AN: Alright, y'all know I can't resist a story suggestion. (See also: The Twelfth Thing and the epilogue to Walking Shadow! lol) So, here is a third chapter, from Cas' perspective. It got very long and philosophical, but on the positive side, we get to see a character I adore and miss. I hope the point I was trying to get across doesn't get muddled. Wildfire and BitterSweetJoy, you asked for it!

Sfaulkenberry: Socially distant and completely not weird hugs! Your comments on chapter 2 really mean a lot to me. I'm so glad you were moved by my little story / interspective.

Wildfire: I know, right?! Thanks as always for your comments and suggestions!

WaitingforAslan: Thank you!

BitterSweetJoy: LMK what you think, please. Feedback feeds the writer, ya know.

In my fantasy, there is a hot wind,

That blows over the cities, like a friend,

I dream of souls that are always free,

Like the clouds that fly.

"A miracle is what seems impossible but happens anyway." Griffin, Men in Black 3

Heaven is a very large place, but most of it is only rooms of souls, and they are plenty of corners where you never see other angels. When he was not busy with his garrison, Castiel would find one of these corners and simply enjoy the quiet. On one such foray, he was surprised to see not just an angel, but an archangel. He took a careful step back, but a timeless voice stopped him. "Castiel."

Angels didn't get nervous…okay, they did. But of all the archangels, this was by far the one he'd prefer to see. "Gabriel."

"Do you know what Brownian motion is, Castiel?"

He was confused. "What? No, I do not."

Gabriel waved a hand slowly in front of his own face and chest, palm pointed out. He hadn't yet turned to face the angel. In front of Gabriel, the air solidified in a large oval and an image appeared, as if there were a window. It showed a large body of Earth water, small waves and ripples spreading in every direction, constantly shifting and running into each other. "Humans haven't named it yet. But once they do, it will give them fits. They'll create equations and algorithms and then computer models and still won't be able to predict exactly how the molecules will move against each other. There's just too many interconnected combinations."

Castiel was confused. "The humans?" The humans' greatest accomplishment so far was tanning hides to use for warmth and protection of their own fragile skins.

"Not yet, said Gabriel, finally turning. The visage he'd chosen was smiling enigmatically. "In 1939, a college student studying anthropology in Krakow realized that Brownian motion parallels human interaction when there are many humans in close proximity." The scene changed to show a bird's-eye view of thousands of humans moving through an area that made no sense. The ground was hard like a floor, and the buildings were massive. The humans' clothing was highly sophisticated, and there was technology Castiel never would have imagined – vehicles that moved independently, for example. "Unfortunately, before he finished his paper on the subject, Hitler invaded and the university was shut down. The boy didn't survive the war that followed."

Castiel frowned, his borrowed visage automatically reflecting what he was feeling, though the motion was unfamiliar. "You are looking at…the future?"

"Yes." Gabriel's tone was still light, but there was a finality in it that made it clear he was not open to questions on the why. Castiel knew why, however. It was well known Who Gabriel was seeking, and who was Castiel to tell an archangel about the rules of time travel? "Don't worry, Castiel. I'm not going there. I'm just looking around," Gabriel added, as if he knew what the angel were thinking.

The conciliatory tone reassured Castiel. The archangels were not held in check by anyone or anything except each other, and there was no way Michael or Raphael would care if Gabriel grew annoyed and made one lowly angel disappear. So, even though Gabriel was the most…approachable archangel by far, he was still extremely dangerous. But Castiel was curious; it was one of his greatest failings. "The humans. How can they demonstrate random motion? They typically move with a purpose, a destination in mind." Even the primitive humans Castiel had sometimes watched planned and decided.

"Watch." The view moved in so rapidly a non-angelic eyes wouldn't have been able to follow, to zoom in on what Castiel believed was a male in dark, heavy garments. He was hurrying within the masses, a case clutched in one hand. A similarly dressed creature moving the opposite direction bumped his shoulder, turning the first slightly. "On January 12, 1964, Jeremy Rell was walking from the bus stop to his apartment. He was thinking about work. Alan Cartwright was walking to the bar to grab a drink after his day at work and stepped to the side to avoid a lump of snow. Because he bumped Rell's shoulder, Rell saw Julie Elders, who was grabbing a smoke. Elders reminded Rell of his sister, and he missed her, so he walked a little faster to get home. Rell's wife was walking past the door when he came in, and he surprised her with a kiss. She'd remember the kiss later and decide she was up for a little lovin'. That night, they conceived Jacob Rell, who 47 years later would help develop code-breaking software that – "

"I think I understand," interrupted Castiel, then immediately regretted daring to butt in. But Gabriel didn't react.

"Do you? The only reason the snow was there is because 84 hours and 12 minutes earlier, 16-year-old Thomas Maier dropped his glove when he was looking at – " The archangel smiled again. "Maybe you do understand. The humans do. They sense it. They know they're just drops in an ocean of oceans, and they know that it isn't the currents they have to deal with, it's the trillions to the trillions of interactions with the other drops. And they still go on, always pushing."

"They are…weak," argued Castiel, confused. They were awkward with their upright gait, their helpless infants, their muddled emotions.

Gabriel's eyes blazed so brightly Castiel winced. "They are the most powerful thing there's ever been." Castiel had no idea what to say. "Do you know why they keep going on?"

"Biological imperative survival instinct?" guessed Castiel, aware that he was parroting what most angels would say.

Without warning, Gabriel swung a blade at the other angel, causing Castiel to draw his own and pull it up in a useless attempt to parry. But Gabriel stopped his strike before it impacted. "You have an imperative to survive, Castiel. If you were a being of pure logic, you would have stood still and waited for the strike because you have no chance to defeat me." He sheathed his blade, and Castiel mirrored the motion. "And don't say it's an imperative to reproduce. That's pathetically oversimplified. Do you know really why they continue on? Because in war and peace and death and sickness and the uncertainty which makes up the biggest part of human life, they keep looking at the stars and making music, and art, and poetry, and chairs. Where's the evolutionary advantage in that?"

