, cutting through Gabriel's thoughts. He had come up when he heard raised voices and falling books.

Those books weren't cheap or easy to come by. Last thing Bobby needed was a pagan god and his demi-god offspring duking it out in the cramped room.

Maya's boiling fury stalled for a moment as she whipped her head to look over at Bobby. She wasn't sure whether she felt relief at his interruption or dread at having to explain what she let slip. She had purposefully left that little incident out of her account of things that had happened to her in John Winchester's care.

Bobby was soon in her space looking her over, a hand on her shoulder and one cupping her face in calloused hands, "Ya okay? Anythin' happen?" Bobby's worried expression became darker and he then growled out protectively, "Remember any names?"

Maya shook her head, some tension in her shoulders leaving as she sighed. "Nothing happened. One of the older Hunters was suspicious and when I…" her voice trailed off as a thought that maybe she didn't get out of there completely without consequences.

"Ya what?" Bobby asked with a raised eyebrow, dropping the hand on her cheek, and resting it on her shoulder.

She gave Bobby an awkward smile, "I may have mentioned that my Dad was Loki and most of them backed off?" Maya's face took on a grim look. She then added with some grim satisfaction, "There was this one guy who didn't, but I fought him and may have almost sliced off something important. Not sure but it was close."

Gabriel watched as Bobby and his daughter talked calmly with each other over the events in some backwoods Hunters' bar. He was feeling a mix of emotions inside his chest. There was a little bit of pride at how strong Maya was, no doubt fighting the fear she must've felt and fighting back like the scrappy fighter he knew she was capable of being.

But mostly he felt guilt that his child had to go through something like that while angels were yanking his chain around—and a few good heaping servings of jealousy towards Bobby.

Gabriel was frowning (read: pouting) and glared daggers at the human. He found himself jealous of how his daughter was more accepting of the gruff man's oddly tender and comforting gestures than his own.

Maya should be seeking comfort and reassurance in his arms. Not Bobby's.

Bobby looked over Maya's head and caught the petulant and childish glare the Trickster was sending their way. Bobby just rolled his eyes, because, honestly—these two idjits. He thought their communication issues were resolved years ago.

Bobby mentally cursed the angels and their meddling. He just had a feeling that all this family drama was their fault—felt it right down in his gut.

"Alright, but if ya remember any names, or anythin' specific about any of them let me know," Bobby told her sternly, receiving a teary-eyed smile and affirmative nod. "Good," he ruffled her lengthening curls making Maya grimace in protest.

Bobby then grabbed Gabriel's jacket at the shoulder and dragged the protesting Trickster out of Maya's room, "C'mon Papa Trickster. Let's give My some breathin' room."

"What?! Hunter—No!" were Gabriel's staggered protests as he—in a little bit of a shocked stupor at this human's audacity—was dragged, again, down the hall and back down the stairs. "I still need to talk things out with my daughter! If you want to play 'house' we can definitely do that some other time—Papa Hunter—but now's not exactly an appropriate time!"

Despite everything going on, Gabriel just couldn't stop himself when an opening for some flirtatious banter arose. Bobby should really know better by now not to leave an opening like that for him.

Gabriel smirked behind the huffing and quietly cursing plaid covered man that dragged him back into the study.

"Listen, Bobby, I don't have a lot of time! I need—" Gabriel started roughly shrugging his shoulder free from the Hunter's grasp, but he didn't let him finish.

"If ya keep pushing she's just goin' to get more and more stubborn!" Bobby barked out harshly. He released a heavy sigh, calming himself a little. It wouldn't help if he started losing his own temper. "I'm not sure on all of the details of what's happened 'cause some idjits think they can hide crap from me," he rolled his eyes heavily. One guess as to who he was referring to. "But far as I can tell her trust in ya is obviously shaken right now," Bobby rubbed his face. "And I think she's scared of bein'…abandoned."

The look Gabriel gave Bobby was fierce and would make lesser men wet themselves, even lesser defecate themselves, but not Bobby. "I did not abandon my daughter," Gabriel growled out dangerously at the human fearlessly rolling his eyes at him.

"I know that!" Bobby put his hands on his hips while he glared at the idjit Trickster. "I've told My that too, but with whatever's goin' on…she might not believe it anymore. Or at least she's scared of trustin' again only to get her heart broke," he crossed his arms with a sigh, watching as Gabriel's shoulders slumped, despondent.

Bobby's frown deepened only slightly when he remembered what Dean did and the heartbreak on Maya's face at the betrayal. He didn't doubt that that was adding to this mess.

"So, wanna tell me what's goin' on? There seems to be a bit more goin' on than not bein' in contact for the last few months," Bobby asked with a perceptively raised eyebrow, his deep brown eyes meeting Trickster gold.

Gabriel sighed and looked away while rubbing the back of his neck. "Couple of months ago I got a prayer from her…she was in trouble and needed my help. I-I didn't go," he admitted with a shame filled sigh. "And I've always told her if she ever needed me, I was just…a prayer away," he gave a pathetic chuckle and kept his eyes downcast, looking everywhere else but at Bobby's face.

Gabriel didn't want to see the condemnation on the Hunter's face. He was her Dad, her parent. He should've just killed the angels then and gone to his baby. Damn all the other—

"Let me guess, angels?" Bobby snorted sarcastically. He wanted to roll his eyes when the Trickster looked up at him with no small amount of surprise. "What? Ain't that big of a leap that the assholes separatin' you two would be the reason you couldn't swoop in to save her. You not savin' her doesn't sound like the thrice-damned annoyin' Trickster I know," he deduced in a matter of fact way.

"Don't get me wrong, I was about to smite some bitches, but Maya got back to me that the danger had passed," Gabriel shrugged helplessly, then bit his lip and carefully cast his eyes around, both physically and metaphysical.

Yep, baby angel was hanging around nearby but not close enough to overhear anything.

Thank Dad for small mercies.

Bobby looked at the Trickster peculiarly. The idjit looked like he was expecting something to pop out of the woodwork. He then narrowed his eyes when he went over the words he'd just spoken.

"Smite?" Bobby asked doubtfully. Granted he didn't know how powerful pagan gods could be, but could they really be all that troublesome for a bunch of angels?

"Gods smite!" Gabriel said quickly and a mite too defensively. He shifted under Bobby's narrowing and scrutinizing gaze. He knew all too well that the Hunter was suspicious about his Trickster status and was sure he was something else. "What?"

