A/N: First, I'd like to thank all of you for your reviews; you guys' genuine interest, questions, and suggestions really make me feel appreciated (especially when real life is less than delightful, as it has been lately). Second, I apologize for the lateness – classes for spring term just started. Enjoy the chapter!

Disclaimer: Supernatural belongs to Kripke but these versions of Gabriel, Belial, and Ramiel belong to me

In studying the beasts of the Earth and the fish of the sea, the fowl of the air and the vegetation of the land, it was always interesting to note how power structures formed, how one specific individual or entity established dominance over the others of its kind, and how such power and authority was maintained. The branching fibrous limbs of underground roots battled against the worm and other tubers; the minnow got eaten by the small fish that in turn got eaten by the dolphin but c'est la vi, such was the natural order of the living and it didn't take some fancy French idiom to figure out.

If the topic of discussion so happened to turn toward animals, things tended to get a bit more complicated. Typically, common knowledge supplied the basic, rudimentary facts of larger males dominating the female species of their kind and both dominating the juveniles, or at least until age started affecting capability. However, upon closer examination, those in the field of sociobiology would point out the variations in hierarchal systems in regards to despotic or linear orders, taking into account all the subtleties of evolution, patterns in food and mating opportunities, and the ever-puzzling presence of altruism in these seemingly mindless and reasonless creatures of the field.

But with humans? Oh mankind, with their egotistical arrogance in lording over all the other species placed upon God's green Earth and their need to be different from the rest; their self-absorbed me, me, me! complex that demanded to be remarkable, set apart, and oh so special – much like that one particular person who always needed to be at the center of attention at all times, lest he or she spontaneously combust (although everyone else probably would've much rather preferred that to the incessant yammering). No wonder the Lord's favored children couldn't be satisfied with simply submitting to the one among them who grunted the loudest and successfully smashed his club at the heads of his challengers. Oh no, they had to get all fancy schmancy, first with their cuneiform and pictographs, which quickly evolved into Merriman-Webster dictionaries (over a couple thousand years, obviously) and their wonderfully intricate and endlessly frustrating intellectual phenomenon of speech and rhetoric.

Not to say that whoever got the last laugh or spoke the most eloquently always won; there wasn't much talk could do when faced with the sharpened edge of a steel blade or the nice, shiny barrel of a gun – ask Julius Caesar or Gandhi. But as ridiculous and cliché as it may seem, one half of Shakespeare's disastrous star-crossed lovers was quite correct in the timeless musing of what's in a name? As discovered over the centuries by the Jewish people who would never speak the forbidden name of YAHWEH aloud, by the ancient Egyptians who believed that knowledge of a spirit's identity gave one complete power over that deity, and by Rumpelstiltskin and that poor stupid miller's daughter – there was power in a name, the power to identify and relate, to demean and honor, the power to strip away all that someone ever was or would ever be, and the power to restore to life a past long forgotten and half-dead.

For example: the name David.

It was a grand epithet with gallant connotations and references, Hebrew in origin and embodied one of the most famous and extraordinary personalities in all of history; the musician who became soldier, husband, king, psalmist and beloved of the Lord, a man whom God described as seeking out after His own heart. The greatest ruler Israel had ever seen, David slew thousands of his enemies and composed more than half of the psalms in the Jewish tradition; it was from his lineage that Christ the Messiah descended, and the Qu'ran depicted him as being an iconic, holy warrior. And without question, if the Creator of every single creature that drew breath singled you out in such a way, surely you were something special, a marvel to behold.

He chuckled grimly, tipping the bottle back to let the last of the now-warm amber liquid slide down the back of his throat, barely grimacing when it hit his empty stomach. Bloodshot grey eyes squinted through the darkness at the diploma displayed upon the wall, at the copperplate script that dictated David Alexander Owens as a graduate of Harvard University, then skirted over a similar framed piece of paper from Oxford University and the man snorted mirthlessly, lightly tossing the empty beer bottle from hand to hand. "Beloved, mankind's warrior, and noble birth", huh? What a shitty joke.

