A/N: Don't you hate it when Real Life interferes with writing fanfiction? My week of absence turned out to be more like a month, so this is Part One of what was meant to be a longer chapter, but is being posted now to prove, you know, that I'm alive. Then I can read a bit without feeling guilty, huh? As always, I love reading your reviews. They're all so thoughtful, and they make my heart melt. Thanks, guys. Thanks for sticking around.

Oh, and tell me what you think of Amelia and Don! I kind of love them. I'll accept flames for that. But I do.

"It's in our best interests to go to her first," Gabriel had said thoughtfully. "We wouldn't want to color her judgment."

Bobby didn't think it was strictly in their best interests to go at all. He also resented the use of we, when they both knew perfectly well it would be Bobby, and Bobby alone who would be going in without a roadmap. When he said as much, Gabriel only smirked. After reminding him that cell phones were in vogue, he went on to outline, painstakingly, why exactly the goddess' allegiance was a necessary first step. She was notorious for picking the winning side. She had good relations with gods across the board, from good to evil and from all faiths. She had the power to command a sizeable force on Earth, and she could likely mobilize the Heavens as well. She had a soft spot for humans. If they had her, they could have anyone.

Bobby couldn't pretend he liked it, but it made enough sense, so he went out unescorted, walked through the crossroads of Heaven, until he'd found himself deep in her realm. The distant barking of dogs along with a single, amphibious croak signaled her arrival, as she cut through the mist to meet him.

It was gratifying to know that she didn't have three heads.

"Heaven's agent seeks my audience to request assistance in a future battle," she said, her voice a soft lilt without any of the power or fire behind it that Bobby expected. Despite the twin torches she held out, only Bobby was illuminated, and she remained distorted by the fog and the shadows that seemed to reach up and cling to her.

"Well, that saves me some time," he said gruffly. He pulled out the cell he'd been given and texted Gabriel he'd found her. Having to be coached on texting by an Archangel still occasionally prone to using anachronistic terminology had been an embarrassment, to say the least. Bobby made up for it by cussing marginally more than he usually did.

He couldn't see her mouth to check for a smile, but the tone of her voice seemed to indicate one. "Fear not, traveler," she said. "I am known to some as the goddess of trivia, after all."

"Seeing as you've already told me why I'm here, maybe you could do your own convincing, too," Bobby answered, irascible. Maybe it was being dead that made him bold, or maybe he was just frustrated that he couldn't get the cell to stop vibrating after Gabriel sent his reply. If you found her, make your fucking point and tell me what she says. This was why Bobby had always used the landline.

"I am curious," she said. "On how your Heaven proposes to fight this threat at all. Well do I know what will occur if the Fallen are left unchecked, and I have been approached already by others seeking a solution. What I can do for them is clear. What could I do for you, the instigators of the problem?"

"The same thing, probably," Bobby ventured. "Heaven is going to be bound up; our Champions—" he bit out the word, the term Gabriel had taught him to use, "—will be able to send them from Earth, zero mess. You have control over the witches. If you could delay the fallen angels, if you could protect the Champions, there is no chance of loss." These lines, precisely the ones Gabriel had drilled into him. He hadn't provided any specifics to Bobby, hadn't even seen fit to tell him how exactly Heaven was going to be closed. But he had faith in his boys, even if he didn't in his so-called "boss".

"Champions?" She straightened. "Let me see." She held out her hands, thankfully normal-looking, if pale, and Bobby scowled as he offered his to her. They'd barely touched before she drew hers away again, as if burned.

"These are your Champions?" she snarled. "They imprisoned and assisted in killing Zeus, my benefactor. They let Artemis, my enemy, live."

"I don't know about any of that," Bobby said.