"Still not tellin' me what ya are then?" Bobby asked, knowing full well how futile the effort was. He wasn't sure to take Gabriel's word that pagan gods 'smite' to be completely true. The lore suggested it, but it was more a euphemism for pagan gods killing in a 'divine' fit of rage, vengeance, or—if they're Greek—for more petty reasons. The only other thing that suggested 'smiting' being something else, a word for an actual type of destructive act was found in the oldest and still most massively printed book on the planet.

The Bible.

"Nope!" Gabriel chirped then made a show of casting his eyes around the den/library. "Angelic eyes and ears a little too close by," he added, pointedly looking at Bobby. "Although, thankfully, this one's still not close enough to hear anything."

"Balls," Bobby cursed understanding at what was implied, his face scrunching in annoyed anger, but also in thought. The Trickster was mighty jumpy at the thought of whatever angel was hovering about hearing whatever he said. Maybe, angels took offense to non-angels using a term they, or perhaps God, coined?

No. That didn't sound quite right either.

Gabriel seeing Bobby lose some of that curious glint in his eyes before he gave the man a rueful smile, "Can't lose track of the only bargaining chip they've got against me now that she's not travelling with the Wonder Twins."

There was an awkward silence between the two. Neither of them knew what to say or to talk about now.

"Why can't we tell her what's been happenin'? Probably help to fix some of yer personal problems right about now," Bobby finally asked, muttering the last part deliberately. "She's not with the boys anymore—"

Gabriel shook his head and cut Bobby off, "I know it would. Odin knows, I know. But…how often do the boys come here for help?"

Bobby grimaced a little remorsefully and shifted on his feet, "Not a lot right now. Told Sam to tell his brother that unless he can control himself around My to keep away."

Gabriel gave him a skeptical look, "Huh. And if they found themselves in a tight spot?"

Bobby rolled his eyes, "I'll help the damn idjits. Practically my sons at this point, but I'm not about to put My at risk because Dean can't control his temper." Bobby didn't like the stormy look that entered Gabriel's eyes. "Ya okay?"

Gabriel closed his eyes, released a slow breath, and muttered quietly, "Oh if I ever get my hands on him…"

"Loki," Bobby said warningly.

Gabriel waved him off, his face still a little brooding.

There was another long awkward pause as Bobby let the Trickster—if judging by his face—come up with plans and tricks he no doubt wanted to test out on Dean if they ever crossed paths again.

Looked like Maya was still going to be kept in the dark.

Idjits. Bobby's surrounded by emotionally constipated and stupidly stubborn idjits.

Bobby then thought of something else to ask, even if he felt foolish bothering to ask the damnable Trickster such a question.

"If you and My don't patch things up before ya leave," Gabriel looked over the slightly sheepish expression of Bobby. "You gonna try and heal up her injuries? That somethin' ya can do?"

Gabriel frowned in surprise at Bobby, because it was a stupid question to ask and he let him know it.

Bobby shrugged and said he just wanted to make sure since pagan gods don't always have the best track record when it comes to their offspring when they're mad at them. No matter what he learned about Tricksters being the exception. That usually only lasted while the kids were still growing into their powers. Only then did they take a step back or feel the need to enact more harsher punishments.

Ever since welcoming Maya into his life—and resigning to the presence of Loki—he grabbed every book on Tricksters and demi-Tricksters he could get his mitts on.

Had to be prepared for what he'd gotten himself into. So far? Normal family drama with some extra supernatural powers tossed in for good measure.

And an uptick in saying 'idjit' both vocally and mentally.

To be fair he experienced the same thing when the boys started coming around more often too.

"It's not so much that I'm mad at her…" Gabriel started haltingly as he trailed off a bit. He felt anger at his daughter's hard-headedness, but he didn't blame her if he couldn't exactly tell her why he stayed away. Maya's anger was justified in that regard for sure. "It's just this whole situation we've found ourselves sucked into. And I'm just…I'm scared for her," Gabriel released a tired sigh.

"Not yerself?" Bobby asked, a quirk of the side of his lips curved slightly upwards.

Gabriel actually barked out a brief laugh, "Oh, there's that, but more so for her. If that glint in your eye is anything to go by you know what I'm talking about." Bobby just shrugged at him, nonchalant. He wasn't going to deny it.

"But to answer your earlier concern, I fully plan on healing her before I have to leave…doesn't mean she'll make it easy though," Gabriel added with a sigh, remembering her fire filled eyes pointed in his direction.

"What'd ya mean?" Bobby asked with an arched eyebrow, even if he had an excellent idea of how stubborn and idiotic Maya could be sometimes.

"I tried to heal her up earlier, but she said she'd overcome her injuries herself. That she didn't need my help," Gabriel huffed in annoyance and hurt. "Guess I'll heal her by surprise," he shrugged, thinking it was a perfectly reasonable thing to do.

Bobby muttered under his breath about stubborn idjits making stupid decisions, because honestly. Who refused having injuries that would handicap them, healed out of some idiotic stubborn sense of anger and pride? He knew there were some trust issues, but they couldn't be that bad, right?

Gabriel just watched the other man with some modicum of amusement and a little bit of that warm fuzzy feeling in his chest. It was nice to know that despite the rift between Maya and him that she still had someone—albeit a crotchety, old, and resourceful Hunter—looking out for her when he couldn't.

'Bobby probably could look after her better if he knew,' Gabriel's mind suggested traitorously. If he knew he might be able to set something up, and Bobby could give him a heads up of things to keep an eye out for. Maybe look out for any…changes in Maya, too.

That anger Maya displayed upstairs was normal given the situation and her age, but Gabriel was worried that there might be something else. Something from her less than human half. Now that she didn't want to talk to him or even look at him, the lie he had told himself was unravelling in his mind.

If it was that he thought it was then Bobby needed to know what to watch out for. Or at the very least do his best to mitigate it but given the current shit show that the world was heading towards it will show itself eventually.

Probably closer to sooner rather than later.

Gabriel mentally shivered. That was one trait he'd hoped wouldn't manifest itself, but it doesn't look like he lucked out in that genetic lottery for Maya.

It would be easy to find a way to tell him and Gabriel may have remembered a trick to keep other interested parties from prying it directly out of the human's head.

Bobby noticed the speculative spark in the Trickster's eyes and gave him the stink eye in return.

"What're ya thinkin, Loki?" Bobby asked suspiciously.

"How badly do you wanna know what I actually am?" Gabriel asked quietly with a contemplative smirk and slight tilt of his head as he stepped a little closer to Bobby. It'd take a moment. Too quick for baby angel to notice—let alone do—anything.

Bobby's instincts told him to take a step back. More accurately a lot of steps back. His primal brain was telling him he was being stalked by something much bigger and much more dangerous than himself.

And that he should put some space between himself and the threat.