The single grade, light blue moiré silk neckband and the connected plate of thinly crafted metal lay innocently on the floor several feet away and he glared at the offending item as if it was the cause of his parents' inability to see into the future, to see what a failure their son turned out to be; an idiotic, fucked up mess of a – no, David decided, he was less than a man and if the recently deceased Mr. and Mrs. Owens had been able to predict that, they would've definitely decided against conceiving and raising such a brainless waste of space, a soulless monster, a godforsaken murderer-

-there was sand everywhere; in his boots no matter how tightly he laced them up, in his eyes no matter how many times he tried to blink the rough granules away; it was under his skin like a parasite, eating away his very sanity and all those years of education paid in full by scholarships, corroding his mind and good sense. But out here there was no such thing as good sense; there was only survival and the M-16 rifle he held in his hands, salvation in the form of lightweight steel, aluminum, and the bullets it spat out like fire and lightening because it was either you or them, and he sure as hell wasn't going to go down without a fight.

He was here for honor and for country, for the sake of those who had already fallen and simply because it was just the right thing to do. And so he fired upon command, spraying into the ramshackle building without discretion or consideration. Taking orders from the higher authority was all that was required, even for a higher-leveled officer like him; superiors were superiors after all and this time, the order had been to clean up and wipe out the insurgents hiding away in the structure that was at the present moment being reduced to little more than a pile of rubble and mortar, to head in with full force and then to recover the weapons stocked within.

There were no weapons. There were no insurgents.

No, he wanted to scream as he dropped to his knees, rifle falling from his slack hands as he gazed in horror as the bodies of the unarmed, defenseless women and children inside the apartment complex, riddled with bullet holes and leaking red away into the dust and the sand. NO!!!

His frantic gaze turned behind him but the rest of his company had abruptly disappeared, and there was nothing here but the young girl who couldn't have been more than seventeen, clinging to her month old child in her final moments, brown eyes staring straight into him and stripping past the interceptor body armor, past the bulletproof vest and into his soul. She opened her mouth and blood bubbled out past her lips; the tears cut tracks through the grime on his face as he knelt beside her, hands outstretched to take the sobbing child she was trying to hand to him, a victim relinquishing her greatest treasure to her slaughterer.

But the child was no longer there; it was a strip of blue ribbon and horror formed a cold knot in his chest as the girl began to speak: "David Alexander Owens, to whom I am proud to award the Medal of Honor-"

David woke with a scream lodged in his throat. Oh God…oh shit…oh fucking hell… He hunched forward, face in his hands and shoulders shaking with near-hysterical sobs, blasphemy and prayer running together as one and on repeat through his mind. Oh God, please…please…

Son of Adam. Child of the Most High, do not be afraid. David Alexander Owens, heed my voice.

When the Voice hit his eardrums then (because what reverberated through the air could only be described with a capital 'v'), he jumped and fell out of the chair, gracelessly crashing to the floor, hard, and he raised his head, lifting a tearstained face. He listened. And before giving an answer of any sort, he asked but one question: "Who are you?"

The reply was world-weary, ringing with a great force that any other time would have registered as awe-inspiring and magnificent, but now filled with loss and remorse, with exhaustion and sorrow. David knew that tone, he'd spoken with that voice and although he never professed to be particularly empathetic, he knew raw pain and grief when he heard it, knew the familiar notes of self-loathing and regret. Here he was being offered a second chance by this creature of flaming ice and frosty flame, a stab at redemption and atonement for the sins of his past– but he knew he wasn't the only one who sought absolution.

My name is Gabriel.

And so he said yes.

Six months later

"C'mon, man. Pick up. Pick up!"

The human brain was a mysterious infrastructure, connected and functional through a million tiny networks of spiderwebbed, interlocking neurons; so very much like the wires holding together the inner workings of a machine – dendrites meeting axon terminal buttons and twisting together positive-positive and negative-negative stripped wires, neurotransmitters leaping across the chasm of the synaptic cleft, vesicle by vesicle; information downloaded itself through sparking circuits, bit by bit to flip the switch that brought the CPU whirring to life, that signified the exact moment when the prodigy cast an eye at the quandary and just simply knew the solution.

"Goddamn it, Dean!"

The mind as a computer analogy was doubtless a long debated theory full of controversy and passionate, vehement backers on either side of the argument, but it was true that some parts of it proved incontrovertible. Although it didn't work in digital senses like the step-by-step logistics of an inanimate creature of wires and microchips, the mind was perfectly capable of consciously organizing itself, could file data into schemas and utilize these tendencies to piece together fragments of a whole, to compartmentalize, and to produce moments of pure genius or stunning brilliance in creativity.

Maybe he's stuck in traffic.

