"Now remember," Michael said as the last of the young angels alighted on the surface of the Earth, "everyone stay together. Stick with your buddy. Don't go wandering off."
"Hold my hand, Cassie," Gabriel said to his youngest brother. Castiel was no longer a baby, but he still didn't have his full grace yet. His wings lay flat against his back like a fluffy black cloak. The fledgling was technically too young to come along on this field trip; Michael had allowed it on the condition that Gabriel stay by the child's side at all times. "I'm not babysitting both of you," the elder archangel had said.
Right now, Castiel was looking around with an expression of utter amazement. "Lookit! Look, Gabey! Iss so pwetty!"
"You should have seen it when it was all muck, squirt. Come back in another few million years. It'll be even better then."
A huge flying creature swooped down and plucked something from the treetops. "Ooh. Whassat?"
"Let's go find out." The group was moving toward the edge of a cliff that looked out over a broad valley.
Michael stopped them about ten feet from the edge. "This is what we've come to see," he said. "These magnificent creatures that our Father has made the rulers of the Earth. One day, they will be called . . . dinosaurs!"
"Ooh!" the angels chorused.
Far below them, gigantic creatures thundered across the landscape. Some of them had huge spines sticking out of their skin. Some had horns, or bony plates on their heads. Some had long, long necks that they used to eat the leaves at the top of the trees.
"Can we pet them?" asked an angel named Anna.
"We are here to observe only," said Raphael, who was partnered with Lucifer because Michael wasn't speaking to Luci again. There had been a lot of that lately; Gabriel didn't like it at all. "Keep your distance and don't interfere. So no, you can't pet the dinosaurs."
"Awww!"
"You can go exploring," said Michael, "as long as you don't go too far from the group. Stick with your partner. We meet back here when the sun-that's that bright thing up in the sky-drops down to the top of that ridge over there." He pointed across the valley to another mountain range. "Have fun, all of you!"
The angels squealed and ran off in a thousand different directions at once.
"Remember to collect your samples!" Raphael called out. "If anyone needs another copy of the list, come see me!"
Gabriel had the list in his pocket. He took it out and unfolded it, studying it closely. "Okay, Cassie, we've got to find a fern, a shell, a rock, and-Cassie? What are you doing?"
The little angel was pulling away, trying to follow some fuzzy flying creature. "Buzz buzz! Lookit, Gabe!"
"Yeah. It's not on the list. C'mon, let's go find our fern-"
"Buzzy, come back!" Castiel broke free of his older brother's grip and ran off after the flyer, not even looking where he was going. Gabriel sighed and flew off after the child, catching up to him at the edge of a small pond.
"Castiel, come here! You know you're not s'posed to run off!"
"Wanna see the buzzy!"
"We can't touch any of the animals. Mikey said so." Then he looked around him. "Cassie, you're a genius! Look what we found!" All along the edge of the water, there were ferns. "Item one, check. Cas, leave the buzzy alone."
"Buzzy, buzzy, come play wif me." The fledgling stretched out a finger, but the creature flew away. "Bye, buzzy."
"C'mon, we've still gotta find a shell, a rock, and a scale. Cassie! Castiel, come over here now!"
Castiel had waded into the water and was reaching up for a tall plant when his foot came down on something that at first Gabriel thought was a bit of vegetation. When the enormous head rose up out of the water, he realized that the thing Cas had stepped on was, in fact, the tip of the creature's tail. And it had a lot of teeth.
"Cassie, no!" He grabbed the child and flew off with him before those sharp teeth could close around the young angel. When they were a safe distance away, he alighted and set Castiel down on his feet. "Are you okay?"
"Uh huh. Wha' wazzat?"
"I don't know, but I think we'd better steer clear of the watering hole for a while. He's mad cause you stepped on his tail."
"I sorry."
"It's okay, buddy. Let's go see if we can find a shell, a rock, or a scale."
They went off in another direction, and along the way, they met up with Anna and Naomi, who were collecting grass samples.
"Ooh! You got a fern?" Anna came over and looked at the tall fern in Gabriel's hand, waving slightly in the breeze. "Where?"
"Down by the water," the archangel told her. "Be careful, though. We kinda stepped on something's tail, and he's probably still mad."
"Big teeth," Cas said.
"Did you scrape any scales off him?" Naomi asked.
"We were too busy getting away!" Gabriel shook his head at her, and then he remembered something. "Some of the dinosaurs shed their scales by rubbing up against a big tree. So look at the base of a tree for some."
"Thanks, Gabriel! C'mon, Anna, let's go find a big tree!"