Her voice softened. "Yet they are a friend of my child Portia's—even if the enemies of those who still remember me. You have mistaken my power, Bobby Singer. It is not over the witches, but over—" she morphed, in an instant turning into a snarling wolf. "—their familiars. They offer guidance, they do not order. My help is of a limited nature." The mist churned around her, and she became a woman again. "You have dealt with powerful magic, Singer. Had Heaven not laid its claim on you, you might have had a familiar long ago. To fill your void."

"The hell you saying?"

"Karen's soul is safe," she said. "I know this for a fact. Tell your Gabriel that I will consider assisting you. It is a better plan than any others I have been privy to, providing that your Champions are trustworthy and capable. I claim my right to test them before making my decision."

Bobby shot off another text. Says she wants to "test" them before making up her mind. Sounds fishy. I don't like it.

Gabriel's reply came back within a few moments. There's a precedent for that sort of thing—we had it done with Job. Give her the okay, and report back to me.

Bobby considered smashing the phone, but he raised his eyes back to those of the goddess. "Alright, then."

She nodded. "As a favor. Tell Gabriel he will be murdered the moment he steps outside of Heaven's walls. The Hindu gods know of his resurrection, and are eager for vengeance."

"You know what? I don't think I will."

oOo

By the time they returned to the bunker, the roses had wilted. Dean wasn't surprised—they weren't in bloom for terribly long—but Castiel was freaking bereft, like the season had killed off someone dear to him, or something.

So, on one stifling hot morning, leaving Sam to do a number three in the Men of Letters library, he made a quick run for supplies. Surprisingly enough, his brother was outside when he arrived back, apparently unwilling to let his book fetish interfere with his summer tan. Consequently, he was there to perform his patented Sam Winchester Eyebrow Gymnastics when he glimpsed the contents of the whorl-decorated clay pot Dean carried with the shopping bag.

"Dude," Sam said. "Is that what I think it is?"

Dean cradled the clay pot against his chest, a little defensive. "Hey, houseplants are awesome. We can take it with us places—like Leon in The Professional."

"Sure, houseplants are fine," Sam conceded. "But those are flowers, Dean. Huge, purple flowers."

"They're easy to care for. Besides, it's not like they're for me." He stepped past him and into the doorway, clearly agitated. Sam rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, exactly."

"Hey, do you know where Cas is?" Sam wondered how his brother ever succeeded in being a con man, when the studied casual tone he adopted now was so painfully transparent. You're fucking bringing him flowers. It would only be funnier if you declared it your anniversary.

"Oh," Sam said. "You know. Training up to become Mr. Universe. You really should talk to him about that, by the way. It's getting a bit excessive."

"He's beating you at running, isn't he?" Sam's affronted snort was all the confirmation he needed. "See you inside, bitch."

Sam snapped his book shut. "Actually, Dean. I need to talk to you about something."

He was more than a little shocked when telling Dean about the dreamwalking only drew a surprised blink and an almost unconscious scratch behind his ear, not so much a gesture indicating he had heard enough as one checking to see if the herbs were still in place. Then he smiled, slightly. "And you're saying you're gaining control over it?"

"What?" This time it was Sam's turn for a surprised blink.

"I said, are you gaining more control over it? I mean, if Adam's still alive, that's not good news, but if you can avoid him, or even find out his location—"

"I don't want to kill him, Dean. We've been over this. And—yeah, yeah, I am, but I guess I—just, isn't this the point where you tell me to quit the psychic crap, or, I dunno, try to figure out what's wrong with me?"

Dean's lips pursed, his brows drawing together. "Is that what you want me to do?"

"No. Yes—I'm not sure. I don't like not knowing what's going on. What if I'm—what if I'm becoming some kind of monster? Again. Why are you so okay with this?"

Dean's lips tugged upwards. "I told you already—it's fine. I trust you. You know, I think that was most of the problem, before. Hell, that's always the problem, not trusting each other when it counts. And I'm tired of playing that game, you know? We're a team, you and me. Anyway, if I could do the things you could do…maybe we should be taking it in stride. Maybe it's a good thing."