He didn't, but Bobby couldn't keep himself from shuffling a little as Gabriel stepped closer, a familiar mischievous gleam in his eyes.

"What's the price? I doubt anythin' yer offerin' isn't exactly free," Bobby snarked, his curiosity really wanting to solve the little mystery that's been bugging him for months now.

Gabriel took on an offended air, complete with hand on the chest and faux surprised look, "What? I would never!" He quickly lost the act and shrugged, "Well, nothing you're not already willing to give and your complete silence on the matter."

Bobby pursed his lips. He eyed Gabriel as he debated internally what he wanted to do.


.

Maya

At this point Maya had been in her room. One would think sobbing into her pillow at the toxic mix of feelings whirling around in her chest.

You know, from betrayal, destruction of trust, wanting to just run into her Dad's arms and cry her eyes out in relief but still too angry at him to let herself. Oh, and angst.

So much angst.

But she did not. For the last little while she'd been trying to reign in the fiery anger that had returned after Bobby had dragged her Dad out of the room to give her some space.

Maya had been feeling this anger for a while now, but not like this. Not this burning feeling inside her breast.

She saw an image of her Dad's sad face in her mind and part of her wanted to just give in, but then the anger flared up. Maya clenched her fists and a whining muffled scream of frustration made its way from behind clenched teeth.

She wanted…she just wanted to scream out all her pain, all her anger. Let everything out in one cathartic scream, but…this kind of anger was new to her. It seemed like something more. Something much more.

Even the desire to scream out to the Heavens—metaphorically—made her throat start to feel off. Like there was a switch inside her just waiting to be consciously flipped.

Maya knew what she was. She was a Trickster. She was a demi-god. This new anger and this odd feeling she got when she felt ready to belt out a scream sent warning buzzers through her brain. It told her that something would happen if she completely released the fiery ball of anger in her chest or screamed her heart out.

The only question was what.

Maya took a slow and deep breath, held it for a moment, and then released it just as slowly. Some of the fire calmed, but it was still there.

Like hot coals waiting to be flamed into a raging and hungry inferno.

Something she feared would have a lot more consequences than slammed doors or a fist through a wall if she was feeling particularly keyed up.

Maya flopped over on her stomach, grimacing at the pains in her legs and stuffed her face in her pillow. She huffed and tossed on the bed. Her head turned and landed on her stuffed elephant.

A reminder of simpler happier times. Her heart ached for them. Her anger took that ache from the trust lost since then and tried to feed itself. She grabbed the elephant and hugged it to her chest. Maya's head bent and buried her face in the stuffed animal, her nose picking up a slight musty smell and released another muffled scream.

She huffed against the well-loved plushie, finally feeling the anger dissipate till the coals only seemed warmed.

For now, at least.

Maya carefully kept her mind blank and did her best not to think about what she lost, or about her Dad, and just…sadly exist.

It helped that she was now emotionally exhausted and her eyes—tired from earlier tears—were heavy. Maya's breathing calmed from irritated huffs to slow albeit a little loud inhaling snorts through the stuffy nose you get from crying.

It wasn't long before she drifted away in sleep.

During her silent rage she ignored the tingling between her shoulder blades as her birthmarks opened that little bit more. The Enochian sigils engraved around the old patch beneath her skin healed, filled in, and began altering those sigils fractionally.

Weakening.


.

Back downstairs…

Bobby's head was still twinging in pain from having bloody sigils carved into his skull by the Trickster, who wasn't a Trickster after all. If what the piece of paper in his hands was anything to go by.

It was a lot and Bobby had seen a lot of shit in his life. Experienced and bore witness to many things that would make a grown ass marine cry and wet and/or shit their pants. He'd fought ghosts, vampires, werewolves, demons and every other nasty myth and legend out there that most sane people didn't believe truly existed. Pretty much adopted a female half-Trickster demi-god as his own daughter along with the two most stubborn sons of bitches he knew as sons.

Hell, he was living a precursor to the Apocalypse right now and trying to help prevent the End of Days.

Bobby stared back into the expectant gold eyes of the not-so-Trickster father of said daughter with only a modicum of disbelief and suspicion.

"Ya pullin' my leg right now?" Bobby asked, still skeptical as he went over the mental short-list of creatures that could possibly play a powerful Trickster.

But, of course, it had to be the one he dismissed right off the bat during his research because it was completely ludicrous to even contemplate. Especially when Sam and Dean told him about their dealings with the angels so far and their contempt for Maya.

So, it made sense that by some remote possibility that a bloody archangel went rogue, they wouldn't masquerade themselves as a pagan god of all things.

Gabriel just grinned widely back at Bobby with all his teeth on display. The archangel's eyes danced with anticipation.

Bobby knew that the damn overgrown turkey was waiting for his reaction at such a large reveal.

But the feather duster had underestimated Bobby's need to thoroughly disappoint the 'Trickster's' expectations concerning his reactions to whatever he had been planning.

So, Bobby carefully collected his rising shock and warning bells going off in his head and schooled his features into only mild surprise—a pair of eyebrows almost raised to his hair line. With the most unfazed and only mildly speculative voice he could muster he said, "Huh."

Gabriel's expectant expression succinctly fell into a pout, "That's it? Just, 'huh'? I engrave Enochian sigils on your skull and tell you exactly what—and who—I am and all you've got for me is, 'huh'?"

Bobby shrugged, got up, and walked past him to the kitchen, "And the need for some of my rot gut if that makes any difference."

Gabriel just watched the Hunter with a curious expression, unsure of what to make of the man as he grabbed some slightly clear brown liquid and poured himself a glass.

"You, Bobby Singer, are an odd human," Gabriel mused before snapping his fingers and switching the rot gut to some high-class whiskey. "I like that in my humans," he said with a broad grin, that was oddly less lecherous than what he usually put on.

Tasting the difference in the liquor Bobby gave the archangel nod of appreciation while ignoring the possessive Gabriel had used before 'humans' and got down to brass tacks. "So, if yer who ya say ya are, what does that make Maya?"

Gabriel smirked, "You tell me."

"Oh, I've got an idea but the last time any of them were on Earth didn't the Big Man flood the planet," Bobby deadpanned.

"Only the part where they were heavily populated," Gabriel shrugged and his face becoming grimmer. "The others were picked off one by one by my little Brothers and Sisters. Out of the womb or not…innocent or not."

Bobby frowned into the now amber liquid of his glass, "Were they that bad?"

Gabriel sighed guiltily, "Some of them were, but I think the others took the orders I delivered and went further than they were supposed to. Either out of disgust or fear."