"We'll come with you. Then we'll mark it so everyone else can find it."
There was a big tree a short distance away, and scattered on the ground around it were hundreds, maybe thousands, of shimmering scales. "We only need one," said Gabriel, and he searched for the biggest and most colorful one he could find. When he had it, he reached up and scratched a particular sigil on the tree. It wouldn't hurt the tree, and the animals wouldn't see it, but to every angel in the area, it shone like a neon sign reading SCALES ARE HERE!
"Now we just need a shell and a rock."
"Shell anna rock, shell anna rock . . ." Castiel sang.
"And they have to look like the pictures," said Naomi. "You can't just pick up any old rock. See how it has bubbles in it?"
Gabriel read the line of Enochian symbols under the picture. "It says this rock is found near a volcano. Where's a volcano around here?"
"Let's find the shell first. Come on, you two," she said to Anna and Castiel, who were chasing each other through the tall grass. "Creatures with shells like in the picture are found near water. And water is . . . that way." She pointed off toward the west.
"Don' step onna tail," Castiel said as he fell in step beside his older brother.
"That's right, Cas. Don't step on anything's tail. Let's all watch where we're going, okay?"
They set off to find the water, which turned out to be a rushing river. Cas started to run toward it, but Gabriel held him back.
"Wanna play inna water!"
"No, Cassie! Remember what happened the last time you played in the water. Stay out here. This is where the shells are."
And it was true; lining the soft sand along the riverbank were hundreds of glimmering shells, cast off by tiny aquatic creatures who came here to mate and then die. Gabriel picked out the two best shells, gave one to Naomi, and then sent up a signal to the others that this was where the shells were.
"On to the volcano!" he shouted, pumping his fist in the air.
Along the way, they passed a bunch of ferns growing at the base of a tree. Gabriel plucked one so that Naomi and Anna would have a fern, too. All they needed now was a rock from a volcano. It shouldn't be that hard to get, should it?
"Gabe? Whassa vo'cano?" Castiel asked.
"It's a big mountain that's mad all the time," said Naomi, the know-it-all. "It spews really hot rocks and stuff."
"Should we be getting close to that?" Gabriel asked in alarm.
"It's not active right now! They wouldn't let us near it if it wasn't safe!"
"Well, sor-ry!"
"Don't say sorry like you don't mean it!"
The four of them soon found that they weren't the first ones to find the volcano. Two young angels named Zachariah and Samandriel were already there, searching for their samples at the base of the volcano.
"Hi Zach! Hi Sammy! Find the rock yet?"
Zachariah looked over his shoulder at the new arrivals. "Nope. Lots of rocks here, but not like the one in the picture."
"Can we help look?" Gabriel pointed up into the sky, where the sun was slowly dipping down towards the top of the ridge. "We don't got a lot of time left."
"All we need's the rock. We got the other stuff."
"Us, too. They gotta be here somewhere, right? Cassie, come help me look for the rock. Cas?"
"Buzzy!" Castiel saw another of the flying insects zooming by and went running after it.
"Castiel! Come back here! Cas!" Gabriel saw that his younger brother wasn't listening, and he tossed the rock samples he was holding onto the ground. "Be right back."
He flew off until he caught up with the child and grabbed him. "Cas, you can't go running off like that! You could get lost, and then we'll get in trouble! What if the big monster comes back?"
Castiel hung his head. "Sowwy, Gabe."
"Okay. C'mon, let's go look for our rock. Then you can play."
Cas' foot struck a rock and sent it flying through the air. As it landed, Gabriel noticed that it had bubbles on it. He bent and picked it up.
"Wow, Cassie, you found the rock! Any more of those?"
"I dunno."
"Let's look around and see. Hey guys!" he called out. "We found one of those rocks over here! Maybe there's more!"
The other youngsters came running, and they found more of the bubbly rocks scattered around in the grass and under some wide, flat leaves. Naomi sent up the sigil this time; the sun was just above the top of the ridge now, and they would have to head back soon.
Gabriel was at the back of the small group, and he thought Castiel had run on ahead, which was all right because the rest of the angels would keep him with them. He relaxed for the first time in this strangely beautiful place and looked around at the colorful vegetation and the even more colorful animals darting here and there through the landscape. Most of them were too small to hurt him, and took no notice of him anyway.
It wasn't until he and the others reached the meetup point that he realized that Cas wasn't with them. He hadn't come back with them. Gabriel frantically flitted from angel to angel, asking if they'd seen little Castiel.
"Wasn't he with you?" Balthazar asked. "Have you managed to lose him?"