Sam had never claimed to be a genius, but while he knew the truths of the impossible and what men of science and great intellect claimed to be nonexistent, still, the younger Winchester more often than not went with reason and sided with good sense. He always carefully separated interfering emotions from cases, packing childish hopes and wishes away from the reality of his life, trading in irrationality for calm and almost mechanical practicality (except for the whole listening to Ruby thing. That had been a major systems failure and crash of both common sense and good judgement).

His pacing footsteps sounded out loudly in the stillness of the room. Since the whole fiasco with shooting a man dead right in front of a frightened little girl and leaving said frightened little girl with the people up at the receptionist's desk, there'd been an awful lot of just that, silence. No singing coming from next door, none of Dean's tense outbursts or griping complaints since his brother had left close to eleven freakin' hours ago, no roar of a familiar engine pulling back into the parking lot; only the maelstrom of wild ideas and absurd notions ripping up a path of haphazard destruction through his mind.

Maybe we hit the wrong psych ward? No, the demon was wearing that uniform and I doubt that demons are hanging out in mental asylums just for kicks and giggles. His fingers gripped the cell phone again, thumb hovering over the button numbered 1. Maybe they'd moved Cas and Dean's gone after them on the trail himself? But he would've called. Sam Winchester's mind was, at the moment, a tempest cyclone of groundless concerns tearing through the carefully separated, post-it marked compartments of his thought processes and scattering everything about because he was just about at the end of his freakin' rope.

He'll be back. Soon. He took a seat by the window, folding his hands atop the table and tried to take a deep breath. Dean always comes back. He's not like…not like Dad. The thought was a knife to the gut and Sam's brow furrowed; he tapped his foot impatiently against the floor. It wasn't like this was the first time he'd been left alone in a motel room before; there had been plenty of times when Dean decided to show some random girl a good time when Dad had been away – but he always returned. Whenever Sam woke up in the morning from where he'd fallen asleep over a textbook, he'd always see his elder brother rummaging around for something to eat, grumbling about Sam being such a girl and needing beauty sleep. So why was it so different this time around?

Probably because right now, things had changed and the problem was now fifty, five hundred, five thousand times worse. The equation was now minus one John Winchester, plus Lucifer and Michael and the friggin' Apocalypse, with angels and demons multiplying out of thin air. Oh wait, that's right – minus God and Cas, too. So what did that all equal out to be? A shitload of a mess so screwed up that it made the lives of the dysfunctional Winchester family look like the Cleavers, a vicious match of hide and seek that would certainly be played in all fun and games to the bitter, bitter end, no matter who got hurt.

What if it was a trap by the angels all along, capturing Castiel and then using him to lure Dean in? His gut twisted in terror at the thought, because truly, that was not at all unlike what those heartless dicks would actually do. His feet apparently had a mind of their own because next thing Sam knew, he was pacing again, trying to let his steps catch up to his frantic brain. Don't be stupid. The angels have no idea where we are and they have no idea where Cas is, either. And that's because Lucifer has him. Not helping. Now he was actually biting at his nails and if Dean was here, he would've undoubtedly been- Oh, SHIT. What if the son of a bitch has Dean, too?

And screw the man who'd encouraged people in such situations to just tie a knot at the end of their ropes and hang on, FDR grew up privileged and never saw a "day of infamy" like each one during the complete and final destruction of the world, where if he woke up each day to the sunrise instead of a blood-soaked sky, Sam counted it as a victory. The inspirational quote pasted on the covers of journals and slapped on the surfaces of magnets sold at Hallmark never said anything about angels and demons, never mentioned anything about a moronic older brother who thought it was perfectly okay to go off for a day straight into the heart of the jungle's darkness without calling or anything, leaving Sam here to pace a tread pattern into the floor as his brain spouted off all the horrific reasons why numbered one through a thousand and beyond.

Yeah, the younger Winchester had seen Dean die that many times before (stupid Mystery Spot). And yes, he'd seen his brother stay dead before too. So envisioning Dean getting tackled by a crazy patient and having to go to the hospital or Dean getting distracted by the Impala's tape deck getting jammed and letting the car careen off the edge of an unfinished section of the interstate or stopping for a bite to eat and choking to death on a piece of pie was certainly not the product of an overactive imagination, excuse you.

This is ridiculous. Sam willed his feet still and dropped into a chair, staring dolefully at a dark ugly patch on the carpeted floor where someone had once dropped their espresso and clearly, the maids had stopped trying to scrub out the remnants a long time ago. Just…stay calm. You're bored, that's all. His foot tapped, his left eye twitched; his fingers drummed on the table, itching to just do something, anything, to still his racing thoughts. What exactly did he used to do whenever Dean just upped and disappeared all those years ago?