"That's uncharacteristically optimistic of you."

"What can I say? I have a good feeling. I want to keep it."

"Okay." Sam nodded to himself, still confused. He'd been prepared for shit to hit the fan, for Dean to have an episode and to have to defend himself. He hadn't expected this, this automatic acceptance and trust. It stirred a strange feeling inside of him—relief? Or something bigger. Elation. He knew he shouldn't still look to his brother for absolution, but the deepest parts of him still depended on Dean for acceptance and love, a fact he'd always been afraid of but couldn't help but feel.

Dean coughed into his hand slightly as he turned away, the shopping bag rustling as he did so, and it drew Sam's attention to something else he'd been thinking about lately.

"Hey, you feeling alright? Lately you've been a little pale."

Dean chuckled. "Yeah, I guess I am feeling a little under the weather. Haven't been getting much sleep lately, you know." He winked, and Sam groaned.

"Seriously? I didn't need that image, you jerk."

A smile twitched at the corners of Dean's mouth. "'Course you did. So. Once you're done burning to death out here." He nudged himself further in the door.

"Yeah, see you in a bit."

When Dean finally shut the door behind him, he let loose the coughing fit he'd been trying to hold in, rubbed his free hand furiously against his jeans when he'd finished. He'd need to wash it in a minute.

Castiel was right after all. This was shaping up to be exactly like last year, and Dean hated himself for it.

oOo

"I told you, I don't have that part translated yet! I can't help it—they're getting harder as they go along, this is probably three times as difficult as translating the Hell tablet was, okay? And the Men of Letters Bunker has nothing that can help me, alright?"

"Well, why don't you come and stay with us for a bit anyway? It'd be safe…you could concentrate… dammit, Kevin, we're your friends! It's not a good idea to be out there on your own!"

It was the third time they'd had this argument, and Kevin was sick to death of it, sick of the fury that sloshed in his belly every time Dean spoke to him. "I'm not your friend," he spat, feeling a rush of pleasure as Dean's end of the line went silent. "Did you ever even bother thinking of the consequences of what you did back in that church? You're all for saving the world, unless it's your family's lives on the line, is that it? Do you know how much I fucking gave up to close the Gates of Hell? My family, my bestfriend, my life. And you fucking dropped the ball, Dean! Now, believe me, I'm thrilled you're all for sealing the angels in Heaven, but I'm not going to get within ten miles of you on the off chance that I lose control and hunt you, your brother, and your goddamned angel pal down for starting this mess!"

Dean's voice was low. "You don't mean that. Kevin, we never meant for that stuff to happen to you—"

"You never cared that it happened, either," Kevin growled. "All for stabbing my mom when she was possessed, remember? You never cared about me; I was—am— just useful, because I'm the Prophet. 'It'll all be over soon,' all those platitudes you're so prone to spouting off—were never true. I don't know how I let myself believe them. So no, we're about as far from friends as you can get, Dean. I think I'm better off on my own, thanks. I'll call you back when I have a translation."

He snapped the phone shut, and scowled at the former demon curled pathetically on the sofa, eyes rimed with red, open pill bottles strewn around him. "What are you looking at," Kevin snarled.

"Told you I needed Scotch, not aspirin," Crowley moaned disgustedly, attempting to toss a pill bottle at Kevin's feet. "You're worse at listening to directions than an imp."

"Drop the sick and incapacitated act," Kevin said. "You were feeling well enough to run around when that zombie mariachi band showed up. I bet you could even handle another case. I found one up in Kermit, Texas. We could even get some Scotch on the way." It was partly Crowley's influence, but Kevin had become startlingly attached to alcohol lately. Hunting and drinking were two activities that seemed to go hand in hand, or at least that was Kevin's explanation for it.

Crowley brightened immediately, and sat up with energy. "Keeping me alive to be slaughtered like a pig," he said gratefully. "You're my Dumbledore. You're sure there isn't a translation for the next part?"