"This isn't funny! We've gotta find him!"
"I'm telling Michael."
"No! I mean, I'm sure I'll find him. He's around here somewhere."
But he wasn't. Gabriel retraced his steps all the way back to the volcano, and Cassie was nowhere to be found. He wasn't by the watering hole, or the river. He wasn't anywhere.
Michael was gonna kill him.
He found the older archangels lounging on a big rock a short distance away from everyone else, where they could keep an eye on the younger kids while still able to talk privately. "Luci," he said, "I've lost Castiel."
"What?" Lucifer slid down off the rock and came over to his younger brother. "How did you lose him?"
"I don't know! I thought he was with the rest of us, but he wasn't, and now he isn't anywhere! I need to find him, now!"
"We'll find him, kiddo. How far could he get?"
"This particular child?" said Raphael. "You'd be surprised. He's fast for his size. We need to split up and search before Michael comes back-"
"Too late," said Gabriel, as a familiar shadow fell over them.
"What is going on?" Michael intoned in his angry older brother voice.
"We've sort of lost Castiel," said Lucifer. "But don't worry, we'll find him."
"You've lost him?"
"Temporarily misplaced. He's around here somewhere."
"This is your fault," Michael said, turning his fury upon Gabriel. "You were supposed to be watching him!"
"I was! I thought he was with us, but he wasn't!"
"I told you he was too young to come along! But you begged me: please, Mikey, please, he'll be good, I'll watch him every single minute. And I gave in. And look what happened!"
"Leave him alone!" Lucifer stepped in front of the younger archangel. "He's done his best all day long. Don't blame this all on him!"
"Stay out of this, Luci!"
"Stop acting like a jerk, and I will!"
"Enough!" Raphael intervened before the argument could turn physical. "This is not helping! We need to be looking for the child, not blaming each other!"
The two elder archangels looked away for a moment. "You're right," said Michael. "Truce?"
"Yeah, I guess so," said Lucifer. "C'mon, let's go rally the troops."
After an inspiring speech (Michael was very good at inspiring speeches), the angels all spread out and searched for the little lost angel.
"Castiel!"
"Cas! Cassie, where are you?"
"You don't s'pose a dinosaur ate him, do you?" asked Balthazar.
Gabriel gave him a look that would have shattered a mountain.
"Sorry. I'm sure he's okay."
They looked in every possible place a toddler angel could hide: behind trees, under tall bushes, near a shade-giving rock (where they startled off a family of orange and blue lizards who hissed at them but went on their way). No sign of Castiel anywhere.
"He's gotta be here," Gabriel moaned. He was close to tears again, but trying to hang on for the sake of the younger kids. "I should've held his hand, but I thought he'd be okay . . ."
Suddenly a sigil appeared in the air, glimmering and glowing for all to see. "I found him, I found him!" Anna called out.
The other angels all came running. Castiel was curled up at the base of a tall tree, fast asleep.
"I got him." Gabriel went and scooped the child up in his arms. "You shoulda told me you wanted a nap, baby."
Suddenly the other angels took a step back as the top of the tree started shaking. Then the branches parted, and the huge dinosaur from the watering hole thundered into the clearing.
"Stand back," Michael warned the others. He drew his sword. The blade gleamed with heavenly light, and most of the young angels covered their eyes. Gabriel kept his open, though. He wanted to see what happened next.
"BEGONE, BEAST!" Michael proclaimed in a voice like thunder.
The dinosaur yelped and turned tail, fleeing back to the safety of the watering hole. The young angels breathed a sigh of relief.
Castiel hadn't even stirred. That kid could sleep through anything. Even the power and might of an archangel's voice.
The sky lit up like fire as the sun hit the top of the distant ridge.
"Time to go home now," Michael told them. No one tried to argue or plead for more time. One by one, the angels returned to Heaven.
Gabriel was about to step through the doorway when Michael held him back. "I have something to say to you," he said.
The younger archangel braced himself for another lecture.
"I'm sorry I yelled at you. I know you did your best. It's hard to keep an eye on someone this young, every single minute. You did a great job."
Gabriel looked up in surprise. "You're . . . not mad at me?"
"Not anymore. It all turned out fine in the end. But let this be a lesson to you: you need to keep eyes on him all the time. Don't take it for granted that he's okay; make sure he is."
"I will. Thanks, Mike."
Michael smiled and patted the youngster on the head. "Get this one to bed, now. He's had a long day. You both have."
Gabriel nodded and stepped through the portal. He hoped they could go and see dinosaurs again sometime. Maybe when Cas was a little older.
Maybe someday.