Flashing back to his pubescent years wasn't a pleasant experience; it never really was (even those who returned to their high school reunions sporting lines on their faces instead of acne and having packed on more than a couple pounds shuddered at the prospect of returning to the so-called "best years" of their lives), and Sam grimaced at the memories of one too many nights spent alone in an otherwise empty room, vehemently promising that when he grew up, things weren't going to be this way anymore. He would leave the "family business" as soon as he could, getting away from a father who never seemed to care and a brother who blindly followed everything he was told; he had a mind of his own, he used to tell himself as he tried to ignore the deep-seated ache of loneliness in his chest, instead filling the gap with schoolwork and research on how much Stanford cost again, and how high one needed to score on the LSATs–

Some things never change, the younger Winchester smirked mirthlessly, fingers having finally found a path in reaching for the volume entitled Enochian: The Language of the Messengers of God – according to Dr. John Dee, although he'd already memorized and tried a lot of the numerous invocations included within – the ones that were comprehensible, anyway. There was no accusation or loathing in the deliberation, Sam decided as he absent-mindedly flipped through the yellowed, brittle pages, only a certain degree of irony. For better or worse, even though they had agreed to starting over, many of the inner workings of the two Winchester boys working together as a team remained the same, and some parts of that were perfectly fine. Dean would always pick the motels and the music (and scissors, for that matter), Sam knew he would always delve more into the research than his brother (sometimes he really hated his work ethic), Dean would be content in clogging his arteries with greasy diner food while the younger Winchester would attempt to balance out a bit of his diet with fruits and vegetables, and all of that was okay.

Dean was a good man (Sam didn't care what anyone else said whether they be demon, angel, or flying cow) and Sam loved his older brother but at times, the elder Winchester could really be a dick. He wouldn't take orders from anyone except their father (and given that John Winchester was dead, that pretty much meant then that Dean didn't give a shit about any figure of authority), he was occasionally idiotic to the point of making Sam want to tear his hair out in frustration, unbelievably tactless upon occasion and every so often, just plain mean.

Like the present moment, which was definitely not okay in Sam's book. Dean was inconsiderate and selfish to leave him hanging like this and not knowing heads nor tails of the situation, Dean was being a reckless ass by not even calling or sending an update through a text, Dean was…

Dean was in the parking lot, sitting on the hood of the Impala with his back turned toward their room and eyes fixed up toward the sky.

Stupid- Sam bit his cheek hard, rising stiffly to his feet as the concern and anxiety rushing through his brain slimmed down into a thin streak of muted anger. Case in point, he groused mentally as he reached for his jacket, for who knew how long Dean had been there, sitting in the chilly twilight air and staring at the blend of reddish oranges gradually fading into hues of magenta and indigo. What the hell is he doing? He wondered angrily, sticking one arm in its appropriate sleeve, gaze still trained on his brother.

The elder Winchester slowly alighted the Impala and threw his arms out to the side as soon as the soles of his feet touched the ground, tossing his head back and hollering something full-throated up at the sky before reaching for something still resting on the hood of the car; Sam saw a glint of metal and-

SHIT!

"DEAN!!" Sam was sure he'd never run so fast in his life, muscles all cramping and spazzing out all at once as his long legs ate the distance from the interior of the room to where Dean stood pointing the muzzle of the beautiful silver Desert Eagle at his temple, but still even that wasn't fast enough. "NO!"

The bullet exited its chamber at 1200 miles per second and the 'crack' of the mini sonic boom echoed in the parking lot – or maybe that was just the sound of Sam's heart splitting in two.

Tiny wisps of grass swayed slightly in the wind, gentle movement starting in waves from the top of the mountain and all the way down its slope in a manner that made it seem as if it would only be appropriate if Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata or some other elegant, lilting waltzing tune was playing in the background. The air at the foothills of the Swiss Alps was crisp and cold and the last breath of fall; the scenic view was beautiful, a picture off the covers of the boxes of those five hundred jigsaw puzzles, the ones with pieces smaller than a grown man's thumb that only enthusiasts or people with too much time on their hands and infinite patience sat down to put together.

There was an addition to the backdrop of the mountains though, snow-capped even at this time of the year: a shadowed figure of a girl kneeling in the midst of the curve of the meadow. The knees of her white stockings and shirt were smudged over with dirt, indicating the vast amount of time that must've passed since she first assumed the position that typically indicated a level of submission or reverence.