"I'll beat my brains out if I stare at that rock any longer," Kevin confirmed. "And you know, I don't care to fry myself trying anymore, I'm going to take a hiatus from translating if I need to. The world owes me a fucking bathroom break every now and again."

"You've become a foul mouthed bugger," Crowley noted, pleased. "Long as I'm the first one to know about a breakthrough. I'm in no hurry."

"No deal," Kevin said. "I'm not playing favorites; I hate you as much as anyone. Let's get moving."

oOo

Castiel didn't always kill mechanically. Sometimes there was feeling behind it, which was exactly what Naomi didn't want.

A prayer came through once, making it past all of the filters and defenses Naomi had rigged. It didn't matter, though. It didn't make what Castiel was doing any less real, any less true.

"Where the hell are you, man?"

I'm here! he wanted to scream, but screaming demonstrated emotion, and that was expressly forbidden him. I'm here and I'm hurting!

He was angry, then; a vat of acid seemed to burst through his Grace, and swipe! stab! Another Dean lay dead at his feet. Castiel, horrified, couldn't pull his eyes away. So he had done it. He'd killed Dean in a fit of rage, unable to control his temper.

The next Dean came running, but fury was a poison, and Castiel took him as well. Was this what he wanted? Did he want to kill Dean? There was no denying he drove Castiel over the edge, in a million different ways: bitterness and happiness and frustration and elation and black, black anger, when nothing else could move him. Maybe this was what he wanted all along; maybe this would solve all of his problems.

Nononono. That was wrong, it had to be. He couldn't harm Dean, he was his protector—

But the two corpses at his feet remained, testimonies against him. You're a monster, Castiel, they seemed to say. I know it, he replied.

Eyes wet, he turned the blade in his hands, but Naomi stopped him before it could plunge into his chest.

"Stop," she commanded, holding his hands. Castiel could feel her confusion. Angels did not commit suicide. It wasn't done.

"I did it wrong, again," she said. Her eyes searched Castiel's face. "What drives you to destroy yourself, Castiel? Why is it so hard to fix you?"

He didn't know. Neither of them did.

Dean was hot when he awoke, and shaking underneath the covers. Castiel had done enough research on human illnesses to understand that this was a bad thing. He reached forward instinctively and touched his fingers to his forehead, only remembering himself when Dean's eyes fluttered open, and he gave him a small, sad smile. He drew them away—he didn't have that power anymore.

"It's already starting," he said quietly. "I will get the Tylenol." The internet had made many recommendations for medicine, and Castiel had been forced to smuggle them all inside the other night, stashing them under the sink while Sam was off running other errands. He'd stopped protesting Dean's secrecy over the matter a while ago—the damage was already done. And there was that promise he'd made, to listen to Dean, and Dean had told him to trust him on that.

So Castiel trusted him.

He slunk downstairs, all stealth, only to find Sam already puttering in the kitchen, pouring himself a glass of water, mixing in some powder for an herbal tea. He liked to drink the concoction cold, he said—preferring the bitterness to its saccharine sweetness when heated.

"Sam," he said solemnly, with a stiff nod. He took one of the chairs at the table, accepting the glass of water Sam offered him. "You're up early."

"And you aren't?" Sam's mouth twisted in a wry smile. "You know you're worrying Dean sick."

"I believe that is Dean's natural condition," he said. "What is keeping you up tonight?"

"I was dreamwalking," Sam said, and Castiel's grip on the glass tightened minutely. "It was Adam—again." The grip loosened. Sam didn't pick up on it. "It's like stepping in mud, dreaming with him—I don't always mean to do it, but then I'm stuck, and it's hard to pull back out."

"What did he do?" Castiel said, eyes narrowing. "If you know his location, perhaps we can hunt him down."