"And, are those orders still standing?" Bobby's dark eyes stared soulfully into a being that existed since the dawn of time, if not before. "She hasn't done a single thing—"

"It doesn't matter," Gabriel cut him off with a shake of his head. "Her existence is considered forbidden. A sin by default. To them her life is forfeit. Along with my life as well since I created her. But if they see her as just another low-level demi-god…" he trailed off pointedly.

"She's just a nuisance," Bobby finished with a sigh.

"A particularly disgusting nuisance that most won't go out of their way to hunt down and kill, yeah. But they find out what and who I am and might just reason out that I went out and created her…it won't end well for anyone, that's for sure," Gabriel grimaced.

"Ya mentioned once that if Hell knew what she was they'd want her even more?" Bobby asked with frown. He remembered that surprise conversation in the car a couple months ago, especially since he thought he'd either run off the road into a ditch or into oncoming traffic.

Gabriel gave him a sarcastic laugh, "Yeah, because Nephilim are always, always, more powerful than their angel parent. She just had the dumb luck of her's being an archangel. Moi. Heaven or Hell, either one, if they find out they'd be wetting their pants. Albeit for different reasons, of course." His mouth was set in a grim line, "Hell for the powerhouse, the weapon she could be, and Heaven for the threat she should pose."

"How powerful we talkin' here?" Bobby asked. He was finding it hard to coalesce the image Gabriel was painting of Maya. This super powerful being that could have Heaven quaking in their shoes and Hell salivating. He'd never seen her do anything that suggested she was that powerful. That said he had also heard the non-definitives Gabriel had just used; 'could be' and 'should'.

"Would probably give my big brothers a run for their money if she was up to snuff," Gabriel scratched the back of his head. "Could definitely wipe the floor with me that's for sure. Had to work a spell just to make sure she didn't kill me or tear a hole in the universe when she was born."

Bobby finally gave an expression of surprise and looked at Gabriel with wide unbelieving eyes, "Ya shittin' me?"

Gabriel gave him a rueful smile, "Nope. Same spell's keeping her power pushed down and contained." Bobby noticed the hesitation then in Gabriel's voice.

"I hear a silent 'but' in there," Bobby said and made an educated guess. "Spell's not holdin' anymore is it?"

"It's Enochian carved under her skin. Every inch. It broke a little a few years ago. Sprouted wings in the middle of a school. I had to do a patch job," Gabriel sat down on the couch and rotated his shoulders. Not meeting Bobby's eyes.

"The birth marks on her back?" Bobby said plainly. Gabriel nodded in confirmation.

"When she was tearing me a new one up there…" Gabriel paused as he worried his lip. "I saw something in her eyes. Not the normal purple ring of light in her sclera but her eyes were back lit. So, I think she might be hitting angel equivalent of puberty," he enjoyed the perturbed look on Bobby's face mixed in with his disbelief.

"Puberty?" Bobby asked incredulously. His face was one he'd normally find hilarious, but Gabriel kept himself contained.

Gabriel rolled his eyes, "I'm joooooking. Phffft. Angel puberty."

Bobby gave him a deadpanned glare, "Like I'd know any different. There's barely anythin' on Nephilim and any I've come across only describe them as the half-human offspring of angels and giants."

"Right. Right. And they were only 'giants' because they guys were reaching 6 feet where everyone else was 5'-6" and under," Gabriel said flippantly, even if he nodded in understanding. Bobby wasn't wrong after all. "What I think I saw in her eyes was the beginnings of…well…archangel rage," his lips had soon stretched into a worried frown.

Bobby blinked not quite understanding but Gabriel's uneasy face told him it did not bode well, "Rage? She's been pissed before. What makes this so different?"

"It's divine rage, Singer," Gabriel said quietly as he leaned on his knees and folded his hands in front of him. "It's what makes archangels all the more terrifying. Heaven's most fearsome weapons. Now, she's normally predisposed towards forgiveness and kindness and compassion, but this rage, it's a consuming inferno. Those sigils break in a moment of pure rage she can't keep a lid on…" Gabriel made an explosion sound with his mouth and mimed his head exploding…or the world in this case. "Or, you know, close enough."

"Let me guess," Bobby said sarcastically. "With all this angel crap the rest of the cloud hoppers got ya doin', this is the first time she's felt this kind of rage?"

Gabriel nodded reluctantly at first then grimaced, "Well, there was the argument that had her running away that first time that led to you finding her in that vampire nest. But pretty sure that was mostly angst and defiance. Nothing…nothing like this."

"Balls," Bobby muttered and sat down heavily beside Gabriel taking a long drink from his forgotten whiskey. "And right when the world is on the edge of collaspin' in on itself. Got any worthwhile insight to that shit show?" Bobby asked, nodding at Gabriel.

Gabriel hesitated and got up a little awkwardly, "I'm going to check on Maya. Maybe see if I can get some healing done—"

"Gabe—" Bobby started but his voice all of a sudden failed. Not the kind where someone suddenly grabbed your neck and squeezed your voice box, but the one where your voice literally disappeared. You feel like you're talking but no sound was coming out.

Bobby glared heatedly at the smirking archangel/Trickster that wiggled his fingers at Bobby and disappeared back upstairs.

The Hunter huffed and grumbled on the couch, nursing his glass of good whiskey and because of the topics of the conversation they just had he couldn't even fully enjoy it.

It was a little bit before Gabriel sauntered back into the room and couldn't help the eyebrow waggle, he sent Bobby who only returned it with a dark glare. He just grinned at him before flopping back down beside the irate Hunter with all the casualness of someone who felt completely at ease and at home next to someone who obviously wanted to murder them with their glare alone.

"I'm sorry, Bobert, was there something you wanted to ask me?" Gabriel cocked his head with a self-satisfied smirk. "Oh, Mallowmars? She was asleep. So, I healed up her legs, but since she decided she 'wanted'—" Gabriel's expression showed his annoyance, but it was downplayed by his use of air quotes, "—to have a challenge to overcome to spite me, she'll need to work on building back up her muscles."

Bobby's pointed glare might've lessened a smidge for only a second till it was back to full force.

'Voice. Now, idjit,' Bobby mouthed with surprising clarity.

Gabriel pretended not to understand, putting a hand beside his ear like he was hard of hearing, "What? I didn't catch that."

If it was possible, Bobby's glare intensified. Then he promptly thumped Gabriel upside the head.

"Ow!" Gabriel whined like a pathetic baby. Another thump. "Hey! Hey! Unless this is leading towards the horizontal tango…no hitting!"

A pause.

Thump!