Or mind-numbing, petrified fear.

"I'm sorry," came the slow, halting whisper. The words dropped like sharply bitten off pieces of glass, cutting the inside of her mouth and slipping out like streams of crimson to match the dried rust-colored blood already caking her ears and cheeks. Clearly, this was an individual who was unfamiliar with the concept of apologizing or the expression of any form of regret; after all, it wasn't like she had ever had to answer to anyone before – and yet these had been the only two words the girl had spoken since arriving upon this location more than several hours earlier.

Finally, the figure before whom she knelt and paid homage to stirred, standing slowly with a languid stretching motion. "Please," Meg said very softly when the other turned his back upon her, but a hand lifted, wordlessly commanding a break or perhaps a discontinuation of the one-sided conversation and bringing with it such a wave of power that the demon flinched and fell silent.

The man then reached outwards, whorls and swirls of his fingers coming to rest against a bud, stroking the unopened flower gently, as if coaxing it into bloom. In answer, the lilac petals unfolded one by one to form a cup-shaped blossom tapering down into a narrow tube; its grass-like petals wrapped around the man's hand, drawn inexplicably to his touch. "So you've failed."

It was but a quiet murmur, but Meg's head snapped upwards as if she'd been slapped in the face. "I did EVERYTHING you taught me, exactly how you taught me!" Slowly, very slowly the other turned, a graceful one hundred eighty degree rotation and the girl shrank backwards, head bowing once again, cowed. "…Father."

Lucifer crooked a finger under the demon's chin and looked into her face, at the dark empty sockets still oozing blood, at the extensive bruising that indicated the rupture of countless blood vessels beneath the surface of the skin and a corner of his lips twitched in what might have been a smirk. "I see." Without any roughness and in a way that could be considered kind, the Morning Star swiped a finger through the streaks of red interestedly, as if contemplating the mysteries of the pulmonary system and the fragile composition of humans. "Apparently young Castiel still managed to get the better of you, my child."

This brother of his was certainly a wonder to be hold, the tenacious little spirit. A most interesting new development, Lucifer mused, thinking upon the whispers he'd been hearing from the others of his kin who were too distracted to bother with ensuring that their voices remained inaudible to the Morning Star. Truly, it took a great amount of skill to hide from the Host – and yet Castiel did so most admirably; yes, Lucifer was confident the other would do very well under his command. If only there were more like you, my brother.

From the very moment the Son of Perdition reached through time and the veil of the Shadow to draw together the remnants of Castiel's soul from the black chasm of oblivion, the first flare of awareness had cried out for life and practically fought its way back out of the well of dark stillness, reaching out for Gabriel and Dean and Father. He had felt everlasting hope bursting forth out of the realm of Death, faith rising from the ashes – and while other members of the Host might have seen Castiel as nothing but a defiant nuisance, the strength of the lesser angel's will was amazing indeed, able to kindle the memory of the long forgotten vestiges of deadened feeling in Lucifer's blazing consciousness.

And now, the determinedly flaming orb of the angel's dampened grace had proved itself fierce enough to strike outwards through and past the blanket of emptiness of that which made all humans so depraved –the forced separation of sin – and merely as an involuntary reaction, to boot. Lucifer was, to say the least, most pleased. "Well, he seems to be more resilient than most," the Devil murmured, cradling the girl's face in his hands and wiping the pads of both thumbs over the hollow sockets, rubbing blood back into the empty holes. Almost like… what was it that the woman read to her son? Ah yes, 'the little engine that could'. The thought of young Castiel's soul chanting "I think I can, I think I can" brought a wry smile to Lucifer's lips. Of course, Job initially resolved to remain faithful, as well.

Meg whimpered slightly, squirming in the Devil's hold. As much as she hated to admit it, the last encounter with the angel had her scared and slightly apprehensive at the prospect of potentially going back for more. The party girl had just gotten busted by the cops, the moth had danced too close to the flame and thanks to the damn angel, now she had no fucking eyes.

"We'll just have to fix that, then," Lucifer said as if he'd heard and he pulled his hands away. Meg gasped up worshipfully at her lord and master, eyes fully restored – pupil, cornea, iris, sclera, vitreous fluid and all, gaping in wide-mouthed wonder. Was it any wonder that she loved her father? Girl, we are back in business.