Sam muffled a laugh with his hand, another one bubbling up through his throat when he saw how taken aback Castiel looked. "No, it's okay, Cas. I just never expected to have two big brothers, that's all." He beamed. "I'm okay, really. This is something that I can handle, I swear. I'm gaining more control the more I do this. It could be really useful, don't you think?"

Castiel shook his head doubtfully. "Adam has threatened to torture and kill you on multiple occasions," he said.

"No more than the rest of the hunting community, really," Sam said, and shrugged. "I'm the demon blood kid, remember? That kind of reputation doesn't disappear overnight; I'm probably only still alive because they're all afraid of me. Besides, I'm watching him while he sleeps. I'll be the first to know if he does anything dangerous."

Castiel leaned back in his seat, a change in posture that seemed to indicate surrender to Sam, because his smile was triumphant. "What's keeping you up, Cas?"

Castiel could see the strategy in this, Sam opening up in order to coax him to do the same. Dean had tried the same many times before, playing on, as Castiel understood it, a human social rule of reciprocity. However well-intentioned it was, he wasn't playing.

"I was thirsty," he said simply, watching Sam deflate.

"Oh. Well. Okay." Sam's parting smile was strained, and Castiel waited for his footsteps to fade down the hallway before setting down his glass—which he hadn't sipped from yet—to rummage around for the pills he needed.

When he returned to Dean's room, he found him wrapped up in the remaining blankets, a padded cocoon curled on the edge of the bed. He shook him gently awake, nodding towards the pills and water he'd set by him.

"Tha's my Cas," Dean slurred affectionately. "Always takin' care of me."

"You're wrong," Castiel corrected him. "I've never done that."

Dean didn't seem to be listening, though. He sat up and his arms darted out of the comforter for only a moment as he took the medication, eager to return them to the warmth. He tossed himself sideways and into Castiel's lap, letting a corner of his encasement drop away and onto the mattress. For a moment, it seemed to Castiel like the corner of a shroud.

"I'm so happy, Cas. It's weird, isn't it? All this goin' on… and I'm the happiest I've ever been."

Castiel said nothing, but ran his fingers through Dean's hair, eyes screwed shut.

"I'm so happy you're here, Cas. You have no idea… no idea." Dean dropped off soon after that, snoring softly, head resting on Castiel's thigh. Castiel hummed him a tune, a fragment of an Enochian lullaby.

What drives you to destroy yourself, Castiel?

He still couldn't say.

oOo

Amelia… give me Amelia.

Sam hadn't been lying when he said he'd been gaining more control over his dreams. So it was he went searching around now, pulling himself toward a mind, towards a dream with the vestiges of Amelia hanging around it. He couldn't say why it was her he sought, whenever he closed his eyes. There was Adam, of course, whom it was his responsibility to keep an eye on. As far as he could tell, he wouldn't go completely psychopathic so long as Sam still occasionally visited, wouldn't become dangerous so long as Sam was there to take the brunt of his anger. He had faith that with time, he could perhaps wheedle Adam into backing down, to overcome the Cage and live a normal life. Sam told himself he was working to fix Adam, that he was doing for him what many others had done to try and fix Sam. He convinced himself he was the only one capable, because he understood the Cage. Understood Adam, whom he spent more years with, on a whole, than with Dean.

Adam, of course, told a different story. And that was why Sam couldn't bear to dream with him too often. Adam got under his skin, talking destruction and alliance and brokenness in a way entirely too reminiscent of Lucifer. Adam played on that, of course—bringing up shadows of the Morningstar to frighten Sam, all the while whispering of how Michael tormented him through the years, of being the least favorite vessel, the most mistreated. He spoke of how he and Sam had cannibalized each other, while Michael and Lucifer cheered them on, and how he missed that. So Sam, for all of his aspirations, his firmest desire to pull Adam back to humanity—couldn't make himself dream with him. Not if he could help it. He had to be pulled in.