Gabriel firmly grasped the Hunter's whiskey free hand he was using to hit him with and wagged a threatening finger in Bobby's face, "I can smite you with the snap of my fingers for this disrespect! I can smite you so hard there won't even be ashes left!" Gabriel let go of Bobby's forearm with a huff.

Whack!

"Fine! Fine! Okay! You win!" Gabriel admitted in defeat with his hands up in surrender. "Jerk with a unfunny stick shoved up his ass," he mumbled as he snapped his fingers, before his eyes lit up with a lewd twinkle in them. "Y'know, I could help—"

Thwack!

"Oi! This is cruelty to-!" Gabriel started but Bobby quickly interrupted him with an irritated bark.

"Ya deserved it! Ya over glorified feathery bastard!"

Gabriel met Bobby's fiery eyes and stared as soulfully as he could into the human's eyes and placed a hand over his heart, "That hurts, Singer. Right here. Right in the heart!" He couldn't keep the playful grin from his face however, and completely destroyed any image of true hurt.

"So, ya goin' to answer my questions about the—" Bobby was cut off when Gabriel quickly covered his mouth with his hand, his face grim as he shook his head slowly. Bobby took this Gabriel seriously and nodded his head.

Gabriel removed his hand and cast his eyes around. His body becoming tenser and tenser.

Baby angel was close now. Listening in.

"Sorry, Hunter. Don't know much about the Judeo-Christian Apocalypse," Gabriel said easily, his face blank but his eyes said it all.

'The walls have ears.'

Bobby gave a small imperceptible nod and made a more overt shrugging gesture, "I figured it was a long shot. Thought maybe you of all pagans might've had an idea."

Gabriel shrugged, "Aaaaah that's only 'cause we're on amicable terms, more or less. Any other pagan god would probably try and find a way to eat you, and not in the fun way." He added with a sexy eyebrow waggle for good measure before continuing, "I only know the basics, Singer. Nothing I bet you couldn't sous out on your own from your expansive library of ancient texts I know you've been hoarding."

Bobby frowned and went to open his mouth to continue what would no doubt be a pointless and overly convoluted conversation, when there was a rustling of feathers and this balding man in a suit showed up looking pleased as punch in front of them.

Without hesitation Bobby grabbed the shotgun he stashed behind the couch and in a matter of seconds fired off a salt round. The balding man lost his grin and frowned, irritatingly at Bobby, before brushing off the salt from his suit and repairing the damage in one gesture.

"Ah, you must be Mr. Singer. I'm Zachariah. Angel of the Lor—" the angel was cut off by another salt round going off and hitting him in the chest again. Zachariah glared at Bobby who just shrugged from his spot on the couch, whiskey glass held between his legs and a Trickster to his right trying not to laugh his ass off.

"Finger slipped," Bobby lied with no ounce of apology in his voice.

Gabriel seeing the barely restrained murder in the other angel's eyes, he carefully extracted the shotgun from Bobby's hands still trying not to laugh.

Bobby was now officially his favorite human.

"Right. Now, what hell do you want douche-ariah?" Gabriel asked eyeing the angel he almost had the pleasure of destroying once. "Raphael gave me 24hrs to spend with—"

"Yes, yes, that disgusting spawn of yours," Zachariah interrupted flippantly. He didn't pay attention to the way the human beside the filthy pagan tensed or the way his eyes narrowed in anger at his words.

Then Zachariah's grin became shark like and smug, "We have need of your…services."

Gabriel's eyes blazed with barely restrained anger. He was only just able to keep a lid on his divine rage. He stilled needed to sort out crap with his daughter!

He did enjoy the fear and hesitancy that sparked in the heavenly asshole's eyes though as his smug smile faltered. Zach clearly remembered his and Gabriel's previous encounter and had started eyeing him warily.

"I'm going to have to take a hard pass this time. I'm going to use some of those vacation hours I've been putting in to spend time and mend some bridges with my kid," Gabriel said sarcastically as he pushed himself up from the couch, shoulders braced back as he stared down the other angel with a glare. Bobby was only a second behind him with his shotgun now back in hand, his finger itching to pull the trigger again. It wouldn't do any good, but it'd make him feel better.

Zachariah shifted and gathered some of his air of superiority he lost, not all of it but enough to give Gabriel a smug grin, "Speaking of the little abomination. Shouldn't it have woken up from the gun shots by now?"

Gabriel and Bobby's faces paled.

"Maya!" Bobby shouted as he went to bypass the balding angel to go search for her. He was stopped by Zachariah's arm shooting out to grab his vest, and then found himself thrown back at the couch with a crash. The shotgun clattering to the hardwood floor. There was much swearing to be had from the Bobby shaped lump on the couch as aging joints groaned in protest at the rough treatment.

"Sit down, Mr. Singer. Nothing to worry about," Zachariah said glibly, like he didn't toss the man like a 5 lb weight.

Gabriel sidestepped to put himself between the Hunter that was making murder eyes at the feathery douchebag.

"What did you do?" Gabriel growled threateningly, his eyes narrowing as he carefully stretched his senses.

Baby angel was up in Maya's room. If their grace was anything to go by, they were having some heated internal debate with their vessel. Gabriel put that little interesting tidbit to the back of his mind.

That was the least of his worries right now.

Zachariah gave him a genuinely pleased grin, "Me? Nothing. My associate however has made sure your offspring doesn't disturb us. Just kept it asleep mind you—" He lost his grin when Gabriel took a threatening step and held up his hands and quickly got out, "I have orders to inform Raphael if you don't cooperate! And if you need to have a more hands-on meeting!"

Gabriel's body froze at the threat levelled at him. The jig was up if he had to fight his big brother and protect Maya at the same time…Bobby too. He'd have to tap more into his archangel-ness if he had to go up against his brother and there was no way he was going to be able to hide his grace then.

Didn't mean he wasn't tempted to quickly rush Zachariah and punch the stupid asshole in the face.

Multiple times.

"What kind of goddamned angel are you?" Bobby demanded having gotten back to his feet and glared heatedly at the balding angel. "Do ya enjoy yankin' these two around or somethin'? Don't ya have nothin' better to be doin'? Like stoppin' the Apocalypse?"

"Bobby, enough," Gabriel ordered firmly, feeling Bobby's glare redirected to the back of his head.

Zachariah looked at them and then smugly said to Gabriel, "Please teach your pet human better manners. Wouldn't want his years of heavy drinking to catch up with him now, do we?"

Bobby kept his mouth shut, but barely. His hand itched to fire off some more salt rounds at the intruding feather duster.

"Why don't you go upstairs and check on Fun Dip for me, Bobby?"