Lucifer smiled benevolently. "Open Castiel's eyes to the truth, hmm?"

It was a firm instruction, a command that left no room for argument and Meg was all too happy to comply with the underlying insinuation. Look out, pretty boy angel. She was going to make the feathered bastard eat every single one of the screams he'd made her utter, even if she had to reach down his throat and rip them out herself.

"Many of them said, 'He is raving mad.' But others asked, 'Can a demon open the eyes of the blind?'"

Bit by infinitesimal bit, he could feel the darkness leaking away from his soul, stains fading away from where they lathered the multi-dimensional layers of his grace and Castiel's fingers twisted in the folds of his brother's robe; he unashamedly buried his face in Gabriel's chest as the archangel's skilled and healing touch smoothed over every burn, every askew feather, every dark blemish. Gabriel's only response was to envelope the both of them even tighter with his magnificent wings and to press one comforting hand against the back of his little brother's head, grace pulsing like a steady, reassuring beat against the lesser angel's soul.

He sat facing the juncture of two walls, knees drawn up tightly to his chest, back stiffly rounded so that his unfettered, torn wings were able to fall limply behind his curled form; he rocked back and forth slowly, in time with the pounding of blood as it rushed through his ears, trying to ride out the strands of agony that twined around each appendage and twisted into a singular, tight coil and his arms were wrapped tightly around his thin torso, a terrible substitute for the warmth and comfort of a true embrace.

The poison of Belial's touch seeped out like venom from a wound but as it did so, instead of relief and comfort, Castiel felt uncertainty and disquietude taking its place – and more than that, an overwhelming fear so terrible that it made his grace twist into an anxious gnarl. "Gabriel-"

"Peace, Castiel." Gabriel's words were quiet as he passed a hand over the largest slash in the other's wing, where the demon's fingers had burned away the feathers like a corrosive grappling hook. "Be not afraid. The servant of darkness shalt not have thee." The archangel's grace flared in righteous fury for but a moment, a swirl of pure holiness and dreadful, glorious might at the mere mention of the fallen one, but subsided the next. "I am here, young one."

But that was exactly what struck at the lesser angel's core; yes, his brother was here – but would Gabriel always be here? The circumstances surrounding Ramiel's assault and the subsequent events had been deemed by all of Heaven's superiors as a severe attack against the Host by Belial, Second Prince to the realm of unrighteousness and evil; therefore there was no reason for the archangel to feel disgust or vexation toward him. But Castiel wondered, if there would ever come the time when Gabriel would turn his back upon his useless little brother, spurn him and forsake him, if there existed the possibility of becoming stained with so much iniquity and wickedness that even the Herald archangel of the Lord could not wipe away.

Would the elder brother he so loved ever abandon him?

A dry sob broke its way out of his mouth, past chapped lips and amidst the shuddering breaths he took, each more painful and laborious than the last. No one heard, for no one thought the man sitting in his room and facing the corner to be of any importance. And that was just as well, for who would care to spare him a thought now? Weak and hopeless, broken with no means of putting himself back together – he was just as useless to himself as he was to those he had been assigned to safeguard and protect. There was no one here. Not anymore.

He'd pressed his ear to the ground and could not find the heartbeat of the Earth; he could no longer hear the song of the Host or feel even his own grace. He could not remember the last time he had seen his charge, but he could remember when he last saw his brother – through the threads that wove together the shroud of everlasting death.

"Forgive me," Castiel whispered, a mere flutter of his soul. "I have sinned. This- this was His judgment." He struggled to confess, for in truth, he knew not what he had done to deserve this. "I have…I have committed an offense against our Father and this was my punishment-"

Gabriel went still. "Thou believest that the ever-loving Almighty would deliver ye into the hands of sinful perversion and unholy lust for the sake of judgment?" Castiel could speak no more as he felt his brother's hands cupping the sides of his face and lifting his head; his gaze met a questioning silver one, filled with astonishment and concern. For a moment the lesser angel marveled at the difference between Belial's filthy grasp that sought to wreak havoc and destroy and Gabriel's kindness that was so great that he wanted to weep. "Thou has done naught requiring pardon."

He rocked even harder, mind clear for the first time in weeks. I cry out to you O God, but you do not answer. A shudder passed through his body, strong and wild, and had this been a year ago, he would have found himself mystified by the simultaneous and conflicting strength and fragility of the human body. As an angel, there hadn't been the ability to crave the consoling touch of another in the raw, frenzy, desperate way humans could; the deluge of emotions and even being able to distinguish pain had always been one of the factors that both baffled and fascinated him back then. As it turned out, actually being human was what made all the difference.