It was Amelia's dreams he clung to, searched out. He might have looked for Cas'—removing the chamomile wouldn't have been difficult, and they all knew he was struggling with something that sleep did nothing to ease—but Dean had forbidden him from both of their heads. And Amelia was the one thing, the only comfort Sam had. He could hide in the corners of her dreams now, bask in her happiness when they were good, and even feel safe in the fact that her worst nightmares involved not being able to save a patient, rather than seeing family torn apart before her eyes. Sam could watch her, and feel that he had made one right decision, left one loved one unsullied by his world of monsters and blood.

Not to say that it was necessarily ethical to spy on her dreams, but they were infinitely preferable to his own. Until that night, when he'd fallen asleep after speaking with Castiel.

The dream was dark and confused, with a tinge of reality that made it seem more memory than fabrication. Raised voices were yelling something indistinct down the hall, the furniture was overturned, and the walls were coated in blood. Amelia was crouched by a closet, too terrified to think of opening it. Sam yanked her up by her elbow, but she wouldn't respond to his questions, her eyes glazed, her breath stuttering. Her arms were covered with cuts of varying degrees—there was glass embedded in a few places. Her dark hair was matted to her forehead and neck, but there were no signs of a head injury.

"Our neighbors, our neighbors," she gasped, dazed. "I don't understand what happened to them. They just stopped acting like themselves. Their eyes changed color, did you know that? I swear, it wasn't just the light, their eyes all—"

"Where is Don?" Sam demanded.

"He's gone—gone!" Amelia screeched. She looked wildly around, the fact of the closet only now seeming to sink in. "I've got to hide," she whispered. "I'll die, I have to—" She crawled into the closet, shutting the door behind her.

The dream began to fragment around him. Sam burst through to the waking world with a roar, shoving his boots onto his feet and slinging the packed duffle always at the foot of his bed over his shoulder almost before he'd blinked the red-stained walls out of his vision.

"DEAN, WE HAVE TO GO!" She had to still be alive, if she was dreaming. Whether she'd still be by the time they made it to Texas—Sam couldn't think about that. He had to movemovemovemove.

"DEAN!"

"Coming!" Dean stumbled out of his room, jacket half-pulled on, gun in hand, a wide-eyed Castiel trailing in his wake. His brother looked wan and pale—worse than he ever looked, even this early in the morning. Sam frowned, about to ask, but Dean had assured him earlier, and there was something else to worry about, broken furniture, broken glass—

"We're going to Kermit. Now."

"Okay," Dean said. He knew that look, and he knew that tone. There was an emergency, and action was going to precede any and all discussion on the matter. "You drive. 'M still tired." The wobble in his step bespoke more than tiredness, but Castiel's supporting arm saved him from getting more than a hard look from Sam before he took the keys .

"I will follow in a few minutes," Castiel said. He nodded at Sam's duffle. "I will pack for the both of us. You two should begin driving."

"Just don't forget the damn GPS this time, okay, Cas?" Sam spared a fleeting smile before whipping out of the door.

"My sense of direction needs no assistance from—"

"Yeah, but you need something to tell you when to switch lanes. You can't go plowing through other people's land just because it's a 'shortcut', you'll be arrested again," Dean reminded him. " Hey, Cas. You'll be—"

"Right behind you. Until Sam sees fit to divulge the exact nature of this trip, we would be best prepared with some things not currently in the Impala's trunk." He pressed a pill bottle into Dean's palm and gave him a long Significant Look.

"Yeah, I got it, okay," Dean sighed. "See you later."

oOo

"What's wrong?" Don whispered. Amelia had woken up trembling in his arms, with a half-muffled shout. Usually it was him doing that. It came with the whole PTSD thing.

"I had a dream… about Sam," she said. "Again. It was so strange, though. I don't understand." There was blood, everywhere. Don was dead, or worse. It didn't feel like a nightmare though, it felt—real. More real than most of waking life, to be perfectly honest.