Bobby cut his eyes back to the golden-haired undercover archangel's head, then back to the balding angel in front of them. The tone in Gabriel's voice brooked no question. This was an order to get him out of the room…and away from someone who had threatened to give him liver failure.

Bobby made a low grumbling sound in his chest and glared at the smug bastard before biting out an irritated, "Fine!"

Zachariah quirked an eyebrow as Bobby carefully edged out of Zachariah's reach towards the kitchen with a glare the whole way in the angel's direction. The feathery asshole didn't wait for Bobby to be out of ear shot when he said, "Guess there's some hope for your pet after all."

Bobby grumbled and cursed from the kitchen as he made his way towards the hall and the stairs.

From Gabriel's spot he caught Bobby's feet disappear upstairs and he released some tension in his shoulders. Bobby would watch out for his vulnerable daughter and he wouldn't have to worry about trying to angelically reverse whatever shit Douche-ariah would do to the grumpy Hunter.

"Not that this isn't fun—" Zachariah hesitated a moment at the glare Gabriel sent him but remembered that he was now kowtowed with the threat of Raphael coming down for another chat. "But we really should get going."

"Your Boss said—" Gabriel growled lowly through clenched teeth.

"Sorry!" Zachariah interrupted with a happy and smug chirp, enjoying all this way too much. "But, to be fair, time in Heaven does move differently there than here on earth. If anything, he technically gave you a few extra days by our perspective up there. So, now, it's time to pay up."

Gabriel's nostrils flared in anger at Zachariah, at Raphael, at himself for not predicting this underhanded trick!

"Can I at least say goodbye to her?" he growled, his fists clenching and accidentally denting the shotgun still in one of his hands.

Zachariah gave him a slow cruel smirk, "No."

Gabriel's heart was breaking in his chest. He just wanted to protect his daughter. Raise her; love her, hold her in his arms!

Was that too much to ask?!


.

Random Ass Town, Random Ass State, United States

Random Abandoned Warehouse #4

Gabriel

If someone could bite down consciously hard enough to crack their own teeth, Gabriel was sure he would be toothless right now—or have a mouth full of broken teeth—with the force he was using to clench his teeth.

He'd just left Hunter's house—his daughter—to this warehouse because Zachariah and all of Heaven were a bunch of angelic assholes. The broken and dirtied windows of the hollow building shook at the palpable rage in his grace, some gaining more spider web cracks in the already fractured frames.

Then a couple of them shattered. The tinkling glass from the second story windows like sharp glittering rain brought him out of his rage enough to calm himself.

Gabriel closed his eyes and breathed slowly to help calm himself down.

Then his traitorous mind decided to bring up the fact that Maya was going to be even more hurt when she found out he left her; again.

His rage filled grace gave another flare, his ears turning deaf from the blood pounding through his skull—not hearing the rustle of a single pair of wings behind him—and slammed a fist through the metal wall beside him. His fist shoved through the metal wall making it look like it was metallic tissue paper. The sheet metal had bowed, tearing outwards and the metallic bang that had reverberated through the cavernous warehouse was already fading.

"DAMMIT!" Gabriel bellowed, glaring with grace shining brightly in his eyes.

His snarl twisted face quickly fell, and his fury drained away just as quick at the voice that gasped behind him and the name that echoed through the now less than empty space like the crack of a gunshot.

"Gabriel?"

Gabriel turned his head to fully look over his shoulder to find an angel—no doubt the one Zachariah said he'd assign to him—looking at him with fear and surprise on their face.

There was a very awkward silence as the angels eyed each other.

Then Gabriel moved before the other angel decided to fly off, grabbing them, and quickly used his grace to stamp a little communication disruption sigil on the angel's skull, hidden by their vessel's hair.

No angel radio for this little flying ass monkey.

The angel hissed as the sigil was branded on his head, clutching it after Gabriel had let them go.

"Dammit, Gabriel! What the bloody hell?!" the British sounding blonde angel hissed. None of the usual amount of deference to an angel of Gabriel's standing present at all. There were only a handful of angels that Gabriel knew would talk to him like that, knowing he found it more amusing than the groveling or bootlicking Mike and Raph's angels did for them.

Gabriel never did know what happened to them and always wondered and hoped they picked up whatever underhanded game was going on up in Heaven and made overtures to look like they conformed. A non-conformist angel didn't last long, especially with the even more militaristic direction his old home had been heading when he left.

But Gabriel took a better look at this angel's grace and an unconscious and amused smirk graced his face, "Balthy?"

Gabriel was treated to a mildly indignant glare.

"If you can't call me by my name, then at the very least call me Balth. Not Balthy. I'm not some juvenile fledgling anymore," the light blonde-haired angel crossed his arms huffily. The British accent all the pronounced in his annoyance.

Gabriel rolled his eyes and mentally told himself that he was so not going to do that.

"So, you're alive," Balthazar stated. A heavy silence draped over them.

"Guess so," Gabriel shrugged trying to keep relaxed, but…an angel knew about him now. "Since I can't outright kill you…" Balthazar looked at him in alarm and took a wary step back. "How about you just forget you learned about my little witness protection situation here? For old time's sake?"

Balthazar tensed then gave Gabriel an incredulous look, "What?"

Gabriel gave an exaggerated shrug, "Look, I don't want to kill you, but I can make it look like an accident, FYI. But, I'd rather not, and just avoid this whole Apocalypse mess. Last thing I need is Heaven knowing who I really am and that I've been hiding out as a pagan."

"And that you've seemed to have taken on a demi-god? Playing house with an abomination?" Balthazar dared to say, watching the archangel's reaction. One Gabriel wasn't able to fully restrain if the whiskey eyes lighting up with a brief flare in furious grace at the insult was anything to go by. "You care about her…" Balthazar observed trailing off in thought.

Gabriel pfft'd, "Do not! She's just a fun distraction to eat up the boredom between pranks. Just this trinket I ran across—"

Balthazar shook his head, "No. You love her."

Gabriel gave an overexaggerated scoff, "I'm not sleeping with—"

"Never said it was that kind of love, Gabriel," Balthazar rolled his eyes, tensing at the intense stare directed his way. Unsure what was going through the more powerful angel's mind. Maybe it was time to figure out an escape strategy.

Balthazar wasn't sure if he'd be faster than God's Messenger if he tried to fly out.

Then Gabriel gave Balthazar an indulgent smirk, "Alright, Sherlock. What kind is it then, huh? Enlighten me." Gabriel was keeping a feeler out for anymore angels popping in while he thought over what to do with Balthazar. Like he said earlier, he couldn't kill him out right unless he wanted another visit from Big Brother Raphie.