Now he knew the true punishment impressed upon Man; he knew the anguish of Jeremiah because of a Lord who asked for too much, the indecision of Gideon due to a waning faith, the doubts of Moses against the Sovereign whose yoke was too heavy and had naught but crumbling pillars of support. But most of all, he now knew the bitterness and rage of Job, a servant used and wounded, afflicted and tormented until he wished for Death itself.

"I must have-"

"Castiel," the archangel broke in firmly, but not without compassion. "Our Father is just and merciful; He delivers judgment where it is due. And thou art blameless."

"But then why…I do not understand..."

His fingers slowly unclenched from around the item he clutched in his fist, half afraid that if he loosened his grasp, it would disappear just like so many other false images dancing in and out of his line of vision and frame of consciousness. He didn't understand by what means Dean's amulet had found its way here, but as he tried to focus in upon the beating of his human heart, the whirling of mass confusion inside his mind, and the roaring ache of everything within his battered frame, he was certain he remembered a comforting hand soothing away the nightmares and chasing away the pain, and a voice rough with emotion but genuine and kind speaking reassurance-

"Have faith," Gabriel whispered. "The Lord shalt always guide thee, Castiel. Nothing shalt ever distance ye from the grace of our Father..." His voice dropped low, going far gentler than Castiel had ever heard before. "Nor from my love, my little brother."

Castiel, the voice had said, Cas. Cloudy blue eyes stared down at the gold amulet, before he ducked his head, pressing his forehead against his knees as he exhaled slowly, bringing the talisman close to his heart. And as he drifted into a dreamless sleep, Castiel hoped, wished, and prayed with all his might that when he awoke, he would once again have his faith, his charge's trust, his Father's favor, and his brother's love.

Momentum brought Sam slamming his brother into the ground with all the force of a charging bull, although the gunshot from moments prior made it clear that at this moment, he was lying sprawled over a mere corpse. Why would Dean commit suicide, why here and why now, why would he waste everything Cas has done for him, why Dean, why, why, WHY- The grief building in his chest and the storm within his mind created a muted effect, numbing the younger Winchester to everything around him, so much so that it took him a while to notice and register the fist pounding at his chest.

"SAM! You weigh more than a- dude, off, off! Sammy, get the HELL off of me right the fuck now or I swear I'll…"

Sammy. The hunter blinked. No one ever called him that except for his father (whom he knew to be dead) and – "Dean?"

He couldn't believe it. There was no way, he'd seen his brother's finger squeeze the trigger, there was just no way at all... But as Sam hastened to do what the wheezy voice had commanded and fell back on his ass to see Dean sitting up, a bit out of breath but otherwise perfectly fine and still with all the pieces of his skull intact, his gaze swung around to the gun lying on the pavement a couple of feet away, brain heedlessly barreling down the stretch of highway entitled 'what the HELL; there's got to be a logical explanation for this'.There was still smoke rising from the barrel. How in God's name-

"The act of intentional self-harm is a sin, Dean Winchester." Both hunters were on their feet and whirling around toward the speaker in less than an instant, the elder wearing a surly smirk of grim satisfaction and the younger staring in baffled speechlessness at the sight of the messenger archangel of the Lord who stood not more than ten feet away. "And had you succeeded in killing yourself," Gabriel intoned emotionlessly, crushing the bullet cartridge he'd obviously swiped between two fingers into dust, "it would not be difficult to bring you back."

Dean was standing toe to toe, nose to nose with the other in two seconds flat, and who cared about his previous edict on personal space; he was so close that he could smell the strangeness of ozone and what seemed to be static electricity and something far more powerful, so close he could see his own reflection in the grey eyes stupid feathered bastard's new vessel. "Knew that would get you to show your face, you son of a bitch."

Okay, so that was a bit of a lie because the elder Winchester really hadn't known that hollering Come and get me, you fucking cowards at the top of his lungs at the sky would really achieve any results; the whole blowing his brains out thing had been kind of a spontaneous decision too. But none of that mattered right now because the archangel was here, and Dean wasn't going to let him go until he'd used up every single breath that he'd held inside until he thought he would explode as he knelt inside an angel's torture cell of a room, used up every gulp of air in screaming at the heartless dick who once identified himself as Castiel's older brother.