"You love him," Don said gently, for the umpteenth time. Amelia thought it was ridiculous, how he was always saying that. A gore-splattered living room wasn't a romantic setting—her subconscious wasn't telling her Sam was The One, it was probably telling her he was a serial killer.

"No, I don't. I love you." Again, repetition. Don sighed, and cupped her cheek in his palm, making sure she was looking at him. He'd been practicing this speech, she could tell.

"I know it. But there's room in your heart for two," he said. "I already have to share it with all of your little patients. Loving me doesn't negate loving him, or vice versa. You keep thinking it does, but it doesn't."

She scowled. "They're just dreams, Don." Ridiculously horrific ones, at that. "And he left me."

"I left, too, remember? But that's not the point. The point is, you love him."

She wrapped her fingers around his wrist, and left them there, loose so that he could move his hand down to cushion her neck. "Look, Don," Maybe they should be talking about how she's dreaming of their impending doom, rather than any vestiges of romantic interest Don has deluded himself into thinking Amelia has for a certain mysterious possible serial killer. But Don has a way of distracting her from the important things. "I don't understand what you're saying. Maybe we had some chemistry—I was depressed, he was depressed, I was a vet, he had a dog, I was starved for sex, and he was Tarzan—but there were so many things wrong with it, I can't even… he wouldn't say anything about his past that wasn't vague or cryptic, and he tried to cover up for it by insisting we talk about me and my feelings all of the time." Her eyes narrowed. "Sort of like you, Don. You've never said a word on what happened—with the army."

Pulling his hand out from under her neck, Don sat up, frustrated. "Maybe I don't want to, okay? It was bad down there, that's all you need to know. I mean—you're like this fantastic, unspoiled thing, Amelia. The archetype of the perfect woman. It's damn unrealistic—you save animals' lives for a living, you're beautiful, you make tall tough hulking men like me go crazy and want to protect you with their lives. You're worse than Mina Murray, you're like a breathing Mary Sue, and I just—I get that you think you're tough, I do, but I don't think I could even talk to you about what happened down there without, without dragging you into it, and that's something I can't do. Do you understand what I'm saying?"

She didn't. At all. "Yeah, okay, Don," she said in what she meant to be a conciliatory tone, but came out just sounding disgruntled. Don was the kind of guy you had to pull a Portia with before he trusted you with information—far more forthcoming when your inner thigh was slashed open as physical evidence of your willingness to listen. "I'll go get some water, alright?"

She flicked on the lamp by the bed and made to walk out of the room, before the light started flickering and the ground shaking beneath her feet.

"Uh, I might have dreamed about our gruesome deaths too, while I was asleep," she said, as plaster started dropping from the ceiling.

"That's nice." He hopped up, and began to fumble around for a gun.

oOo

"Job?" Bobbly roared. "Job was the precedent? The Job whose children were all killed, property lost, and so sick he wished he was never born Job?"

"Well, we made up for it afterwards," Gabriel said plaintively. "More wealth than ever, some more children, and he was never unhealthy, just a hypochondriac—"

"You killed his children! Do you think he just got over that?"

"Well, for all his purported piety, I always thought he was a heartless old bastard," Gabriel said. "He only mourned them in passing, seemed pleased enough when he had some more. Hated the loss of his property more, really."

Bobby pinched the bridge of his nose. "I guess what I'm trying to get at here, is how exactly are they gonna be tested?"

"Can't tell," Gabriel said. "I guess the same thing as ever—are they more willing to save the world or each other, when the chips are down? After the Hell Trials, I'm sure that's what everyone's wondering. I mean, I've rooted for them before, but you can't win a chess game if you don't make sacrifices. The way your boys do things might work in a Disney movie, but the fact of the matter is, their methods don't turn sunny side up for them, unless the Big Man has a direct hand in it."

"Speaking of, I mean, I've lost track of angel resurrections at this point, but was he the one who brought you back?"

Gabriel smiled. "Who says I died?"

TO BE CONTINUED