But Balthazar was once one of Gabriel's angels under his command. A funny little soldier with a sarcastic sense of humor Gabriel could fully appreciate.

"Exactly what your little cover story suggests," Balthazar gave him a smirk. "You love her like she's your own kid."

The amusement fell from Gabriel's face.

"And you actually used her actual pronoun instead of 'it'," Gabriel pointed out as he took a stalking step closer to Balthazar. Balthazar matched each of his steps with one of his own, going backwards.

"I doubt you'd appreciate me calling your daughter an it," Balthazar shrugged helplessly.

Gabriel made a false 'eh'-face, "Not technically my—"

"No," Balthazar interrupted. "You—even the Trickster you—wouldn't tie themselves down to just any child. Not of they weren't 100% yours."

"Hardly," Gabriel snorted derisively. "It's been a long time Balthy, I've changed. So, when the real Loki helped me out of a bind and asked me to do him a favor, I said sure. His sons aren't usually too keen on new babies entering the family. So, he asked me to look after her and I ended up getting attached. I'm a bit more sentimental now, I guess," Gabriel shrugged as he lied through his teeth. He doubted Heaven knew too much of pagan god politics or how god begotten monsters reacted to half-human siblings. "'Magine my surprise when I find out she was also John Winchester's kid on top of it all."

Balthazar studied Gabriel, unsure of the truthfulness of the archangel. He wasn't so naïve as to believe that angels didn't lie. Gabriel had taught him and the others long ago that that was wrong, when he complimented Michael on his garish roman armor the older archangel favored.

Father was that armor atrocious.

Gabriel was perhaps the only reason Balthazar had been able to stay under Heaven's radar and their…methods of reform. He was still able to retain his own thoughts and emotions, and most importantly his memories of an earlier time.

The silence stretched and became more awkward as time progressed.

"Well, looks like we're in a bit of a Mexican stand-off at the moment then, aren't we?" Gabriel said after a bit.

Balthazar licked his lips as he considered his options and what he knew.

He knew Gabriel baled on Heaven and made it look like he was killed. Gabriel, the sentimental fool, even adopted a demi-god as his own child despite Heaven's views on them.

And Gabriel didn't want to kill him but…his 'child/ward' was at risk. He also seemed to be following the majority of humans' lead when it comes to be being extremely protective over their children and would kill any threat to them. Blood relation or not.

Balthazar—on an author's little observational side note—wasn't like Zachariah and didn't want to use or hold this information over his old superior's head.

So, Balthazar took a chance, "Teach me to fake my death like you did, and I keep my trap shut like you asked." When Gabriel didn't shoot him down right away, he continued, "I knew what they were doing up there. So, I shut my trap, stopped asking questions, and kept my head down. Doubt they will figure it out anytime soon. I'd rather have an exit strategy and not need it, than need one and not have it. Yours seemed to have worked out well enough for you. So…?"

Gabriel looked at Balthazar first in surprise, then mild curiosity, and finally a bit impressed.

"Better than killing you and dealing with Raphael and letting the cat out of the bag that's for sure," Gabriel smirked, a brief glint of mischief in his eyes. "But I've got just one amendment to this little deal."

Balthazar listened to Gabriel's condition with a very Britishly raised eyebrow but nodded his consent to it.

Chances were slim of it happening, but he promised. Now if Heaven caught wind of Balthazar's 'defect' or if he just wanted to bug out, he could.

Might need to take some 'souvenirs' first if he did though.


.

Sioux Falls, South Dakota, United States

Bobby's House

Bobby

Bobby had made it to Maya's room ready to shoot ineffective rounds on a supernatural being he had no idea how to hurt, but when he entered the room it was empty. Didn't stop the prickling sensation that crossed the back of his neck. Instincts telling him that the room might not be as empty as it looked.

When he walked over to Maya. The feeling on the back of his neck left and Bobby released the tension in his shoulders and a sigh, he hadn't known he'd been holding back. He placed a hand on her shoulder and shook her a little. Her face scrunched as she blearily woke up and looked up at him with sleep dazed eyes.

"Pa?" she asked sleepily with a yawn, stretching out. "Did I sleep through dinner or somethin'?"

Bobby's lips quirked in a half smile filled with affection. His heart warming at hearing her endearment for him.

It never got old.

"Nah, yer good. Just wanted to check on ya is all," Bobby reassured. Everything seemed to be in order.

Maya gave him a quizzical look as she noticed the shotgun he was carrying, "With a shotgun? What did I miss? I was taking a nap!"

She pushed herself up into a sitting position and made to swing her legs and tensed, expecting pain but nothing. She frowned as she draped her legs over the bed, shifting them and moving them every which way.

Maya looked up at Bobby, "Bobby?"

"Yer Dad didn't want ya sufferin'," Bobby shrugged, grabbing her arm when she wobbled a little shakily on her feet. "Said ya'd need to build up the muscle again, but ya'd be able to run again."

Bobby took in her displeased and stormy look. He frowned disapprovingly at her.

"What's with the look?" he asked, his hands unconsciously going to his hips in one of the stances of parental disapproval. Or preemptive disapproval in this case since he just knew he wasn't going to like her answer.

"I told him not to heal me…" Maya mumbled near unintelligibly, but Bobby heard, and his frown deepened dangerously at the reminder of his daughter's stubborn and prideful idiocy.

"You're a right idjit, aren't ya?" Bobby scoffed angrily at her. "Why in blue blazes would you want to be disabled? Especially right now with all this crap going on?!"

"After everything I went through when he was incommunicado, I survived! Without him! I'd have survived with a gimpy leg too!" Maya said petulantly her voice raising in volume.

There was a poignant moment of silence before Bobby grabbed his trucker's cap from his head and whacked his prideful half-Trickster daughter up the side of the head with it.

"Ow!" Maya yelped and took in Bobby's look burning a hole in her head as he glowered down at her. She shrunk back and in on herself, realizing that she probably shouldn't have been so honest. Now she was in trouble with her second father.

Oof.

"You're goin' to cut out this prideful bullshit, Maya," Bobby growled down at her. "Yer Dad's only got so much time to spend some time with ya…" he grabbed her arm and pulled her up and out of the bed to her feet. "Before he has to go again to—just so ya remember—to keep ya safe. This whole thing hasn't been exactly easy for the bastard neither, My," he harrumphed as he dragged her out of the bedroom and down the hall.

"I may not know all the gritty details or what promises he's made ya when ya were young, but I could damn well guess," he slowed down when they got to the stairs, taking them slow since Maya was still a little shaky on her newly healed legs. He kept focused and sharp eyes on her as they walked down and waited till they reached the bottom to continue his rant.