Because Dean had to believe that this cold, calculating soldier still cared enough for his little brother to help them, to help Cas. Because deep down, he knew that this was their only hope.

"Where the FUCK do you get off being so high and mighty, you son of a-"

His brain had finished cycling through its mass panic and near-nervous breakdown about Dean committing suicide, leaving Sam feeling honestly dizzy – but that didn't mean that his mind wasn't still running high and at optimal speed. As Dean started ranting and raving like a raging lunatic, the younger Winchester's attention was focused elsewhere, and for good reason, too. His brother might have been running on nothing but emotions and what sounded like the scrape of raw hurt in his voice, but Sam found himself taking in Gabriel's rumpled, bedraggled vessel and the dark bags underneath the eyes that held weariness, despite being twin shards of diamond on the exterior, found himself noting the archangel's uncharacteristically slumped posture and the interesting fun fact of how Gabriel no longer sounded like a King James version of the Holy Bible-

"-listening to Cas begging for you and your worthless ass, you shitty excuse of a brother-" To Dean though, Gabriel's face was an impassive mask and he simply stood there without interruption and as he paused to take a breath, the elder Winchester noticed the lack of a response, of any response and growled, literally growled. "Are you even listening?!"

"I have heard what you have to say."

Silence for a moment, and Sam winced when Dean flared up again, unrelenting and sharp as a knife, but with a definite note of crazed desperation that would've driven even the most heartless sociopath to pity. "And?!"

"And unless you have decided to acquiesce to Michael, I have no further business here."

For the second time in so short a time span, Sam thanked his lucky stars (he wasn't quite sure if he should be thanking the Big Man upstairs anymore; word was that God had already left the building) for his speed; he grabbed his brother just in time to prevent Dean from shattering his fist on an archangel's face and spoke – more like yelled as he tried to make himself heard over Dean's profanity, struggling to make his tone neutral – "Aren't you going to do anything to help Cas?"

Gabriel was unflappable and imperturbable, reply polished and ready. "Castiel has chosen his own path, and it is one that has taken him away from the righteousness of Heaven." A little too ready. "Any ill that befalls him is none of my concern."

He knew a mechanical answer when he heard one, knew the sound of a reply practiced over and over until it rolled off the tongue like a fact of life or convincing argument of which the speaker was trying to convince himself. There was no venom or real conviction behind the words and so Sam tried again, pressing a little harder because he knew Gabriel was holding back. He didn't know how he knew the archangel was struggling to utter the cruel, unfeeling words that sounded more along the lines of something that would've been prattled off by someone like Zachariah. "But he's your brother."

"As was Lucifer, once."

At this, Sam's ire rose for reasons that remained somewhat unclear – maybe it was because he was getting sick and tired of the obvious bullshit or maybe it was because he himself had encountered the two beings in question himself, one who was the embodiment of pure evil and the other, the closest example of what an angel of the Lord was supposed to be: merciful and forgiving (The Lord forgives you for what you have done, Samuel Winchester…as do I). "You're wrong." It was too close to hearing his own brother's voice ringing out as Dean called him a monster and so now it was his turn to spit: "Cas is nothing like Lucifer."

"Both traitors made their choice. Castiel has made the choice to follow Man." For the first time then, Gabriel's voice became a knot of velvet anger, seeping through with bitterness and anguish in one short, sharp hiss; his features creased in sorrow so fleeting that Sam nearly missed it. "And see what has become of such a choice." One millisecond and a deep breath later, the Herald archangel drew himself up haughtily, surveying the Winchesters with cold contempt. "This trial is meant for Castiel alone and I will not interfere."

Oh, HELL no. Dean swung blindly, literally choking on his anger because he did not see Castiel reduced to little more than some freakin' broken doll for Meg to play Saw or Operation or Crazy Psycho Nurse with; he did not just spend five hours on his knees at Cas's bedside, promising the angel that everything was going to be alright as he listened to the other literally sobbing and pleading an unknown entity for absent Father and complete dickhead of a brother; he did not just almost blow his brains out for nothing-

"Gabriel!" he hollered, but to no avail.

The archangel was gone, his final statement hanging in the still air like the jangling of thirty pieces of silver.

A/N: Well, I apologize for the slower pace of this chapter, but things will definitely pick up speed in the coming chapters. Gabriel's back though! Although I gather it's not exactly the reappearance everyone's been waiting for… don't kill me, please! But I'd be delighted with a review!

No translations this time around, but the verse used was from John 10: 20-22.