"Chairs?" asked Castiel, a bit weakly.

"Yes. Comfort. Not helpful for survival. And not only that, they make purple fucking chairs. Why? Why do they have a racially universal drive to keep on keepin' on, Castiel?"

His voice was so impassioned it was unsettling. He didn't sound like an angel. But it made Castiel consider his answer before simply spouting something. "I…do not know."

Gabriel looked at him, really looked directly at him. "And you never will if you keep looking so macro, Castiel. You have to look micro. Look closer and figure it out. And figure out why angels taking vessels will change everything forever, because we won't be able to ignore it any more. We won't be able to ignore them any more." He nodded to himself. "I'm going to go take a walk down there. You can look me up some time when I'm back."

"Gabriel – " Castiel didn't know what he wanted to ask, but Gabriel turned back and winked.

"Why tell you? Because you bother to come out here instead of just hanging with all the other angels. You come out here on the fringes where the barrier between Heaven and Earth is the thinnest. That's why I told you. Because there just might be hope for you." And he was gone.

The window to Earth stayed open, just showing a normal woman humming while she chopped vegetables and waited for her husband to come home and Castiel watched her until the window closed.

Castiel thought about Gabriel's words every time he took a vessel, and many other times over the millennia. But he didn't begin to understand them until he met the Winchesters

WINCHESTER * WINCHESTER

They had not expected the manticore to be able to shoot its spines. Or to have a family. Eve's appearance had leveled up a lot of monsters, and the manticore's paralytic seemed to be working faster than lore suggested it would, too.

Now the brothers were somewhere in a forest in Maine, no back up, no way out except for the river flowing behind them. Sam's side was full of the spines. He could no longer move his legs, and his arms were growing heavy too. Dean could have jumped in the water and gotten away, but Sam could not. So Dean stayed, crouched in front of his wheezing brother like an angry bear while the manticores ranged back and forth, confident in the knowledge that their prey could not escape. That even with his consecrated iron knife he couldn't take them all out, and soon both brothers would be dead.

Sam had yelled at Dean, threatened him, and then pleaded with him to leave, but they both knew it wouldn't happen.

Zachariah would have taken one look at the pair – Dean with a feral snarl on his face, Sam doing his best to keep his struggle quiet even as he choked on his own tongue, as if his death would hurt Dean less if it didn't sound painful – and shake his head at the animalistic nature of humanity. He'd point out the stupidity of Dean's actions and the futility of Sam's struggle. But he wouldn't see how Dean made sure his knee touched Sam's shoulder as he knelt in the dirt, offering silent support. He wouldn't notice how Sam curled his fingers in the hem of Dean's coat, not seeking comfort for himself, but seeking to give comfort and forgiveness.

He wouldn't understand that Dean's silent mouthing of the word "Cas" wasn't a request for help, but an apology that they would fail in their mission and leave him alone. And most angels certainly wouldn't understand what drove Cas – who heard the prayer, even if wasn't intended as such – to not just save them, but to blow the manticores to atoms. It didn't matter that they were creatures of instinct, not malice. Cas found himself unable to react in a more logical manner when he perceived the scene, because he saw all the things the others wouldn't. He saw that sacred connection that Sam and Dean exemplified more than any other humans he'd ever seen or known. And he understood just what a privilege it was to be allowed into that circle, as much as anyone ever had been. Without familial connection, without biology, he was nonetheless welcomed to a closer view of that bond than anyone else in existence.

Cas could hardly be unaffected. So yes, he acted emotionally. And he understood some, maybe even most, of what was communicated between the brothers with a simple clasp of forearms, when Dean pulled Sam to his feet and the brothers simply stared at each other for a long moment. Nobody but the Winchesters themselves could see every layer, but that didn't make Cas any less appreciative.

He thought this, perhaps, was what Gabriel had been talking about so very, very long ago.

WINCHESTER * WINCHESTER

When an angel healed someone, they couldn't help but catch residual echoes of thoughts and feelings. Cas had long since discovered that healing someone he knew only increased that tendency. He did not want to intrude, but he could not avoid it all.

And the emotional pain, the trauma, like a necrotic, weeping wound full of gravel that broke open again and again, tasted like acid as he healed Sam's head wounds. Cas had the impression of a keloid mass being torn into by dirty nails and he felt ill. How had Sam endured such soul damage? Cas had experienced it, for a while, and he had been trapped in his own mind by its weight. To have that bothered and harried by the thought of another possession…he wondered if Sam would break.

Yet Cas could not be angry with Dean. He had seen Dean's face as he told the story. He'd heard the notes of agony in his voice, the haunting horror and guilt as he described Sam lying in the hospital bed and talking to Death like an old friend. And most of all he'd felt the waves of pain that washed off Dean, the feeling of failure as Crowley hacked Gadreel.

The brothers didn't know it, but pain could not break their bond, it only obscured it. In fact, Cas believed there was nothing that could truly destroy it. Death certainly couldn't, nor destiny, nor plans a billion years in the making. It could be covered, damaged, twisted, exploited, but not truly demolished.

Their pain wouldn't let them see that right now, but Cas had hope that, ultimately, they would be drawn back together. No, not hope. Faith.

Cas had lost his faith in many things, but not in them. He had not lost his faith in what it was that drew humans to make art and music, and yes, purple chairs. He had not and would not lose faith in what forever inspired Sam and Dean Winchester to defeat all odds and save the world, and to forgive each other no matter what. Cas would not lose faith in the greatest thing in all of existence.

Love.