"Where was I? Ah. Right," Bobby muttered when they paused at the bottom of the stairs for a moment. "But I know one thing, and it's somethin' I told ya months ago but ya seemed to have elected to forget. Yer Dad didn't abandon ya, My. Ya don't think it didn't damn near kill him to be away from ya so long? That hearin' what you've been goin' through doesn't drive a pain through his heart like the most blood drenched stake?"

"Bobby, he promised he'd always be there when I prayed for—" Maya tried to protest in her defense, but Bobby was having none of it.

"And the world has never been this close to tippin' over the edge!" Bobby shot back grouchily. "Under normal circumstances I don't doubt that son of a bitch would have zeroed in on ya in less than a heartbeat if ya were in trouble. But we aren't exactly livin' under normal circumstances at the moment," he pointed out, satisfied at the contrite look Maya was starting to sport. That earlier anger no longer lingering in her eyes.

Guess she just needed some time to cool down…and an angelically induced nap.

Bobby sighed and released his annoyance at his idjit daughter and put a hand on her shoulder, "The Apocalypse is comin' up fast, My, and there's no knowin' if we're goin' to be able to stop it. Especially without casualties. Do ya really want this anger to be the last memory you've got of yer Dad?"

Maya looked up into Bobby's eyes before looking away, knowing he was right, and vocally told him so before wrapping her arms around him in a hug.

" 'Course I'm right," Bobby muttered quietly into Maya's hair as he returned the heartfelt hug. He let her go, sniffed, then coughed like they didn't just have a tender chick flick moment, "Let's go see the damn bastard and straighten at least some of this stuff out." He motioned his head towards the—he just realized—oddly quiet den where he'd last left the Trickster angel.

The lack of the asshole angel's voice was reassuring... for the most part.

Bobby frowned as they rounded the corner to find…nothing.

No asshole angel…and no Trickster disguised archangel.

Maya's openness to reconciling some things with her father disappeared from her face as she quickly realized that her Dad had left again. Left her again.

Bobby quickly turned to her, "Now, My—"

Maya shook her head and quickly mumbled, upset, "Forget it." She stormed away before Bobby could reach out to her.

If her Dad didn't want to stick around to talk things out after she cooled down somewhat, then that was fine with her!

Bobby watched as Maya disappeared from his sight before looking back into the empty room just knowing that balding angelic asshole was the cause of Gabriel leaving without a word. Undoubtedly forced to go under threat of killing Maya.

"Balls!" Bobby cursed.


AN: Long time no see! And look! Chapter 50 people!

Sorry it's taken so long to get this chapter up and ready for you guys. Some writing roadblocks and then some personal stuff that had me going through one of the roughest month of my life.

My mild depression took a turn for the worst and I've experienced things related to it I haven't before, like loss of appetite and working myself up so much, mentally, that my entire body locked up and I couldn't move a muscle. And other scary thoughts. I've started therapy to help me deal with everything and I've been doing better the last few days. I've also started college online and reduced work hours to accommodate for it, but I'll still be pretty busy.

I am not abandoning this story. I might not be able to do my monthly updates, but I'm not giving up.

I'd also like to thank vrskaandrea for helping with some brainstorming this chapter. I had backed myself into a corner writing wise and talking with them helped a lot. I loved the idea they gave me so Gabriel being under a spell and finding out and Raphael coming into the equation threatening him to behave, so Gabriel having to tread carefully not to expose his daughter.

Reviews!

Eli Clark: Sorry you feel that way about how I've written Gabriel. I was going for Heaven having Gabriel on a short leash and that doing anything that could expose him and subsequently Maya as anything other than Tricksters and bringing suspicion on them. I hoped you enjoyed this chapter and I don't know how much more Gabriel we'll see, maybe more in season 5. He's one of my favorites too.

Procrastinator 1: I know, I know. It hurt to write that scene. You can hope there will be a fluffy reunion scene, but…this is Supernatural. Dean's going to regret not taking a moment to think and hear any of them out.

Kitten: I will take your sleep deprived and drug-like jitters as a compliment! I'm glad to hear my writing isn't redundant and you have no idea how often when writing and referencing earlier info I have to go back and search through previous chapters, so I know exactly what I wrote before. Thanks, so much for your praise in my writing! It means a lot to me to hear how much people like/love my writing. I often wonder if I'm doing a good job since this has never been a big forte of mine. I sent you a message a few days ago about beta-ing this chapter but the app doesn't show messages you get in your inbox on the site. Maybe next chapter

VegasGranny: Agreed this was one of the most disturbing chapters I've written. I have a special place for cannon John in what little hate I have. It was a good chapter for Castiel's growth and hoped you liked this very Gabriel centric chapter.

Pupyluv247: Here you go!

Xenocanaan: Yeah, Dean's a pretty big dumbass. Yes you're emotional and under a lot of stress, but come on!

Atlansix: Yes, I'm not letting anything happen to puppers yet. John deserved everything AND MORE! And no Maya did not deserve any of what John out her through. Cas is definitely one step closer to TFW. All the questions for the poor befuddled angel. Dean's not stopping anytime soon…not till someone whacks it up the side of his head that is. Glad I pulled it off. With chapters like this I always wonder if it comes off the way I intend it too.

Vrskaandrea: Thanks again so much for your help a couple of months ago! It helped a lot! Also I thought I'd have this done a month ago but the chapter wouldn't end! Extra 8,000 words at least.

Netejala: Dean's on most everyone's shit list. To be fair, he's not wise to Heaven's manipulations yet.

Lazarith: Yeah, I too was a little iffy on 2008 Dean and if he would act like that. I figured John only been gone for a couple years and he's under a lot of stress worrying about Sam, the Apocalypse, Hell memories. Still not cool though.

Senera: You called it with Dean not coming to the conclusion that Maya had no choice, but regardless of how he learns the truth the damage is done. Also quite reading my mind for future plot lol. It's scary how close or spot on you are for what I have planned. You also nailed it on the head why I had Dean do what he did. To put the biggest strain on Sam and Dean's relationship so far (up to season 4) and put a huge motherlovin' divider between the two. Hope this chapter put a light on what Gabriel's been up to.

Maassassin: Sorry for the late update! Hope it was worth it!

Lolxxx: That is the best description of John Winchester I have ever heard, 'John Winchester is a dumpster fire of a man'. That made me smile so much when I read that. Yeah Daddy issues run the family and Maya is slowly developing hers. Didn't plan for it to happen so soon but this story just kind of takes a life of its own and wrestles the reigns from me sometimes.

Mackenzie: I've done it! I've updated!